Sherlock Fic: I Go to Prepare a Place for You (3/3)
Part One is here.
Part Two is here.
Mind the warnings.
Lestrade kept his eyes firmly on the leather straps as he fastened the last restraint around John’s left ankle. He stood and took stock of Mycroft’s position by the rack of tools and implements before leaning in toward John’s ear and speaking softly, “Remember what I said.”
John didn’t respond, but continued to stare straight ahead past the broad wooden X to which his limbs were strapped, to the door beyond. Lestrade stepped back and took up a position by the far wall, where he had a clear view of John’s bare body, but wouldn’t have to see his face.
Mycroft hefted a long, elegant paddle about the size of a cricket bat but thinner. His eyes skipped past Lestrade-observing him, but not inviting comment-and landed on John.
“Can you remind us, Dr. Watson, why you’ve been sentenced to this punishment?”
“You’re inexplicably fond of Chaucer.”
Mycroft struck fast, like a biting snake, swinging his arm out and landing the paddle directly across the thickest part of John’s arse.
John hadn’t seen the blow coming. To his credit, he tensed at the hit, but did not cry out.
“That’s not part of your punishment, John, just a reminder of how you should speak to me. Now. What is your sin?”
“I’m sure you could articulate it better than I, sir.”
“I’m sure I could. However, speaking it would teach me nothing. Gregory, perhaps you can assist him. You witnessed the transgression.” Mycroft turned to face Lestrade. John craned his neck in his restraints as well.
Nothing in Mycroft’s expression revealed his intentions. So, Lestrade was to try his hand at mind-reading then. Perfect. He walked up to John, around the front of the saltire cross, and put Mycroft’s sharp eyes firmly out of his mind. “You put your master in danger, John. That’s what he objects to.”
“Put him in danger? He was throwing books at a bloody wall! The wall can’t fight back.”
“But My-Lord Mycroft can. Lord Sherlock was deliberately provoking him.”
Mycroft stepped in close behind John and tucked a hand against the jut of his hip. Lestrade’s eyes snapped to that point of contact and stayed there. Mycroft leaned in close to John’s ear, just as Lestrade had done a moment before. “If he had spoken to another Lord that way, he would be facing a much worse punishment.”
“He isn’t facing any punishment, sir.”
“Isn’t he?” Mycroft asked mildly. “John, I worry about my brother. Constantly.”
“How very trying for you, sir.”
Lestrade watched Mycroft’s hand clench tightly against John’s hip. “Careful,” Mycroft admonished softly. “You could help me, you know. Bring me information about him: who he speaks to, what he observes. I have people watching him, of course, but I imagine you’d be able to supply more...intimate details.”
“Not interested.”
“Did you say no to me, slave?”
Lestrade kept his eyes focused on Mycroft’s hand wrapped around John’s hip. He didn’t want to see Mycroft’s face; hearing him speak like that to a fellow slave was surreal enough. Lestrade took two slow steps back. John noticed his move and looked up. When their eyes met, John saw something in Lestrade’s expression that made him frown.
“I asked you if you were certain of your choice before I allowed Sherlock to purchase your contract. Did you think he would be able to protect you?”
“It’s not his responsibility to protect me. It’s my...” John wet his lips with his tongue, then pressed them together in a grim line.
“It’s what, John?” Mycroft prompted.
“Those arrangements are between me and my master.”
“Hm. You’re very loyal very quickly. But John.” Mycroft leaned in closer, pressing his cheek to John’s. “You’d do well to remember that there are other brilliant minds in the Empire aside from Sherlock.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for those, sir.”
Mycroft backed away, releasing John from his grip, and Lestrade thought he saw Mycroft’s mouth turn up at the corners.
“Twenty strokes, John. You’ll keep count, yes?”
At the far end of the room, the door rattled, then swung open. All three men looked to the door.
Lord Sherlock slid a set of lock picks into the pocket of his finely tailored gray jacket. He strode into the room and pushed the door closed behind him. “Mycroft.”
Lestrade moved out of the way, stationing himself beside the wall, so as not to be noticed.
“Come to witness your slave’s disgrace, Sherlock?” Mycroft asked.
Sherlock prowled around John’s bound form, looking him over with almost clinical attention. “He doesn’t seem very disgraced. John, has he been mercilessly talking at you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“See there, Mycroft. There’s not much to witness.” Sherlock brought his inspection to a halt, standing mere inches from his brother.
“Not yet. We’ve not begun carrying out his punishment.” Mycroft lifted the paddle.
Sherlock’s eyes darted to John, where one reddened stripe marked Mycroft’s first blow, then back to Mycroft. “You’ve touched him.”
Lestrade tensed, poised to step in before he realized there was nothing he could do; his social betters wouldn’t take kindly at all to his interference.
“Meting out punishment is part of my duty,” Mycroft said. He twirled the paddle against the ground, an echo of a habitual gesture with his umbrella. “I don’t suppose you’d want to... Oh, likely you’re not interested.”
“Your games are childishly transparent, Mycroft.” Sherlock stayed where he was, unsettlingly close to Mycroft. “If you have something to ask me, do so.”
“It sounds as if you might be interested in administering John’s punishment yourself.”
“And if I were?”
“I’m not sure. Wouldn’t you be predisposed to be too lenient? He is your own property.” Mycroft moved to take a step toward John, but Sherlock blocked his way.
“I’m perfectly capable of administering discipline fairly.”
“You don’t have a winning track record on that front.”
“After we’ve finished, you may judge whether or not my methods meet your standards.”
“If they do not?”
“Then you may administer the same sentence to my person.”
Mycroft’s expression did not change appreciably, but Lestrade noted the slight straightening of his spine that meant he was very surprised indeed. Mycroft offered the paddle up, sitting flat against his palm like a ceremonial sword.
Sherlock grabbed it by the handle and hefted its weight. “John, I trust that my brother has already dispensed with the boring part of the punishment, enumerating your sins.”
“Yes.”
Sherlock traced a hand down John’s spine, chasing a rivulet of sweat. “John.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Were you polite to Mycroft when he questioned you?” When John didn’t immediately answer, Sherlock turned to Lestrade. “What would you say, Lestrade? Did he live up to the household’s standards of conduct?”
Lestrade shook his head slowly.
“Gregory,” Mycroft admonished. “We can’t hear you.”
“Not exactly, sir.”
“No, I thought not,” Sherlock said. “I’ve come to expect as much from John.” Sherlock dragged his hand down John’s chest and loosely cupped his cock. “Your behaviour is far from proper, wouldn’t you say, John?” Sherlock’s voice had dropped to an indecent register, almost a purr, and his hand continued to move on John, out of Lestrade’s field of vision. “Answer me.”
“Yes, sir,” John breathed. In mere seconds Sherlock had managed to do what Mycroft hadn’t: strip away the doctor’s careful composure.
“Good boy. Count for me.”
Sherlock swung gracefully, sending the paddle slamming against John’s arse as if it belonged there. When he drew back, Lestrade could plainly see the reddened outline the blow had left behind. Sherlock touched the very tips of his fingers to John’s skin. Lestrade recognized the look of dangerous fascination in his eyes: the desire to experiment in a new medium. He swung again.
John let out a gentle puff of breath as the paddle struck. Though Lestrade couldn’t see John’s face, he felt certain John wasn’t in distress. For one thing, he’d stopped pulling against the restraints as he had been when Mycroft questioned him. Now John seemed almost relaxed. His voice as he counted each stroke rang out strong and even. Sherlock, on the other hand, shone with a kind of fierce joy. Each blow rose and fell so gracefully that the paddle seemed an extension of his arm.
The two of them--master and slave--seemed to form one harmonious organism, like a mad machine that both dispensed and accepted punishment. Lestrade found himself mesmerized by the way they moved.
“Twenty,” John called out.
Lestrade dragged his eyes away from the pair and looked to his master. Mycroft was watching Lestrade with the blindingly neutral expression he wore when waiting for an important answer. He stood perfectly still, as if he’d been watching Lestrade for some time.
Discomfited, Lestrade looked away.
Sherlock reached around John with the paddle and used it to turn John’s face toward him. Sherlock kissed him once, firmly on the mouth. Then he stepped back and gestured grandly toward John with the paddle. “Satisfied?” Sherlock asked.
Mycroft prowled over to the cross and dragged a hand down John’s flank past the overlapping rows of reddening marks. Even from a distance, Lestrade could tell Sherlock hadn’t held back.
“I am, for the time being.” He traced a finger around the edge of John’s collar. “John, you’d do well to remember the whole of this lesson.”
“I’m sure he’ll remember the relevant parts,” Sherlock said.
Mycroft swept past Lestrade and out the door. As soon as he was gone, Sherlock stepped in close to John and began to whisper in his ear. He gripped John’s shoulder, the injured one. Only the soft, indistinct rumble of Sherlock’s voice reached Lestrade, but by the way John writhed in his bonds and groaned, he could imagine the words.
Lestrade quickly followed his master out of the workroom and found himself shutting the door quietly so as not to disturb them.
Mycroft stood halfway down the corridor, hands clasped behind his back, eyes focused on the window that looked out over the darkened gardens. He seemed so buoyant as to practically bounce on the balls of his feet. Lestrade approached him, but came to a careful stop a proper two paces behind.
“Would you like me to have the room set to rights, sir?”
“No. With any luck, they’ll be occupied a while. It’ll keep until morning.”
“Right.” Lestrade wanted to ask what Mycroft had intended to accomplish, but now was not the moment. Besides, he needed to time mull over his observations and come to some conclusions of his own.
Mycroft turned his head a fraction, and a weight seemed to settle upon him. “I’ve some business to attend to before I retire.”
Lestrade recognized the signals: business, before I retire. An offer to relieve Lestrade of tonight’s duties.
“I’ll pick up some papers and meet you in your office.” Lestrade made it a statement so that Mycroft would be less inclined to deny him. From what Anthea had said earlier, his master may have formed some erroneous assumptions that needed to be put to rights.
Mycroft was silent for a moment, and Lestrade readied a second attempt in case Mycroft did try to put him off. Then he said, “The bedroom. I can handle correspondence just as easily from there.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll attend you presently.”
--
“Well done, John.” The hot, low rumble of Sherlock’s voice next to his ear penetrated through John’s adrenaline haze. Sherlock’s grip tightened on his scarred shoulder. He tried to focus the awareness that seemed to be buzzing along his nerves. Sherlock’s thumb brushed against the tip of John’s cock. For an instant, John’s attention focused on that one point, and then it flooded over Sherlock’s touch, spreading across his skin and pooling in the hot lines where the paddle had left its mark. He craned his neck to the side, but he couldn’t see.
“Sherlock!” he called.
Immediately, a tall, lanky form moulded itself to John’s back, pushing his chest and limbs firmly against the wooden X. Sherlock’s left hand curled around his hip. Like Mycroft’s had. John squirmed, but Sherlock had him firmly pinned, and struggling only served to rub the raw skin on his reddened ass against the scratchy front of Sherlock’s trousers.
“He touched you,” Sherlock growled.
John nodded, then stilled when Sherlock pulled away, separating their bodies
“You let him touch you.”
John tugged once, hard, against the leather restraints that bound his wrists and ankles. “Bit tied up.”
Sherlock’s hand traced the line of John’s hip around and down to wrap his elegant fingers around John’s shaft. He gave it a firm squeeze, and John’s cock jumped in his grip. With his other hand, Sherlock delivered a harsh slap against John’s abused ass. “Have you conditioned yourself, somehow, to take pleasure in this sort of treatment? No. You like it when I touch you, but what Mycroft did failed to arouse you. Why, John?”
“Dunno,” John grunted. He steered his mind away from why, exactly, he enjoyed himself with this mad tyrant of a master. He’d been avoiding examining the subject for days, and had become quite adept at it. Using the little leverage he had in his restraints, he bucked up against Sherlock’s hand, seeking more friction.
“You did tell me the first night we were together that I had been the cause of your arousal, not the beating I delivered, nor the other slaves’ presence in the room. I thought you were employing petty flattery. Perhaps there was a degree of truth in your statement.” Sherlock formed a loose fist and stroked John’s length at a maddeningly slow pace.
“You find me physically attractive,” Sherlock continued. “But that in itself is not enough to overcome the humiliation you feel at your social station. What else, then? How do you make yourself endure, even enjoy our encounters?” Sherlock swung around the side of the cross to stand face to face with John, then grabbed hold of his cock again.
John’s lips parted as he tried to gulp in enough oxygen to fuel his reeling brain. “I have to,” he said.
“Always a soldier. But that’s not all of it, is it, John? You don’t just lie back and think of the Empire. I’ve never seen anyone act like you do when you’re with me. How are you doing it? How?” Sherlock tightened his grip on John. It should have hurt, but John’s body was already firing so many conflicting signals that the additional pressure just felt good.
“I’m not afraid of you,” he slurred.
“Is that the difference? Others have tried to please me out of fear of punishment, but not you. You may not fear me, but you do hate me, despite what you say. You hate what I represent. You chafe against any reminder of your slave status.” He slid a finger under John’s collar and tugged, cutting off the flow of air for a moment. “You defy me at every opportunity. You obstinately guard against surrendering anything beyond the bare minimum required for compliance.
“And yet.” He twisted his hand around the crown of John’s dick and wrung a soft moan out of him. “You give me this. How? Do you pretend I’m someone else? No, you already find me physically attractive. That’s not the problem. Perhaps you imagine you are someone else, someone who enjoys being a slave. No, you’d balk at putting yourself in such a role. What then?” His hand quickened, stroking John ruthlessly as John strained forward, then releasing him altogether. “Tell me,” he demanded.
John’s muscles had clenched tight, straining toward release. When Sherlock’s touch deserted him, he gasped at the near-pain of it. He opened his eyes to be greeted with the sight of Sherlock’s pale gaze, very close.
“Us,” John panted. “Us.”
“What are you saying?” Without breaking eye contact, Sherlock brushed his fingers along the underside of John’s cock, a maddeningly light touch.
“I imagine we’re different.”
“Different people, you mean?”
“No, no. Damn it.” John writhed in his bonds, but could find no relief.
“Tell me!”
“You’re you, and I’m me, but we’re partners. Equals. Together.”
“Together,” Sherlock said slowly.
John closed his eyes to avoid seeing the inevitable disdain in his master’s expression. “It’s just a fantasy.”
“Yes.” Sherlock’s hand tightened around John’s cock. “Yes, that’s it.”
Sherlock glided to his knees. Though the cross blocked John’s line of sight, he felt Sherlock settle his lips around John’s cock. John was so close to the edge already that when the hot mouth enveloped him all the way to the edge of where Sherlock’s fingers still clutched him, he lost control. He shouted a nonsensical progression of sounds, and his hips pumped forward desperately as Sherlock swallowed him down.
John slumped in his restraints, shaking. Sherlock leant his head forward against the crease of John’s thigh. They stayed like that for a minute or more as oxygen returned to John’s bloodstream.
As John’s heart rate evened out, his logic returned, and he realized what he’d said. He tried to formulate a strategy for denying the confessions Sherlock had wrung out of him with too-clever fingers. “Sherlock,” he said. His voice sounded wrecked.
Sherlock jerked away. He stumbled to his feet and took three steps backwards, away from John. With some distance between them, John could observe better. Sherlock’s face was very white. A wet spot was spreading on the front of his gray trousers. His eyes were fixed at the centre of John’s chest.
Sherlock’s lips parted, then drifted closed. “John,” he said. “The photograph. Those marks.” Then he turned and fled the room.
John stared after him, blinking. The door swung shut and clicked ominously. John tugged against the leather straps, but they didn’t give. In the silence of the empty room, he muttered, “Bollocks.”
--
Lestrade stopped briefly by the common room, where Sally assured him that all was running smoothly. Then he made a dash to his room to fetch the tablet with the day’s reports. When he at last met the door at Mycroft’s bedroom and stepped inside, he thought for a moment that his master had yet to arrive.
Then Lestrade caught sight of a glass of port held in an elegantly manicured hand extending past the wings of the armchair facing the fireplace.
Lestrade set his tablet down on the desk next to a pile of Mycroft’s correspondence, which seemed not to have been touched. He examined the tableau by the crackling fire, working out his best course of action. Mycroft had to know he was there, but he’d said nothing. Combined with the day’s earlier behaviour, the current silence sent alarm bells ringing in Lestrade’s head.
Lestrade divested himself efficiently, folded his clothes into a neat pile, and placed them out of the way. He fetched the silk pyjamas he kept here-he had an old flannel set in his room, but these were for Mycroft-and re-dressed himself. He pressed his fingers against the tag at the front of his collar to feel the etched initials of his master. After a moment, he stripped off his shirt, leaving his chest bare to the chilly air of the room. He didn’t expect to be cold long, in any case.
The hardwood floor felt chilly on the soles of his bare feet, but the thick rug by the fireplace felt invitingly soft. He stepped up to the side of Mycroft’s chair and held out his hand.
Mycroft looked up at him, considering. In the flickering shadows of the firelight, the weight of a hard day’s work showed clearly on him.
“Come to bed,” Lestrade said.
“There’s correspondence.”
“It will keep.”
“I’ve not finished my drink.”
Lestrade plucked the glass out of Mycroft’s hand and downed the port with a satisfied smile. Mycroft had begun to keep the Portuguese wine in his room since he’d seen Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade sipping some she’d got him last Boxing Day. He set the glass on the mantle and held out his hand to Mycroft again. “You didn’t want to drink, anyway. If you wanted to drink, you would have got brandy.”
A small smile crept onto Mycroft’s face. “Alright. I surrender.” He placed his hand in Lestrade’s and allowed himself to be pulled out of his chair and towards the bed.
Mycroft stood silently while Lestrade stripped off his jacket and draped it over the back of the nearest chair. Mycroft had his own valet, of course, but Lestrade had learned to take over these duties on occasion. He’d got tired of watching Mycroft stand stoic and impassive during his evening routine, keeping up his persona of Lord and master when he should have been preparing to rest. Now, Mycroft seemed to relax with every piece of his finely-tailored armour that Gregory removed.
After Gregory untied Mycroft’s tie and unbuttoned his vest and shirt with practised fingers, and had begun on his trousers, Mycroft let his eyes drift closed, and spoke. “You did very well tonight, Gregory.”
“I didn’t do anything.” Lestrade knelt down to remove Mycroft’s shoes, and set them aside.
“But you did. You helped John understand his role in all this: your advice, your reactions set the proper context for John’s experience.”
“Oh,” Lestrade said. He hadn’t thought of it quite that way. He wasn’t sure he liked the thought; it reminded him of putting a wild horse in with a tame one who could set a good example.
“It was well done,” Mycroft said, brushing his fingers against Lestrade’s temple.
“I wasn’t aware I was so crucial to the proceedings.” Lestrade gave Mycroft a gentle nudge toward the bed, and he sat obligingly so Lestrade could strip off his socks and trousers.
“You were absolutely crucial. I told you this morning.”
“Right,” Lestrade said. That’s not what he’d remembered from the conversation, but then again, he often found himself surprised after the fact at what a discussion with his master had actually been about.
Lestrade fetched Mycroft’s pyjamas from the cupboard and got him dressed while he mulled over Mycroft’s interpretation of the evening’s events. His master sat on the side of the bed, watching Lestrade go about the business of putting the room to rights, and finally switching off the bedside lamp, leaving only the dancing glow of the firelight. Mycroft pulled back the covers on the near side of the enormous bed, and reached out a hand to Lestrade.
Lestrade put his hand in Mycroft’s and allowed his master to pull him into bed. Mycroft tugged Lestrade in against him, with Mycroft’s broad chest pressed to Lestrade’s back, his arm wrapped tight around Lestrade’s waist, and an ankle hooked over his leg. The fire crackled in its grate. Lestrade felt warmth seeping into him, wearing away the day’s worries.
Mycroft leaned his forehead against Lestrade’s bare shoulder. “You’re quiet tonight.”
“I’m thinking.”
“Putting the pieces together.” Mycroft’s arms wrapped more tightly around Lestrade. “Alright. Tell me.”
Lestrade wasn’t certain he’d worked it all out, not yet, but he ought to make a start. “You made an excuse to punish John.”
“Yes.”
Lestrade paused a moment while his next thought solidified. “But you have no interest in disciplining other people’s slaves. You wouldn’t have gotten any pleasure out of beating John.”
“No.”
Another puzzle piece slotted into place. “You didn’t really expect him to pass on information about Lord Sherlock.”
“No.”
“So I thought it through backwards, assuming that you accomplished what you wanted, else you wouldn’t be so pleased.”
“Well observed.”
“You made an enemy of John, I think, but I’m not sure that was your aim.”
“A regrettable side effect.”
“You did inspire Sherlock to show some interest in his slave’s well-being.” Lestrade paused again, allowing his thoughts to settle. “Was it a test? To see if he would intervene on John’s behalf?”
Mycroft’s smile curved against Lestrade’s shoulder. “The Imperial Police Force lost a good thing in you, Gregory.”
Lestrade couldn’t prevent the tension that seized him at the mention of his former life. The memory of his disgrace should not have had the power to haunt him this way, he scolded himself. He took a deep breath and forced his body to relax, first his shoulders, his arms, then down and out, willing himself calm. In mere moments he was again lying pliant in Mycroft’s arms. He had no illusions, however, that his master had overlooked the lapse.
Lestrade cast about for a way to offer a distraction that would not seem desperate. Before he could make an attempt, Mycroft released him and rolled onto his back.
“It’s been a trying day, Gregory. Sleep now.”
--
“John? John.”
John pulled himself up through an achy haze to focus on the voice in front of him. A beautiful woman swam into view, her face scrunched into a frown.
“Can you hear me?” she asked.
“Yes.” He tried to reach out to her to determine if she was indeed real, but found his hand caught fast. He looked up to see leather bindings around his wrists that pinned him to a wooden X. The night’s events came back to him in a rush. “Damn.” He looked at the woman again, clad in striped pyjamas with a red silk robe over them, with her hair done in a neat ponytail. “Anthea?”
“The very same. Hold still. I’ll get your feet out, first.” She disappeared from John’s line of sight, but he felt her hands working at the bindings on his ankles. “Stand, come on,” she prompted.
It wasn’t until John got his feet under him that he realized the relief he felt in his shoulders, which had been taking more of his weight as he slumped. Another moment’s work and Anthea had unclasped the cuffs on his wrists. “You might want to-“ she began, but John had already started to waver. She rushed past the wooden X and caught him around the middle. “Come on, then.” She dragged him over to a padded bench against the wall and dumped him onto his side. John grunted as his tender backside came into contact with the cold wall. Still and all, this position was a drastic improvement.
Anthea tugged off her robe and flung it over him. “Mycroft should know better,” she muttered.
“He left me with Sherlock.”
“He should know better than that, too.” She took a few steps away, toward the table of supplies. “You’re lucky I think of everything.”
“I am?”
“More than you know. Here, drink this.” She returned with a bottle of water, which she pressed into his hand. John propped himself up on his elbow to drink. She asked, “Are you injured?”
John stretched against the bench, feeling protests from cramped muscles and a sharp ache from the beating he’d taken, but nothing broken or bleeding. “Nothing I can’t treat on my own.”
“It’s just past midnight. You should get back to your room. Can you walk?”
“Think so.”
With Anthea’s help, he was able to stand and hobble down the corridor to his quarters. John concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other until the motion became automatic. Once his muscles had remembered their proper function, he felt steadier on his feet, and could stop leaning on Anthea. She stayed with him, though. John found he was grateful not to be left alone with his thoughts just yet.
“Thank you for helping me,” he said.
Anthea tucked her hands into the pockets of her pyjamas, which seemed as neatly tailored as a suit. She said, “It’s not you I’m helping.”
“Oh, I see,” he said, although he didn’t.
“Are you fed up with him yet?”Anthea asked, giving him a sideways glance. “If you want, I bet Lord Mycroft could make arrangements to buy out your contract.”
“No!” John fought back a stab of the same surprising panic he’d felt in the woods earlier, and made himself speak more calmly. “No. I belong to Sherlock now.”
“I can see that.” Anthea stopped in front the door that led to the personal slaves’ quarters. “Here we are.”
“I can make it from here.”
“Alright.” She handed John a bundle of his clothing, which he hadn’t even seen her pick up. “Keep the robe.”As she disappeared rapidly down the hallway, he realized her phone hadn’t made an appearance at all.
John pushed his thumb against the keypad to open the door, shuffled down the silent corridor to his own room, unlocked that door, and stepped inside. In the spill of light from the corridor, he could see that his bed was filled with six feet of naked Sherlock Holmes, sprawled on his back, snoring softly.
John let the door click shut behind him. He tossed his clothes into the growing pile on the floor and shuffled over to the desk to turn on the lamp there. His copy of Freedom through Obedience lay open on his desktop next to a print-out of the photo he’d taken with Sherlock’s phone. Sherlock’s scribbling marred the surface of the print-out and gathered in the margins of the book’s pages. He’d been working. He’d left John alone in order to chase the next clue on his own.
John considered his options. His body was pleading desperately to lie down and sleep. His doctor’s brain was urging him at least to check out his arse and make certain that the damage wasn’t worse than it appeared. Another part of him wanted to shake Sherlock awake violently and demand an explanation for his unbelievable thoughtlessness.
He let his head drop forward and took a deep breath. He’d known what he was getting into with Sherlock. He was a slave, he told himself for the hundredth time. No one would look out for him, so he had to keep his guard up. No matter how much Sherlock tempted him to give his trust, he mustn’t do it.
A warm hand curled around his bare calf. He turned to see Sherlock with one eye cracked open, reaching over from the bed. “You’ve got a new robe.”
“Your powers of observation are astounding, sir.”
Sherlock rolled over onto his side, propped his head up on his fist, and looked John up and down. “Did Anthea try to convince you to defect?”
“She didn’t try very hard. I did choose you over Lord Mycroft not that long ago.” John again steered his mind away from the uncomfortable evidence: his failure to even consider Mycroft’s order to spy on Sherlock, or Anthea’s offer to break Sherlock’s contract. Very loyal, very quickly, Mycroft had said. Was that true? Today he’d been publicly berated, shot at, and beaten with a paddle, but this was the most alive he’d felt since becoming a slave.
Sherlock was watching him closely, so John said, “Although I bet Lord Mycroft wouldn’t leave Lestrade chained inside a torture chamber.”
“Oh, so you’d rather I treat you as my brother treats his slave, is that it?” Sherlock’s lip curled in disdain.
John remembered vividly the curve of a smile on Lestrade’s face as he’d danced with his master. He also remembered the sharp edge in Mycroft’s voice as he’d addressed John in the library that morning. “Not precisely.”
“Not remotely,” Sherlock corrected. “Mycroft is fettered by the rules of society, and dare not defy them, even when it comes to his precious Lestrade. No risk for them, no danger, just hedonism and a relationship of convenience built on societal necessity.”
John quickly shook his head. He felt far from certain about the nature of his friend’s relationship with Mycroft-and when had Lestrade become a friend, anyway?-but he couldn’t endorse Sherlock’s assessment. “You’re wrong.”
“Seldom if ever. What they have is not what you want.” Sherlock sat up. “You told me what you want.”
“Yes, about that. I didn’t mean-“
“Didn’t you?” Sherlock’s eyes were dark in the muted glow of the desk lamp. John couldn’t read them. He wasn’t sure he wanted to.
“I was desperate,” John said quickly. “I didn’t know what I was saying.”
“All the more reason to believe it.” Sherlock uncoiled from the bed and stood. He took John’s face in both hands. Slowly, giving John plenty of time to pull away, he leaned in to plant a gentle kiss on John’s lips.
“What are you doing?” John muttered against Sherlock’s mouth.
“Imagining.”
“Imagining what?”
“What you said before.” Sherlock pushed the robe off John’s shoulders, baring him to the chill air of the darkened room. His hands traced lightly up John’s sides as his gaze remained fixed on John’s face. The touch felt-not possessive, as Sherlock’s touch often did, but something else. Reverent. He raced his fingertips along John’s collarbone and across his throat, carefully avoiding John’s collar.
John’s mind stuttered to a halt as the sense of Sherlock’s words reached him, and he grasped what it was that Sherlock was imagining. “Sherlock…”
“Are you in pain?” Sherlock asked, breath warm against John’s cheek.
“A little,” John said truthfully, though until Sherlock had brought it up, his awareness of his body had narrowed to the brush of Sherlock’s touch against his skin and the growing heat of arousal simmering in his belly.
“Do you want to hurt me in return?” Sherlock traced his fingers up John’s arms. “It’s only fair.”
John pictured Sherlock stretched out naked against crossed wooden beams, writhing as John lay into him. The room suddenly felt much warmer. “You’d let me hit you?”
“Would it make you happy?”
John overcame the sore temptation to say yes immediately, and turned the image over in his mind. He couldn’t imagine Sherlock enjoying the sort of helplessness John had felt tonight. He didn’t like the idea of Sherlock’s expressive face twisted in distress, his teeth gritted to bite back pleas to stop. Taking pleasure in another man’s pain held no appeal for John. “Not really,” he said. “It would seem wrong to tie you down.”
John half expected Sherlock to chide him for a fool, but Sherlock remained stone-faced as his hands roved over John’s body. His touch slid down John’s back until his fingers hovered above the stripes he’d recently left on John’s ass. “If someone else had hurt you that way, I would kill him. Even if it were Mycroft. No one touches what’s mine.”
“What’s yours.” A touch of warning crept into John’s voice.
“That is not what I meant.” Sherlock gripped John’s arms and held him still, as if to ensure John would pay attention. Funny that he thought John had any hope of looking away, even for a second. “I mean there’s a connection between us. I belong to you as much as the other way ‘round. Isn’t that how these things work?”
“Sometimes,” John said weakly. Sherlock’s pale eyes seemed too clear for lies. Dangerously clear.
“It’s difficult for me to express what I mean about this. You’ve said you’re also inexperienced in love, so I thought you’d have some sympathy.”
John’s mouth dropped open to emit a shocked chuckle at Sherlock accusing someone else of lacking sympathy.
A frown creased Sherlock’s brow. “At least provide some data. Did you enjoy what we did tonight?”
John almost snapped that no, he hadn’t enjoyed being chained up and lectured by Lord Mycroft, thanks very much, but Sherlock’s intense gaze caused him to really consider the question. Sherlock’s hitting him had been... exhilarating. John had felt Sherlock’s focused interest channelled into him with every blow he took. They’d worked together perfectly, rising to Mycroft’s challenge. And as John had counted out the strikes, arousal had roared up to claim him, as bright as the thrill of battle. He said, cautiously, “I could have done without the audience.”
“But you did like it?” Sherlock asked, leaning forward a fraction.
“In a way,” John said, but wished an instant later that he could bite the words back. He shouldn’t. It was bad enough that he could enjoy what Sherlock did to him; he must not admit to that level of depravity.
“What way? Describe it.” Sherlock leaned even closer, eyes roving over John’s face as if he could deduce John’s desires from all the things he wasn’t saying. “I want to know what you like. I want to see your expression with your eyes wide open when you achieve orgasm. I want to know the taste of every part of you. I want to listen to your heartbeat race. I want to know what hurts you, and what makes the pain go away.” He pressed his whole body against John’s, and bowed his head against John’s temple so that his words were a mere breath in John’s ear. “All your secrets, John. I want you to give them to me.”
“Stop. Stop shamming. Stop it!” John pushed Sherlock away. Sherlock stumbled back, bumping against the wall with none of his usual grace. John clenched his hands into fists to keep them at his side. “Don’t pretend you care about me. It’s too... Just don’t. Be Sherlock again.”
Sherlock was silent for an uncomfortably long moment, staring at John with his brow furrowed and his lips slightly parted. Then his nonplussed expression evaporated into cold neutrality. “Fine.” He brushed his hands down his sides, as if straightening a suit he wasn't wearing. “It was getting boring, anyway.”
Sherlock returned to the bed and flung himself onto it. In stark contrast to his earlier sprawl, he now seemed to be tucked into as small a space as possible, flattened along the wall.
John’s heart still beat frantically, as if he’d been running for his life. Staring at Sherlock’s pointedly turned back didn’t seem to be calming him. “Sherlock?” John ventured.
“I’m tired, John.” Sherlock’s voice did indeed sound weary. “Lie down and be quiet.”
John stood still. He made his fists unclench, though his instincts screamed at him to do something, to fight. Sod off, he told them. He’d done what he resolved to do: resisted Sherlock’s attempts to manipulate him. He made himself breathe deeply until his pulse had calmed.
John climbed into bed. The pain in his arse had quieted to a dull throb, and under the tangled blankets, warmth began returning to his chilled extremities, but still he couldn’t get comfortable. Sherlock lay unmoving on his sliver of bed. The cell of a room suddenly seemed unbearably lonely.
John curled his arm around Sherlock’s waist and waited for the inevitable protest. When none came, he scooted closer, slotting himself against Sherlock’s back and tucking his arm around Sherlock more tightly. Sherlock unbent a bit, at ease in John’s arms. That, at least, felt right.
--
[Done here? Check out another story in this 'verse or visit The Master Post]
Part Two is here.
Mind the warnings.
Lestrade kept his eyes firmly on the leather straps as he fastened the last restraint around John’s left ankle. He stood and took stock of Mycroft’s position by the rack of tools and implements before leaning in toward John’s ear and speaking softly, “Remember what I said.”
John didn’t respond, but continued to stare straight ahead past the broad wooden X to which his limbs were strapped, to the door beyond. Lestrade stepped back and took up a position by the far wall, where he had a clear view of John’s bare body, but wouldn’t have to see his face.
Mycroft hefted a long, elegant paddle about the size of a cricket bat but thinner. His eyes skipped past Lestrade-observing him, but not inviting comment-and landed on John.
“Can you remind us, Dr. Watson, why you’ve been sentenced to this punishment?”
“You’re inexplicably fond of Chaucer.”
Mycroft struck fast, like a biting snake, swinging his arm out and landing the paddle directly across the thickest part of John’s arse.
John hadn’t seen the blow coming. To his credit, he tensed at the hit, but did not cry out.
“That’s not part of your punishment, John, just a reminder of how you should speak to me. Now. What is your sin?”
“I’m sure you could articulate it better than I, sir.”
“I’m sure I could. However, speaking it would teach me nothing. Gregory, perhaps you can assist him. You witnessed the transgression.” Mycroft turned to face Lestrade. John craned his neck in his restraints as well.
Nothing in Mycroft’s expression revealed his intentions. So, Lestrade was to try his hand at mind-reading then. Perfect. He walked up to John, around the front of the saltire cross, and put Mycroft’s sharp eyes firmly out of his mind. “You put your master in danger, John. That’s what he objects to.”
“Put him in danger? He was throwing books at a bloody wall! The wall can’t fight back.”
“But My-Lord Mycroft can. Lord Sherlock was deliberately provoking him.”
Mycroft stepped in close behind John and tucked a hand against the jut of his hip. Lestrade’s eyes snapped to that point of contact and stayed there. Mycroft leaned in close to John’s ear, just as Lestrade had done a moment before. “If he had spoken to another Lord that way, he would be facing a much worse punishment.”
“He isn’t facing any punishment, sir.”
“Isn’t he?” Mycroft asked mildly. “John, I worry about my brother. Constantly.”
“How very trying for you, sir.”
Lestrade watched Mycroft’s hand clench tightly against John’s hip. “Careful,” Mycroft admonished softly. “You could help me, you know. Bring me information about him: who he speaks to, what he observes. I have people watching him, of course, but I imagine you’d be able to supply more...intimate details.”
“Not interested.”
“Did you say no to me, slave?”
Lestrade kept his eyes focused on Mycroft’s hand wrapped around John’s hip. He didn’t want to see Mycroft’s face; hearing him speak like that to a fellow slave was surreal enough. Lestrade took two slow steps back. John noticed his move and looked up. When their eyes met, John saw something in Lestrade’s expression that made him frown.
“I asked you if you were certain of your choice before I allowed Sherlock to purchase your contract. Did you think he would be able to protect you?”
“It’s not his responsibility to protect me. It’s my...” John wet his lips with his tongue, then pressed them together in a grim line.
“It’s what, John?” Mycroft prompted.
“Those arrangements are between me and my master.”
“Hm. You’re very loyal very quickly. But John.” Mycroft leaned in closer, pressing his cheek to John’s. “You’d do well to remember that there are other brilliant minds in the Empire aside from Sherlock.”
“I’ll keep an eye out for those, sir.”
Mycroft backed away, releasing John from his grip, and Lestrade thought he saw Mycroft’s mouth turn up at the corners.
“Twenty strokes, John. You’ll keep count, yes?”
At the far end of the room, the door rattled, then swung open. All three men looked to the door.
Lord Sherlock slid a set of lock picks into the pocket of his finely tailored gray jacket. He strode into the room and pushed the door closed behind him. “Mycroft.”
Lestrade moved out of the way, stationing himself beside the wall, so as not to be noticed.
“Come to witness your slave’s disgrace, Sherlock?” Mycroft asked.
Sherlock prowled around John’s bound form, looking him over with almost clinical attention. “He doesn’t seem very disgraced. John, has he been mercilessly talking at you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“See there, Mycroft. There’s not much to witness.” Sherlock brought his inspection to a halt, standing mere inches from his brother.
“Not yet. We’ve not begun carrying out his punishment.” Mycroft lifted the paddle.
Sherlock’s eyes darted to John, where one reddened stripe marked Mycroft’s first blow, then back to Mycroft. “You’ve touched him.”
Lestrade tensed, poised to step in before he realized there was nothing he could do; his social betters wouldn’t take kindly at all to his interference.
“Meting out punishment is part of my duty,” Mycroft said. He twirled the paddle against the ground, an echo of a habitual gesture with his umbrella. “I don’t suppose you’d want to... Oh, likely you’re not interested.”
“Your games are childishly transparent, Mycroft.” Sherlock stayed where he was, unsettlingly close to Mycroft. “If you have something to ask me, do so.”
“It sounds as if you might be interested in administering John’s punishment yourself.”
“And if I were?”
“I’m not sure. Wouldn’t you be predisposed to be too lenient? He is your own property.” Mycroft moved to take a step toward John, but Sherlock blocked his way.
“I’m perfectly capable of administering discipline fairly.”
“You don’t have a winning track record on that front.”
“After we’ve finished, you may judge whether or not my methods meet your standards.”
“If they do not?”
“Then you may administer the same sentence to my person.”
Mycroft’s expression did not change appreciably, but Lestrade noted the slight straightening of his spine that meant he was very surprised indeed. Mycroft offered the paddle up, sitting flat against his palm like a ceremonial sword.
Sherlock grabbed it by the handle and hefted its weight. “John, I trust that my brother has already dispensed with the boring part of the punishment, enumerating your sins.”
“Yes.”
Sherlock traced a hand down John’s spine, chasing a rivulet of sweat. “John.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Were you polite to Mycroft when he questioned you?” When John didn’t immediately answer, Sherlock turned to Lestrade. “What would you say, Lestrade? Did he live up to the household’s standards of conduct?”
Lestrade shook his head slowly.
“Gregory,” Mycroft admonished. “We can’t hear you.”
“Not exactly, sir.”
“No, I thought not,” Sherlock said. “I’ve come to expect as much from John.” Sherlock dragged his hand down John’s chest and loosely cupped his cock. “Your behaviour is far from proper, wouldn’t you say, John?” Sherlock’s voice had dropped to an indecent register, almost a purr, and his hand continued to move on John, out of Lestrade’s field of vision. “Answer me.”
“Yes, sir,” John breathed. In mere seconds Sherlock had managed to do what Mycroft hadn’t: strip away the doctor’s careful composure.
“Good boy. Count for me.”
Sherlock swung gracefully, sending the paddle slamming against John’s arse as if it belonged there. When he drew back, Lestrade could plainly see the reddened outline the blow had left behind. Sherlock touched the very tips of his fingers to John’s skin. Lestrade recognized the look of dangerous fascination in his eyes: the desire to experiment in a new medium. He swung again.
John let out a gentle puff of breath as the paddle struck. Though Lestrade couldn’t see John’s face, he felt certain John wasn’t in distress. For one thing, he’d stopped pulling against the restraints as he had been when Mycroft questioned him. Now John seemed almost relaxed. His voice as he counted each stroke rang out strong and even. Sherlock, on the other hand, shone with a kind of fierce joy. Each blow rose and fell so gracefully that the paddle seemed an extension of his arm.
The two of them--master and slave--seemed to form one harmonious organism, like a mad machine that both dispensed and accepted punishment. Lestrade found himself mesmerized by the way they moved.
“Twenty,” John called out.
Lestrade dragged his eyes away from the pair and looked to his master. Mycroft was watching Lestrade with the blindingly neutral expression he wore when waiting for an important answer. He stood perfectly still, as if he’d been watching Lestrade for some time.
Discomfited, Lestrade looked away.
Sherlock reached around John with the paddle and used it to turn John’s face toward him. Sherlock kissed him once, firmly on the mouth. Then he stepped back and gestured grandly toward John with the paddle. “Satisfied?” Sherlock asked.
Mycroft prowled over to the cross and dragged a hand down John’s flank past the overlapping rows of reddening marks. Even from a distance, Lestrade could tell Sherlock hadn’t held back.
“I am, for the time being.” He traced a finger around the edge of John’s collar. “John, you’d do well to remember the whole of this lesson.”
“I’m sure he’ll remember the relevant parts,” Sherlock said.
Mycroft swept past Lestrade and out the door. As soon as he was gone, Sherlock stepped in close to John and began to whisper in his ear. He gripped John’s shoulder, the injured one. Only the soft, indistinct rumble of Sherlock’s voice reached Lestrade, but by the way John writhed in his bonds and groaned, he could imagine the words.
Lestrade quickly followed his master out of the workroom and found himself shutting the door quietly so as not to disturb them.
Mycroft stood halfway down the corridor, hands clasped behind his back, eyes focused on the window that looked out over the darkened gardens. He seemed so buoyant as to practically bounce on the balls of his feet. Lestrade approached him, but came to a careful stop a proper two paces behind.
“Would you like me to have the room set to rights, sir?”
“No. With any luck, they’ll be occupied a while. It’ll keep until morning.”
“Right.” Lestrade wanted to ask what Mycroft had intended to accomplish, but now was not the moment. Besides, he needed to time mull over his observations and come to some conclusions of his own.
Mycroft turned his head a fraction, and a weight seemed to settle upon him. “I’ve some business to attend to before I retire.”
Lestrade recognized the signals: business, before I retire. An offer to relieve Lestrade of tonight’s duties.
“I’ll pick up some papers and meet you in your office.” Lestrade made it a statement so that Mycroft would be less inclined to deny him. From what Anthea had said earlier, his master may have formed some erroneous assumptions that needed to be put to rights.
Mycroft was silent for a moment, and Lestrade readied a second attempt in case Mycroft did try to put him off. Then he said, “The bedroom. I can handle correspondence just as easily from there.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll attend you presently.”
--
“Well done, John.” The hot, low rumble of Sherlock’s voice next to his ear penetrated through John’s adrenaline haze. Sherlock’s grip tightened on his scarred shoulder. He tried to focus the awareness that seemed to be buzzing along his nerves. Sherlock’s thumb brushed against the tip of John’s cock. For an instant, John’s attention focused on that one point, and then it flooded over Sherlock’s touch, spreading across his skin and pooling in the hot lines where the paddle had left its mark. He craned his neck to the side, but he couldn’t see.
“Sherlock!” he called.
Immediately, a tall, lanky form moulded itself to John’s back, pushing his chest and limbs firmly against the wooden X. Sherlock’s left hand curled around his hip. Like Mycroft’s had. John squirmed, but Sherlock had him firmly pinned, and struggling only served to rub the raw skin on his reddened ass against the scratchy front of Sherlock’s trousers.
“He touched you,” Sherlock growled.
John nodded, then stilled when Sherlock pulled away, separating their bodies
“You let him touch you.”
John tugged once, hard, against the leather restraints that bound his wrists and ankles. “Bit tied up.”
Sherlock’s hand traced the line of John’s hip around and down to wrap his elegant fingers around John’s shaft. He gave it a firm squeeze, and John’s cock jumped in his grip. With his other hand, Sherlock delivered a harsh slap against John’s abused ass. “Have you conditioned yourself, somehow, to take pleasure in this sort of treatment? No. You like it when I touch you, but what Mycroft did failed to arouse you. Why, John?”
“Dunno,” John grunted. He steered his mind away from why, exactly, he enjoyed himself with this mad tyrant of a master. He’d been avoiding examining the subject for days, and had become quite adept at it. Using the little leverage he had in his restraints, he bucked up against Sherlock’s hand, seeking more friction.
“You did tell me the first night we were together that I had been the cause of your arousal, not the beating I delivered, nor the other slaves’ presence in the room. I thought you were employing petty flattery. Perhaps there was a degree of truth in your statement.” Sherlock formed a loose fist and stroked John’s length at a maddeningly slow pace.
“You find me physically attractive,” Sherlock continued. “But that in itself is not enough to overcome the humiliation you feel at your social station. What else, then? How do you make yourself endure, even enjoy our encounters?” Sherlock swung around the side of the cross to stand face to face with John, then grabbed hold of his cock again.
John’s lips parted as he tried to gulp in enough oxygen to fuel his reeling brain. “I have to,” he said.
“Always a soldier. But that’s not all of it, is it, John? You don’t just lie back and think of the Empire. I’ve never seen anyone act like you do when you’re with me. How are you doing it? How?” Sherlock tightened his grip on John. It should have hurt, but John’s body was already firing so many conflicting signals that the additional pressure just felt good.
“I’m not afraid of you,” he slurred.
“Is that the difference? Others have tried to please me out of fear of punishment, but not you. You may not fear me, but you do hate me, despite what you say. You hate what I represent. You chafe against any reminder of your slave status.” He slid a finger under John’s collar and tugged, cutting off the flow of air for a moment. “You defy me at every opportunity. You obstinately guard against surrendering anything beyond the bare minimum required for compliance.
“And yet.” He twisted his hand around the crown of John’s dick and wrung a soft moan out of him. “You give me this. How? Do you pretend I’m someone else? No, you already find me physically attractive. That’s not the problem. Perhaps you imagine you are someone else, someone who enjoys being a slave. No, you’d balk at putting yourself in such a role. What then?” His hand quickened, stroking John ruthlessly as John strained forward, then releasing him altogether. “Tell me,” he demanded.
John’s muscles had clenched tight, straining toward release. When Sherlock’s touch deserted him, he gasped at the near-pain of it. He opened his eyes to be greeted with the sight of Sherlock’s pale gaze, very close.
“Us,” John panted. “Us.”
“What are you saying?” Without breaking eye contact, Sherlock brushed his fingers along the underside of John’s cock, a maddeningly light touch.
“I imagine we’re different.”
“Different people, you mean?”
“No, no. Damn it.” John writhed in his bonds, but could find no relief.
“Tell me!”
“You’re you, and I’m me, but we’re partners. Equals. Together.”
“Together,” Sherlock said slowly.
John closed his eyes to avoid seeing the inevitable disdain in his master’s expression. “It’s just a fantasy.”
“Yes.” Sherlock’s hand tightened around John’s cock. “Yes, that’s it.”
Sherlock glided to his knees. Though the cross blocked John’s line of sight, he felt Sherlock settle his lips around John’s cock. John was so close to the edge already that when the hot mouth enveloped him all the way to the edge of where Sherlock’s fingers still clutched him, he lost control. He shouted a nonsensical progression of sounds, and his hips pumped forward desperately as Sherlock swallowed him down.
John slumped in his restraints, shaking. Sherlock leant his head forward against the crease of John’s thigh. They stayed like that for a minute or more as oxygen returned to John’s bloodstream.
As John’s heart rate evened out, his logic returned, and he realized what he’d said. He tried to formulate a strategy for denying the confessions Sherlock had wrung out of him with too-clever fingers. “Sherlock,” he said. His voice sounded wrecked.
Sherlock jerked away. He stumbled to his feet and took three steps backwards, away from John. With some distance between them, John could observe better. Sherlock’s face was very white. A wet spot was spreading on the front of his gray trousers. His eyes were fixed at the centre of John’s chest.
Sherlock’s lips parted, then drifted closed. “John,” he said. “The photograph. Those marks.” Then he turned and fled the room.
John stared after him, blinking. The door swung shut and clicked ominously. John tugged against the leather straps, but they didn’t give. In the silence of the empty room, he muttered, “Bollocks.”
--
Lestrade stopped briefly by the common room, where Sally assured him that all was running smoothly. Then he made a dash to his room to fetch the tablet with the day’s reports. When he at last met the door at Mycroft’s bedroom and stepped inside, he thought for a moment that his master had yet to arrive.
Then Lestrade caught sight of a glass of port held in an elegantly manicured hand extending past the wings of the armchair facing the fireplace.
Lestrade set his tablet down on the desk next to a pile of Mycroft’s correspondence, which seemed not to have been touched. He examined the tableau by the crackling fire, working out his best course of action. Mycroft had to know he was there, but he’d said nothing. Combined with the day’s earlier behaviour, the current silence sent alarm bells ringing in Lestrade’s head.
Lestrade divested himself efficiently, folded his clothes into a neat pile, and placed them out of the way. He fetched the silk pyjamas he kept here-he had an old flannel set in his room, but these were for Mycroft-and re-dressed himself. He pressed his fingers against the tag at the front of his collar to feel the etched initials of his master. After a moment, he stripped off his shirt, leaving his chest bare to the chilly air of the room. He didn’t expect to be cold long, in any case.
The hardwood floor felt chilly on the soles of his bare feet, but the thick rug by the fireplace felt invitingly soft. He stepped up to the side of Mycroft’s chair and held out his hand.
Mycroft looked up at him, considering. In the flickering shadows of the firelight, the weight of a hard day’s work showed clearly on him.
“Come to bed,” Lestrade said.
“There’s correspondence.”
“It will keep.”
“I’ve not finished my drink.”
Lestrade plucked the glass out of Mycroft’s hand and downed the port with a satisfied smile. Mycroft had begun to keep the Portuguese wine in his room since he’d seen Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade sipping some she’d got him last Boxing Day. He set the glass on the mantle and held out his hand to Mycroft again. “You didn’t want to drink, anyway. If you wanted to drink, you would have got brandy.”
A small smile crept onto Mycroft’s face. “Alright. I surrender.” He placed his hand in Lestrade’s and allowed himself to be pulled out of his chair and towards the bed.
Mycroft stood silently while Lestrade stripped off his jacket and draped it over the back of the nearest chair. Mycroft had his own valet, of course, but Lestrade had learned to take over these duties on occasion. He’d got tired of watching Mycroft stand stoic and impassive during his evening routine, keeping up his persona of Lord and master when he should have been preparing to rest. Now, Mycroft seemed to relax with every piece of his finely-tailored armour that Gregory removed.
After Gregory untied Mycroft’s tie and unbuttoned his vest and shirt with practised fingers, and had begun on his trousers, Mycroft let his eyes drift closed, and spoke. “You did very well tonight, Gregory.”
“I didn’t do anything.” Lestrade knelt down to remove Mycroft’s shoes, and set them aside.
“But you did. You helped John understand his role in all this: your advice, your reactions set the proper context for John’s experience.”
“Oh,” Lestrade said. He hadn’t thought of it quite that way. He wasn’t sure he liked the thought; it reminded him of putting a wild horse in with a tame one who could set a good example.
“It was well done,” Mycroft said, brushing his fingers against Lestrade’s temple.
“I wasn’t aware I was so crucial to the proceedings.” Lestrade gave Mycroft a gentle nudge toward the bed, and he sat obligingly so Lestrade could strip off his socks and trousers.
“You were absolutely crucial. I told you this morning.”
“Right,” Lestrade said. That’s not what he’d remembered from the conversation, but then again, he often found himself surprised after the fact at what a discussion with his master had actually been about.
Lestrade fetched Mycroft’s pyjamas from the cupboard and got him dressed while he mulled over Mycroft’s interpretation of the evening’s events. His master sat on the side of the bed, watching Lestrade go about the business of putting the room to rights, and finally switching off the bedside lamp, leaving only the dancing glow of the firelight. Mycroft pulled back the covers on the near side of the enormous bed, and reached out a hand to Lestrade.
Lestrade put his hand in Mycroft’s and allowed his master to pull him into bed. Mycroft tugged Lestrade in against him, with Mycroft’s broad chest pressed to Lestrade’s back, his arm wrapped tight around Lestrade’s waist, and an ankle hooked over his leg. The fire crackled in its grate. Lestrade felt warmth seeping into him, wearing away the day’s worries.
Mycroft leaned his forehead against Lestrade’s bare shoulder. “You’re quiet tonight.”
“I’m thinking.”
“Putting the pieces together.” Mycroft’s arms wrapped more tightly around Lestrade. “Alright. Tell me.”
Lestrade wasn’t certain he’d worked it all out, not yet, but he ought to make a start. “You made an excuse to punish John.”
“Yes.”
Lestrade paused a moment while his next thought solidified. “But you have no interest in disciplining other people’s slaves. You wouldn’t have gotten any pleasure out of beating John.”
“No.”
Another puzzle piece slotted into place. “You didn’t really expect him to pass on information about Lord Sherlock.”
“No.”
“So I thought it through backwards, assuming that you accomplished what you wanted, else you wouldn’t be so pleased.”
“Well observed.”
“You made an enemy of John, I think, but I’m not sure that was your aim.”
“A regrettable side effect.”
“You did inspire Sherlock to show some interest in his slave’s well-being.” Lestrade paused again, allowing his thoughts to settle. “Was it a test? To see if he would intervene on John’s behalf?”
Mycroft’s smile curved against Lestrade’s shoulder. “The Imperial Police Force lost a good thing in you, Gregory.”
Lestrade couldn’t prevent the tension that seized him at the mention of his former life. The memory of his disgrace should not have had the power to haunt him this way, he scolded himself. He took a deep breath and forced his body to relax, first his shoulders, his arms, then down and out, willing himself calm. In mere moments he was again lying pliant in Mycroft’s arms. He had no illusions, however, that his master had overlooked the lapse.
Lestrade cast about for a way to offer a distraction that would not seem desperate. Before he could make an attempt, Mycroft released him and rolled onto his back.
“It’s been a trying day, Gregory. Sleep now.”
--
“John? John.”
John pulled himself up through an achy haze to focus on the voice in front of him. A beautiful woman swam into view, her face scrunched into a frown.
“Can you hear me?” she asked.
“Yes.” He tried to reach out to her to determine if she was indeed real, but found his hand caught fast. He looked up to see leather bindings around his wrists that pinned him to a wooden X. The night’s events came back to him in a rush. “Damn.” He looked at the woman again, clad in striped pyjamas with a red silk robe over them, with her hair done in a neat ponytail. “Anthea?”
“The very same. Hold still. I’ll get your feet out, first.” She disappeared from John’s line of sight, but he felt her hands working at the bindings on his ankles. “Stand, come on,” she prompted.
It wasn’t until John got his feet under him that he realized the relief he felt in his shoulders, which had been taking more of his weight as he slumped. Another moment’s work and Anthea had unclasped the cuffs on his wrists. “You might want to-“ she began, but John had already started to waver. She rushed past the wooden X and caught him around the middle. “Come on, then.” She dragged him over to a padded bench against the wall and dumped him onto his side. John grunted as his tender backside came into contact with the cold wall. Still and all, this position was a drastic improvement.
Anthea tugged off her robe and flung it over him. “Mycroft should know better,” she muttered.
“He left me with Sherlock.”
“He should know better than that, too.” She took a few steps away, toward the table of supplies. “You’re lucky I think of everything.”
“I am?”
“More than you know. Here, drink this.” She returned with a bottle of water, which she pressed into his hand. John propped himself up on his elbow to drink. She asked, “Are you injured?”
John stretched against the bench, feeling protests from cramped muscles and a sharp ache from the beating he’d taken, but nothing broken or bleeding. “Nothing I can’t treat on my own.”
“It’s just past midnight. You should get back to your room. Can you walk?”
“Think so.”
With Anthea’s help, he was able to stand and hobble down the corridor to his quarters. John concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other until the motion became automatic. Once his muscles had remembered their proper function, he felt steadier on his feet, and could stop leaning on Anthea. She stayed with him, though. John found he was grateful not to be left alone with his thoughts just yet.
“Thank you for helping me,” he said.
Anthea tucked her hands into the pockets of her pyjamas, which seemed as neatly tailored as a suit. She said, “It’s not you I’m helping.”
“Oh, I see,” he said, although he didn’t.
“Are you fed up with him yet?”Anthea asked, giving him a sideways glance. “If you want, I bet Lord Mycroft could make arrangements to buy out your contract.”
“No!” John fought back a stab of the same surprising panic he’d felt in the woods earlier, and made himself speak more calmly. “No. I belong to Sherlock now.”
“I can see that.” Anthea stopped in front the door that led to the personal slaves’ quarters. “Here we are.”
“I can make it from here.”
“Alright.” She handed John a bundle of his clothing, which he hadn’t even seen her pick up. “Keep the robe.”As she disappeared rapidly down the hallway, he realized her phone hadn’t made an appearance at all.
John pushed his thumb against the keypad to open the door, shuffled down the silent corridor to his own room, unlocked that door, and stepped inside. In the spill of light from the corridor, he could see that his bed was filled with six feet of naked Sherlock Holmes, sprawled on his back, snoring softly.
John let the door click shut behind him. He tossed his clothes into the growing pile on the floor and shuffled over to the desk to turn on the lamp there. His copy of Freedom through Obedience lay open on his desktop next to a print-out of the photo he’d taken with Sherlock’s phone. Sherlock’s scribbling marred the surface of the print-out and gathered in the margins of the book’s pages. He’d been working. He’d left John alone in order to chase the next clue on his own.
John considered his options. His body was pleading desperately to lie down and sleep. His doctor’s brain was urging him at least to check out his arse and make certain that the damage wasn’t worse than it appeared. Another part of him wanted to shake Sherlock awake violently and demand an explanation for his unbelievable thoughtlessness.
He let his head drop forward and took a deep breath. He’d known what he was getting into with Sherlock. He was a slave, he told himself for the hundredth time. No one would look out for him, so he had to keep his guard up. No matter how much Sherlock tempted him to give his trust, he mustn’t do it.
A warm hand curled around his bare calf. He turned to see Sherlock with one eye cracked open, reaching over from the bed. “You’ve got a new robe.”
“Your powers of observation are astounding, sir.”
Sherlock rolled over onto his side, propped his head up on his fist, and looked John up and down. “Did Anthea try to convince you to defect?”
“She didn’t try very hard. I did choose you over Lord Mycroft not that long ago.” John again steered his mind away from the uncomfortable evidence: his failure to even consider Mycroft’s order to spy on Sherlock, or Anthea’s offer to break Sherlock’s contract. Very loyal, very quickly, Mycroft had said. Was that true? Today he’d been publicly berated, shot at, and beaten with a paddle, but this was the most alive he’d felt since becoming a slave.
Sherlock was watching him closely, so John said, “Although I bet Lord Mycroft wouldn’t leave Lestrade chained inside a torture chamber.”
“Oh, so you’d rather I treat you as my brother treats his slave, is that it?” Sherlock’s lip curled in disdain.
John remembered vividly the curve of a smile on Lestrade’s face as he’d danced with his master. He also remembered the sharp edge in Mycroft’s voice as he’d addressed John in the library that morning. “Not precisely.”
“Not remotely,” Sherlock corrected. “Mycroft is fettered by the rules of society, and dare not defy them, even when it comes to his precious Lestrade. No risk for them, no danger, just hedonism and a relationship of convenience built on societal necessity.”
John quickly shook his head. He felt far from certain about the nature of his friend’s relationship with Mycroft-and when had Lestrade become a friend, anyway?-but he couldn’t endorse Sherlock’s assessment. “You’re wrong.”
“Seldom if ever. What they have is not what you want.” Sherlock sat up. “You told me what you want.”
“Yes, about that. I didn’t mean-“
“Didn’t you?” Sherlock’s eyes were dark in the muted glow of the desk lamp. John couldn’t read them. He wasn’t sure he wanted to.
“I was desperate,” John said quickly. “I didn’t know what I was saying.”
“All the more reason to believe it.” Sherlock uncoiled from the bed and stood. He took John’s face in both hands. Slowly, giving John plenty of time to pull away, he leaned in to plant a gentle kiss on John’s lips.
“What are you doing?” John muttered against Sherlock’s mouth.
“Imagining.”
“Imagining what?”
“What you said before.” Sherlock pushed the robe off John’s shoulders, baring him to the chill air of the darkened room. His hands traced lightly up John’s sides as his gaze remained fixed on John’s face. The touch felt-not possessive, as Sherlock’s touch often did, but something else. Reverent. He raced his fingertips along John’s collarbone and across his throat, carefully avoiding John’s collar.
John’s mind stuttered to a halt as the sense of Sherlock’s words reached him, and he grasped what it was that Sherlock was imagining. “Sherlock…”
“Are you in pain?” Sherlock asked, breath warm against John’s cheek.
“A little,” John said truthfully, though until Sherlock had brought it up, his awareness of his body had narrowed to the brush of Sherlock’s touch against his skin and the growing heat of arousal simmering in his belly.
“Do you want to hurt me in return?” Sherlock traced his fingers up John’s arms. “It’s only fair.”
John pictured Sherlock stretched out naked against crossed wooden beams, writhing as John lay into him. The room suddenly felt much warmer. “You’d let me hit you?”
“Would it make you happy?”
John overcame the sore temptation to say yes immediately, and turned the image over in his mind. He couldn’t imagine Sherlock enjoying the sort of helplessness John had felt tonight. He didn’t like the idea of Sherlock’s expressive face twisted in distress, his teeth gritted to bite back pleas to stop. Taking pleasure in another man’s pain held no appeal for John. “Not really,” he said. “It would seem wrong to tie you down.”
John half expected Sherlock to chide him for a fool, but Sherlock remained stone-faced as his hands roved over John’s body. His touch slid down John’s back until his fingers hovered above the stripes he’d recently left on John’s ass. “If someone else had hurt you that way, I would kill him. Even if it were Mycroft. No one touches what’s mine.”
“What’s yours.” A touch of warning crept into John’s voice.
“That is not what I meant.” Sherlock gripped John’s arms and held him still, as if to ensure John would pay attention. Funny that he thought John had any hope of looking away, even for a second. “I mean there’s a connection between us. I belong to you as much as the other way ‘round. Isn’t that how these things work?”
“Sometimes,” John said weakly. Sherlock’s pale eyes seemed too clear for lies. Dangerously clear.
“It’s difficult for me to express what I mean about this. You’ve said you’re also inexperienced in love, so I thought you’d have some sympathy.”
John’s mouth dropped open to emit a shocked chuckle at Sherlock accusing someone else of lacking sympathy.
A frown creased Sherlock’s brow. “At least provide some data. Did you enjoy what we did tonight?”
John almost snapped that no, he hadn’t enjoyed being chained up and lectured by Lord Mycroft, thanks very much, but Sherlock’s intense gaze caused him to really consider the question. Sherlock’s hitting him had been... exhilarating. John had felt Sherlock’s focused interest channelled into him with every blow he took. They’d worked together perfectly, rising to Mycroft’s challenge. And as John had counted out the strikes, arousal had roared up to claim him, as bright as the thrill of battle. He said, cautiously, “I could have done without the audience.”
“But you did like it?” Sherlock asked, leaning forward a fraction.
“In a way,” John said, but wished an instant later that he could bite the words back. He shouldn’t. It was bad enough that he could enjoy what Sherlock did to him; he must not admit to that level of depravity.
“What way? Describe it.” Sherlock leaned even closer, eyes roving over John’s face as if he could deduce John’s desires from all the things he wasn’t saying. “I want to know what you like. I want to see your expression with your eyes wide open when you achieve orgasm. I want to know the taste of every part of you. I want to listen to your heartbeat race. I want to know what hurts you, and what makes the pain go away.” He pressed his whole body against John’s, and bowed his head against John’s temple so that his words were a mere breath in John’s ear. “All your secrets, John. I want you to give them to me.”
“Stop. Stop shamming. Stop it!” John pushed Sherlock away. Sherlock stumbled back, bumping against the wall with none of his usual grace. John clenched his hands into fists to keep them at his side. “Don’t pretend you care about me. It’s too... Just don’t. Be Sherlock again.”
Sherlock was silent for an uncomfortably long moment, staring at John with his brow furrowed and his lips slightly parted. Then his nonplussed expression evaporated into cold neutrality. “Fine.” He brushed his hands down his sides, as if straightening a suit he wasn't wearing. “It was getting boring, anyway.”
Sherlock returned to the bed and flung himself onto it. In stark contrast to his earlier sprawl, he now seemed to be tucked into as small a space as possible, flattened along the wall.
John’s heart still beat frantically, as if he’d been running for his life. Staring at Sherlock’s pointedly turned back didn’t seem to be calming him. “Sherlock?” John ventured.
“I’m tired, John.” Sherlock’s voice did indeed sound weary. “Lie down and be quiet.”
John stood still. He made his fists unclench, though his instincts screamed at him to do something, to fight. Sod off, he told them. He’d done what he resolved to do: resisted Sherlock’s attempts to manipulate him. He made himself breathe deeply until his pulse had calmed.
John climbed into bed. The pain in his arse had quieted to a dull throb, and under the tangled blankets, warmth began returning to his chilled extremities, but still he couldn’t get comfortable. Sherlock lay unmoving on his sliver of bed. The cell of a room suddenly seemed unbearably lonely.
John curled his arm around Sherlock’s waist and waited for the inevitable protest. When none came, he scooted closer, slotting himself against Sherlock’s back and tucking his arm around Sherlock more tightly. Sherlock unbent a bit, at ease in John’s arms. That, at least, felt right.
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