FIC: Everything of Worth (Sirius/James, PG-13, somewhat dark and strange)
Title: Everything of Worth
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Mainly Sirius/James, but other pairings implied
Disclaimer: HP obviously isn’t mine. Neither is Dory Previn, nor the couple of nursery rhyme/folk song thingys that I’ve plundered here.
Notes: Inspired by fleshdress’s fascinating AU, The Road to Hell, I’ve had a go at my own dark!Sirius. Possibly this will be completely incomprehensible. I’m not even sure what to warn for, really: it could be read as containing some incest, dub con/coercion, possible character death and underage sex, but nothing is made explicit. Yes, that would be nothing at all is made explicit. Actually, there is cross-dressing. A bit. Although it’s not clear if it’s really happening… That’s the only thing that’s definitely there.
Feedback: So, so welcome. I’d love to know if anyone actually understood, let alone liked it.
ETA: the funny punctuation is a stylistic choice. Please don't let it stop you from reading!
oh no he isn’t crying, oh no, no, no. it is early in the morning, too early to be awake
but he is awake, sitting up, silent, not crying, hardly thinking at all. he remembers when they went up the tower at midnight,
it was a ritual, some kind of ritual of adolescence that he doesn’t recall, in detail, any longer - the room is dark still,
even though it is not actually night, but morning, only very early, and very cold. it was some kind of ritual, James had taken both of his hands in warmer, larger ones - but not too much larger, only enough that you were safe, never overwhelming - nobody else is awake at this hour, not even the birds.
be silent, be silent, and they won’t ever wake up. if they awaken and speak to you, then you will not be able to hold back your tears any longer. draw your breath silently, try not to disturb even one mote of dust lying over the beds, try to be gentle as a shadow as you sit there.
tomorrow, perhaps, when everybody has come back, he will paint his eyes with black kohl, careful line, careful delicate line, smudge and ruin, I-just-woke-up it says. such beautiful eyes, little Sirius, such dark, tricksy eyes you have.
perhaps there will be hats in black velvet and soft fur and red satin,
perhaps a dress tight and loose in all the wrong places, silk and strange,
perhaps the scent-soft grease of red to stain his mouth,
perhaps they will all sing. sometimes they used to do that. things used to be so easy.
tomorrow, he thinks - it is all that he thinks - everyone will come back, the light will trickle in half-hearted through grimy glass and James will start complaining. is it too far away, or still too soon? how many years ago was it, when they sang? can you remember a song, my child? he can remember a song. where are you going to, my pretty maid… where have you flown to, ladybird, ladybird? your house is on fire, your children are gone. it is not the song that he remembers.
when they went up to the tower at midnight, James would - wouldn’t he? - say that it would always be like this, would never change.
and it has not changed. you always woke before they did, call it wariness, mayhap, because when you were seven you woke and she was in your room watching you grow, she said. call it a greater hunger for being awake than they would ever understand, the others. so it has not changed. soon they will wake and you will have to find a smile for them. you have flown, but where, where? kind of sort of cabaret, they did, they used to do. I have flown
to star-stained heights on bent and battered wings.
he is thirsty,
his throat itches and bleeds with thirst, itches, bleeds, cracks with caresses
because perhaps he has sung too much. should he let someone else have a turn? on second thoughts, sharing had never turned out well. he hadn’t wanted to, she’d just… intruded. because he’d already said it would always be like this, would never change. he wouldn’t have lied. why will you think like this? why will you not give us another song?
when it was June there were roses, he wants to say, but the words are too heavy for his mouth, they would not hold up for one minute in the thin air, no they would not. is he enchanted now? because nothing happens without some explanation, he has learnt: even if it is only in your blood, your blood a thousand years old, more pure than mercury. where can he go, now, even if he can ever summon the strength to rise at all? in search of mythical kings, mythical kings, whispers your mind, under its breath
among his lands - for surely they are his lands now - is a lake, the waters gleaming black and pellucid under swelling northern clouds, a lake where he might have drowned, once upon a time, maybe, long ago. you will sing, and you will dance, and you will be merry in the caverns under the water. remembrance is like ash seldom-scattered, over some white Italian balcony of the eighteenth century, somewhere they would have travelled to, if all were as it should be, if there were loving parents to kiss them and say farewell, farewell my son, travel well, be safe and be joyous.
or like the false coins of sleep laid gently over tired eyes. where can he go, now?
down down down
there are caverns, he thinks, somewhere under the water.
there is nothing at all for him to be afraid of any more, even when formed grass can be seen creeping he knows it will not bring harm, everyone is around him, everyone sleeps but him. he is bruised all over on the inside, painted and dressed for the morning when the sacrifice will happen, relaxed in the middle of all this dust.
he sits in the centre of stillness,
he sleeps on the green island where all our princes live. how swift his hand to strike, how tender his look!
he thinks of all their rituals, how no month dared pass unnoticed, as if all the time they were waiting to lose each other, as if all the time they had known that it would all go wrong, because there are secrets, he knows, in the blood that cannot ever be slain, that will persist when friendship and everything else is gone away. did they ask him to sing, was there a choice, or did he simply draw the first breath and make it all inevitable? he tries to remember a song, but there is only silence.
sure that everything of worth
is in the sky and not the earth
and I never learned
to make my way
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Mainly Sirius/James, but other pairings implied
Disclaimer: HP obviously isn’t mine. Neither is Dory Previn, nor the couple of nursery rhyme/folk song thingys that I’ve plundered here.
Notes: Inspired by fleshdress’s fascinating AU, The Road to Hell, I’ve had a go at my own dark!Sirius. Possibly this will be completely incomprehensible. I’m not even sure what to warn for, really: it could be read as containing some incest, dub con/coercion, possible character death and underage sex, but nothing is made explicit. Yes, that would be nothing at all is made explicit. Actually, there is cross-dressing. A bit. Although it’s not clear if it’s really happening… That’s the only thing that’s definitely there.
Feedback: So, so welcome. I’d love to know if anyone actually understood, let alone liked it.
ETA: the funny punctuation is a stylistic choice. Please don't let it stop you from reading!
oh no he isn’t crying, oh no, no, no. it is early in the morning, too early to be awake
but he is awake, sitting up, silent, not crying, hardly thinking at all. he remembers when they went up the tower at midnight,
it was a ritual, some kind of ritual of adolescence that he doesn’t recall, in detail, any longer - the room is dark still,
even though it is not actually night, but morning, only very early, and very cold. it was some kind of ritual, James had taken both of his hands in warmer, larger ones - but not too much larger, only enough that you were safe, never overwhelming - nobody else is awake at this hour, not even the birds.
be silent, be silent, and they won’t ever wake up. if they awaken and speak to you, then you will not be able to hold back your tears any longer. draw your breath silently, try not to disturb even one mote of dust lying over the beds, try to be gentle as a shadow as you sit there.
tomorrow, perhaps, when everybody has come back, he will paint his eyes with black kohl, careful line, careful delicate line, smudge and ruin, I-just-woke-up it says. such beautiful eyes, little Sirius, such dark, tricksy eyes you have.
perhaps there will be hats in black velvet and soft fur and red satin,
perhaps a dress tight and loose in all the wrong places, silk and strange,
perhaps the scent-soft grease of red to stain his mouth,
perhaps they will all sing. sometimes they used to do that. things used to be so easy.
tomorrow, he thinks - it is all that he thinks - everyone will come back, the light will trickle in half-hearted through grimy glass and James will start complaining. is it too far away, or still too soon? how many years ago was it, when they sang? can you remember a song, my child? he can remember a song. where are you going to, my pretty maid… where have you flown to, ladybird, ladybird? your house is on fire, your children are gone. it is not the song that he remembers.
when they went up to the tower at midnight, James would - wouldn’t he? - say that it would always be like this, would never change.
and it has not changed. you always woke before they did, call it wariness, mayhap, because when you were seven you woke and she was in your room watching you grow, she said. call it a greater hunger for being awake than they would ever understand, the others. so it has not changed. soon they will wake and you will have to find a smile for them. you have flown, but where, where? kind of sort of cabaret, they did, they used to do. I have flown
to star-stained heights on bent and battered wings.
he is thirsty,
his throat itches and bleeds with thirst, itches, bleeds, cracks with caresses
because perhaps he has sung too much. should he let someone else have a turn? on second thoughts, sharing had never turned out well. he hadn’t wanted to, she’d just… intruded. because he’d already said it would always be like this, would never change. he wouldn’t have lied. why will you think like this? why will you not give us another song?
when it was June there were roses, he wants to say, but the words are too heavy for his mouth, they would not hold up for one minute in the thin air, no they would not. is he enchanted now? because nothing happens without some explanation, he has learnt: even if it is only in your blood, your blood a thousand years old, more pure than mercury. where can he go, now, even if he can ever summon the strength to rise at all? in search of mythical kings, mythical kings, whispers your mind, under its breath
among his lands - for surely they are his lands now - is a lake, the waters gleaming black and pellucid under swelling northern clouds, a lake where he might have drowned, once upon a time, maybe, long ago. you will sing, and you will dance, and you will be merry in the caverns under the water. remembrance is like ash seldom-scattered, over some white Italian balcony of the eighteenth century, somewhere they would have travelled to, if all were as it should be, if there were loving parents to kiss them and say farewell, farewell my son, travel well, be safe and be joyous.
or like the false coins of sleep laid gently over tired eyes. where can he go, now?
down down down
there are caverns, he thinks, somewhere under the water.
there is nothing at all for him to be afraid of any more, even when formed grass can be seen creeping he knows it will not bring harm, everyone is around him, everyone sleeps but him. he is bruised all over on the inside, painted and dressed for the morning when the sacrifice will happen, relaxed in the middle of all this dust.
he sits in the centre of stillness,
he sleeps on the green island where all our princes live. how swift his hand to strike, how tender his look!
he thinks of all their rituals, how no month dared pass unnoticed, as if all the time they were waiting to lose each other, as if all the time they had known that it would all go wrong, because there are secrets, he knows, in the blood that cannot ever be slain, that will persist when friendship and everything else is gone away. did they ask him to sing, was there a choice, or did he simply draw the first breath and make it all inevitable? he tries to remember a song, but there is only silence.
sure that everything of worth
is in the sky and not the earth
and I never learned
to make my way