Happy Holidays, Raine_wynd!
Title: First Steps Out of the Grave
Author: It's a Lovely Day For Snow
Written For: raine_wynd
Characters: Richie Ryan, Jehan Héraut, Henry Monmouth, unnamed character
Rating: PG
Author's Notes: Part of the They Who Sleep In Elysium AU, wherein more than one person gets some variant of a happyish ending.
Summary: Richie doesn't know what's happened, or how he's alive again. Or why him, when there are so many others who could have been given this, and are still dead. And while whoever it is that did this isn't hiding, they're not making it easy for him to find answers, either.
"I was dead." Richie is staring at the mirror at the angry red line that goes all the way around his neck. "How does this work?"
"I'm not the one to ask that, but I do know someone who has a better idea of it." Jehan meets his gaze a moment, a wry smile crossing his face before he returns his attention to dinner preparations. "I sent him an email while you were sleeping."
"Is he Immortal, too?" Richie turns away from the mirror and the reminder that he shouldn't be here, talking to Jehan and hiding from the rest of the world for a few days. At least.
"No, and never has been. I watched him die, wasting away, the first time." Jehan's voice has that peculiar steadiness to it that makes Richie think he's trying very hard not to show any of whatever he was feeling the first time around. "We encountered each other again maybe six months later, on the road, entirely by accident."
It still doesn't actually answer Richie's question of how the hell he's back from the dead this time, when as far as he knows, getting his head cut off should have killed him. Had killed him. Then he'd woken up next to a freshly unearthed grave with a massive headache, and an impression that there'd been a good deal more to everything than what he remembered.
"So, he's mortal? Sorta?"
"No." Jehan looks up to meet Richie's gaze again. "He's neither mortal nor Immortal, but something else entirely. You should ask him when he arrives."
"Do you at least know when that is?" Richie sits on one of the barstools across from Jehan and his stove. "And does your friend have a name?"
"As I don't know where he is this time, I have no idea how long it will be before he arrives. And while I know the name he was given in his first life, I don't know what name he'll want to introduce himself by." Jehan reaches for a bowl of chopped vegetables, dumping them into the pan. "There are plates in the cupboard over the window, and utensils in the drawer below. It's likely just us for dinner, and my friend knows where to find things if he arrives tonight."
"Someone who comes over a lot?" Richie goes to get the place settings, pausing to look out the window as he does. It's gray and damp outside, obscuring the grounds that surround Jehan's home, and making it impossible to tell what might be beyond that.
"He has a key, and is able to come and go as he pleases." Jehan is smiling when Richie turns back to face him, the expression softening the long lines of his face. "I would not have it any other way."
Richie tightens his grip on the plates a moment before making himself smile in return. He remembers seeing that expression on Tessa's face when he'd been just the kid she and Mac had rescued, and he's not sure why it hurts now more than it has in a while. Maybe if she hadn't died that night, things would have gone differently later, and Richie wouldn't be here, wondering why he's alive after Mac had taken his head off.
"Are you all right?" Jehan is at Richie's elbow, and he startles, nearly dropping the plates. "You looked lost, and didn't hear me."
"Sorry." Richie smiles, shaking his head, and moving toward the counter to set the plates down. "I'm fine."
Jehan watches him a moment before nodding, taking him at his word - or at least leaving it be instead of pressing Richie to talk when Richie isn't sure he can or wants to.
"You could contact your friends, the ones who know you were Immortal, if you wanted to." Jehan gestures to the phone that's on one of the shelves that line most of the walls of the house. "There is no requirement for secrecy in this sort of unexpected return."
He could, but how to convince them that it really is him, Richie isn't certain. He's not even certain he wants to do that right now. And he really doesn't want to call Mac, not unless there's a way to be certain whatever it was that had sent him off the deep end had been fixed.
"I don't have a lot of people to call."
Jehan gives him a rueful smile. "A hazard of our lives."
Richie shrugs, returning the smile with a brief one of his own. "Yeah." He pauses, trying to think of some other, less painful subject. "Hey, do you have somewhere around here to practice? Or spar?" He doesn't really want to spar with Jehan, not without knowing the other Immortal better, but being able to at least keep in practice is better than doing nothing.
"There's a salle in the extension on the barn." Jehan goes to pull open a drawer under one of the shelves, taking out a key. "You'll need this to unlock it. With the swords in there, I prefer not to leave easily opened."
It's a modern key, so probably a modern lock, which Richie hadn't been certain of when a lot of the locks he's seen in the house look like they're the originals. Old fashioned and needing an equally old fashioned key.
"Thanks."
He goes to the outside door, even though it means circling the barn the long way, and getting damp from the misty rain that's turned today as gray as yesterday. Every day since he woke up, really, and Richie is starting to wonder about the weather.
Inside, there are cabinets along one wall, one with towels, the rest with swords and other weapons. There's a sink too, and a cabinet over it that holds glasses for drinking water. The floor is packed earth, spotted darker in places that Richie would bet are where blood has soaked in.
Richie finds a sword that feels right in his hands, wondering for a moment why his own blade hadn't been with him when he revived this time. Wondering if Mac has it, or if someone had taken it when they dug him up. Neither one is a particularly pleasant thought, so he pushes those thoughts away, focusing instead on reminding himself how to move and fight.
How long he's there, he's not certain, but he is sweating and almost ready for a break when he hears the door open. Not Jehan, or Richie would have felt him approaching before he got to the door. And the man who is closing the door behind him has lighter hair, and a broader build.
"Who are you?" Richie keeps a hold of the sword he's been using, watching the stranger.
"Henry. Jehan said he had a guest." Henry watches Richie with an expression that he's not sure how to interpret, but makes him feel uneasy regardless. "Would you like to spar?"
Richie shrugs, moving so Henry has a clear line to the cabinets of swords. "Sure." He hopes this is the friend Jehan had been talking about yesterday. "Jehan said you had a better idea than he did about how this works."
"Coming back from the dead, and never being able to regain that state?" Henry chuckles a moment, reaching into the cabinet for a longsword that looks like it came straight out of some mediaeval painting. "Oh, for a few centuries, yes. I attracted the right person's attention. I imagine you did the same, though I won't speculate who."
"Why not?" Richie shifts his stance into a ready one, watching as Henry swings the sword around a bit, as if reminding himself of the way it moves in his hand.
Henry grins, moving to stand opposite Richie. "Those who could do this tend to keep at least a little attention on those who benefit from their generosity. And they're not all of them kind or merciful. Better not to guess wrong, and annoy them."
That sends a chill down Richie's spine, and he frowns, thinking about Mac hallucinating dead people because of a demon. It can't be the same, can it? Richie is alive, and more than one person can see him, can acknowledge his existence.
There's a momentary sense of amusement that isn't his own emotion, and then he has to focus on fighting. Henry moves with the same ease as any Immortal, practiced and familiar with a sword from long use. Maybe even from being old enough to have begun to learn as a child, instead of as a teen or adult.
Certainly he's better than Richie, and the spar ends with Richie failing to catch a blow, and the sword biting deep into his side. Henry grimaces, and quickly moves to catch Richie, lowering him to the floor without letting go of his sword.
Henry is saying something, but Richie can't catch it as consciousness flees, and, he thinks, life with it, at least for now. It's a relief that he gladly succumbs to.
He wakes up inside propped up a bit on a bed, his borrowed and ruined shirt stripped off him. Richie rolls to the side as he takes deep, shuddering breaths. His head is pounding once more, and he feels like he's been in the sun for hours, with his throat dry and skin burned. Not the relief that being dead while injuries heal usually is.
"Here. Drink."
Henry's voice makes Richie startle, and it takes a moment before he can reach out to take the offered mug, which apparently holds lukewarm tea. Not a drink he usually likes, but right now, it tastes fantastic.
"You were dead again, for a while. No heartbeat, no breath." Henry is watching him with a smile that seems more relieved than anything else. Richie isn't sure what to make of that. "Did you dream?"
"I don't think so." Richie doesn't remember, but he could have. How, he doesn't know, since he was dead, and he shouldn't be able to dream while dead. Should he? "Why?"
"There's something between alive and dead, and it's strange and dream-like, and I remember no more than that. I don't think we're supposed to remember." Henry shakes his head. "Perhaps it's different if you were Immortal before this sort of gift, or if whoever brought you back is different from the one who did that favor for me."
Richie pushes himself upright, sitting on the edge of the bed after setting the mug on the bedside table. "Who was it that did... whatever this is to you?" If Henry even knows who it is.
"I have yet to find an answer to that, though it is perhaps that the lack of knowing is the price I pay for this continued and permanent living." Henry shrugs. "I try not to think too hard upon it."
Not knowing what - or who - has brought him back, or how, is something Richie doesn't think he could so easily accept, even if at the moment, he's not sure how he'd find out. Especially since Henry probably doesn't have as many answers as Jehan had implied he did. Just enough to know that it's probably something wierder than just being Immortal.
There's a repeat of the same sense of amusement he'd caught just before sparring with Henry, and the distinct impression it's not his own. Henry doesn't look to be nearly amused enough to fit what Richie's feeling, and there's something about it that feels different. He's not sure what, or how to put that difference in words, only that it's not something that fits what little he's seen of Henry, nor does it fit what he knows of Jehan.
Richie doesn't know how to figure it out, though, and he's certain Henry won't actually do much to help him find out who or how or why, so there's no point asking him more questions. And he still doesn't know what he wants to do about telling anyone - any Immortal - he knows that he's alive again, especially when he doesn't have any answers.
"Shall I leave you to whatever is occupying your thoughts?" Henry is smiling a little, and Richie lets out a brief laugh. "I will be here for a few weeks, at least. You can take time to let your questions come to you, if you wish."
"Yeah. That's probably a good idea." Richie slides off the bed as Henry stands, heading for the wardrobe as Henry leaves. A fresh shirt, even borrowed, makes him feel a little better, though he still feels unsettled.
He waits until Henry is out of earshot before he speaks. "So, are you going to keep me in the dark like Henry, or do I get a little more of a clue than someone who finds this all funny?"
"Everything can be amusing, if you look at it from the right angle. Terrifying, infuriating, heart-breaking, anything. If you can't find it amusing, it all becomes too much." As far as Richie can tell, it's his own reflection in the mirror next to the wardrobe speaking. Which means whoever or whatever it is, doesn't want to be seen. He thinks.
"You have a name?" Richie wonders if either Jehan or Henry would hear both sides of the conversation if they walked by the room right now.
"Yes." His reflection grins, mischief in its eyes.
"Are you going to tell me?" Richie crosses his arms, though his reflection doesn't echo the gesture, and it adds to the weirdness of this whole thing.
"No." A shrug. "You'll have to figure it out on your own. And I promise you can, since it hasn't been lost even to mortals."
"But it won't be easy, will it?" Richie shakes his head. Of course it won't be. Because when has anything ever been easy, other than dying?
His reflection grins at him, as if reading his thoughts, then there's another flash of amusement before it once more is just a reflection, not something being used by someone else. Leaving Richie with more questions than answers.
END
Author: It's a Lovely Day For Snow
Written For: raine_wynd
Characters: Richie Ryan, Jehan Héraut, Henry Monmouth, unnamed character
Rating: PG
Author's Notes: Part of the They Who Sleep In Elysium AU, wherein more than one person gets some variant of a happyish ending.
Summary: Richie doesn't know what's happened, or how he's alive again. Or why him, when there are so many others who could have been given this, and are still dead. And while whoever it is that did this isn't hiding, they're not making it easy for him to find answers, either.
"I was dead." Richie is staring at the mirror at the angry red line that goes all the way around his neck. "How does this work?"
"I'm not the one to ask that, but I do know someone who has a better idea of it." Jehan meets his gaze a moment, a wry smile crossing his face before he returns his attention to dinner preparations. "I sent him an email while you were sleeping."
"Is he Immortal, too?" Richie turns away from the mirror and the reminder that he shouldn't be here, talking to Jehan and hiding from the rest of the world for a few days. At least.
"No, and never has been. I watched him die, wasting away, the first time." Jehan's voice has that peculiar steadiness to it that makes Richie think he's trying very hard not to show any of whatever he was feeling the first time around. "We encountered each other again maybe six months later, on the road, entirely by accident."
It still doesn't actually answer Richie's question of how the hell he's back from the dead this time, when as far as he knows, getting his head cut off should have killed him. Had killed him. Then he'd woken up next to a freshly unearthed grave with a massive headache, and an impression that there'd been a good deal more to everything than what he remembered.
"So, he's mortal? Sorta?"
"No." Jehan looks up to meet Richie's gaze again. "He's neither mortal nor Immortal, but something else entirely. You should ask him when he arrives."
"Do you at least know when that is?" Richie sits on one of the barstools across from Jehan and his stove. "And does your friend have a name?"
"As I don't know where he is this time, I have no idea how long it will be before he arrives. And while I know the name he was given in his first life, I don't know what name he'll want to introduce himself by." Jehan reaches for a bowl of chopped vegetables, dumping them into the pan. "There are plates in the cupboard over the window, and utensils in the drawer below. It's likely just us for dinner, and my friend knows where to find things if he arrives tonight."
"Someone who comes over a lot?" Richie goes to get the place settings, pausing to look out the window as he does. It's gray and damp outside, obscuring the grounds that surround Jehan's home, and making it impossible to tell what might be beyond that.
"He has a key, and is able to come and go as he pleases." Jehan is smiling when Richie turns back to face him, the expression softening the long lines of his face. "I would not have it any other way."
Richie tightens his grip on the plates a moment before making himself smile in return. He remembers seeing that expression on Tessa's face when he'd been just the kid she and Mac had rescued, and he's not sure why it hurts now more than it has in a while. Maybe if she hadn't died that night, things would have gone differently later, and Richie wouldn't be here, wondering why he's alive after Mac had taken his head off.
"Are you all right?" Jehan is at Richie's elbow, and he startles, nearly dropping the plates. "You looked lost, and didn't hear me."
"Sorry." Richie smiles, shaking his head, and moving toward the counter to set the plates down. "I'm fine."
Jehan watches him a moment before nodding, taking him at his word - or at least leaving it be instead of pressing Richie to talk when Richie isn't sure he can or wants to.
"You could contact your friends, the ones who know you were Immortal, if you wanted to." Jehan gestures to the phone that's on one of the shelves that line most of the walls of the house. "There is no requirement for secrecy in this sort of unexpected return."
He could, but how to convince them that it really is him, Richie isn't certain. He's not even certain he wants to do that right now. And he really doesn't want to call Mac, not unless there's a way to be certain whatever it was that had sent him off the deep end had been fixed.
"I don't have a lot of people to call."
Jehan gives him a rueful smile. "A hazard of our lives."
Richie shrugs, returning the smile with a brief one of his own. "Yeah." He pauses, trying to think of some other, less painful subject. "Hey, do you have somewhere around here to practice? Or spar?" He doesn't really want to spar with Jehan, not without knowing the other Immortal better, but being able to at least keep in practice is better than doing nothing.
"There's a salle in the extension on the barn." Jehan goes to pull open a drawer under one of the shelves, taking out a key. "You'll need this to unlock it. With the swords in there, I prefer not to leave easily opened."
It's a modern key, so probably a modern lock, which Richie hadn't been certain of when a lot of the locks he's seen in the house look like they're the originals. Old fashioned and needing an equally old fashioned key.
"Thanks."
He goes to the outside door, even though it means circling the barn the long way, and getting damp from the misty rain that's turned today as gray as yesterday. Every day since he woke up, really, and Richie is starting to wonder about the weather.
Inside, there are cabinets along one wall, one with towels, the rest with swords and other weapons. There's a sink too, and a cabinet over it that holds glasses for drinking water. The floor is packed earth, spotted darker in places that Richie would bet are where blood has soaked in.
Richie finds a sword that feels right in his hands, wondering for a moment why his own blade hadn't been with him when he revived this time. Wondering if Mac has it, or if someone had taken it when they dug him up. Neither one is a particularly pleasant thought, so he pushes those thoughts away, focusing instead on reminding himself how to move and fight.
How long he's there, he's not certain, but he is sweating and almost ready for a break when he hears the door open. Not Jehan, or Richie would have felt him approaching before he got to the door. And the man who is closing the door behind him has lighter hair, and a broader build.
"Who are you?" Richie keeps a hold of the sword he's been using, watching the stranger.
"Henry. Jehan said he had a guest." Henry watches Richie with an expression that he's not sure how to interpret, but makes him feel uneasy regardless. "Would you like to spar?"
Richie shrugs, moving so Henry has a clear line to the cabinets of swords. "Sure." He hopes this is the friend Jehan had been talking about yesterday. "Jehan said you had a better idea than he did about how this works."
"Coming back from the dead, and never being able to regain that state?" Henry chuckles a moment, reaching into the cabinet for a longsword that looks like it came straight out of some mediaeval painting. "Oh, for a few centuries, yes. I attracted the right person's attention. I imagine you did the same, though I won't speculate who."
"Why not?" Richie shifts his stance into a ready one, watching as Henry swings the sword around a bit, as if reminding himself of the way it moves in his hand.
Henry grins, moving to stand opposite Richie. "Those who could do this tend to keep at least a little attention on those who benefit from their generosity. And they're not all of them kind or merciful. Better not to guess wrong, and annoy them."
That sends a chill down Richie's spine, and he frowns, thinking about Mac hallucinating dead people because of a demon. It can't be the same, can it? Richie is alive, and more than one person can see him, can acknowledge his existence.
There's a momentary sense of amusement that isn't his own emotion, and then he has to focus on fighting. Henry moves with the same ease as any Immortal, practiced and familiar with a sword from long use. Maybe even from being old enough to have begun to learn as a child, instead of as a teen or adult.
Certainly he's better than Richie, and the spar ends with Richie failing to catch a blow, and the sword biting deep into his side. Henry grimaces, and quickly moves to catch Richie, lowering him to the floor without letting go of his sword.
Henry is saying something, but Richie can't catch it as consciousness flees, and, he thinks, life with it, at least for now. It's a relief that he gladly succumbs to.
He wakes up inside propped up a bit on a bed, his borrowed and ruined shirt stripped off him. Richie rolls to the side as he takes deep, shuddering breaths. His head is pounding once more, and he feels like he's been in the sun for hours, with his throat dry and skin burned. Not the relief that being dead while injuries heal usually is.
"Here. Drink."
Henry's voice makes Richie startle, and it takes a moment before he can reach out to take the offered mug, which apparently holds lukewarm tea. Not a drink he usually likes, but right now, it tastes fantastic.
"You were dead again, for a while. No heartbeat, no breath." Henry is watching him with a smile that seems more relieved than anything else. Richie isn't sure what to make of that. "Did you dream?"
"I don't think so." Richie doesn't remember, but he could have. How, he doesn't know, since he was dead, and he shouldn't be able to dream while dead. Should he? "Why?"
"There's something between alive and dead, and it's strange and dream-like, and I remember no more than that. I don't think we're supposed to remember." Henry shakes his head. "Perhaps it's different if you were Immortal before this sort of gift, or if whoever brought you back is different from the one who did that favor for me."
Richie pushes himself upright, sitting on the edge of the bed after setting the mug on the bedside table. "Who was it that did... whatever this is to you?" If Henry even knows who it is.
"I have yet to find an answer to that, though it is perhaps that the lack of knowing is the price I pay for this continued and permanent living." Henry shrugs. "I try not to think too hard upon it."
Not knowing what - or who - has brought him back, or how, is something Richie doesn't think he could so easily accept, even if at the moment, he's not sure how he'd find out. Especially since Henry probably doesn't have as many answers as Jehan had implied he did. Just enough to know that it's probably something wierder than just being Immortal.
There's a repeat of the same sense of amusement he'd caught just before sparring with Henry, and the distinct impression it's not his own. Henry doesn't look to be nearly amused enough to fit what Richie's feeling, and there's something about it that feels different. He's not sure what, or how to put that difference in words, only that it's not something that fits what little he's seen of Henry, nor does it fit what he knows of Jehan.
Richie doesn't know how to figure it out, though, and he's certain Henry won't actually do much to help him find out who or how or why, so there's no point asking him more questions. And he still doesn't know what he wants to do about telling anyone - any Immortal - he knows that he's alive again, especially when he doesn't have any answers.
"Shall I leave you to whatever is occupying your thoughts?" Henry is smiling a little, and Richie lets out a brief laugh. "I will be here for a few weeks, at least. You can take time to let your questions come to you, if you wish."
"Yeah. That's probably a good idea." Richie slides off the bed as Henry stands, heading for the wardrobe as Henry leaves. A fresh shirt, even borrowed, makes him feel a little better, though he still feels unsettled.
He waits until Henry is out of earshot before he speaks. "So, are you going to keep me in the dark like Henry, or do I get a little more of a clue than someone who finds this all funny?"
"Everything can be amusing, if you look at it from the right angle. Terrifying, infuriating, heart-breaking, anything. If you can't find it amusing, it all becomes too much." As far as Richie can tell, it's his own reflection in the mirror next to the wardrobe speaking. Which means whoever or whatever it is, doesn't want to be seen. He thinks.
"You have a name?" Richie wonders if either Jehan or Henry would hear both sides of the conversation if they walked by the room right now.
"Yes." His reflection grins, mischief in its eyes.
"Are you going to tell me?" Richie crosses his arms, though his reflection doesn't echo the gesture, and it adds to the weirdness of this whole thing.
"No." A shrug. "You'll have to figure it out on your own. And I promise you can, since it hasn't been lost even to mortals."
"But it won't be easy, will it?" Richie shakes his head. Of course it won't be. Because when has anything ever been easy, other than dying?
His reflection grins at him, as if reading his thoughts, then there's another flash of amusement before it once more is just a reflection, not something being used by someone else. Leaving Richie with more questions than answers.
END