Dæmonverse AAU (7-8/16)
Title: Principles of Growth
Author: dominus_trinus
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Chase, House/Wilson (established).
Genre: Alternate alternate universe, à la Pullman's His Dark Materials.
Summary: Secrets and stories shared among heretics.
Notes: My sincere thanks to ruby_took for various R & D conversations and assuring me this story wasn't too bizarre to post, and to bluerosefairy for the truly excellent beta.
Coming a Terrible Storm
Dad’s out again-yet another conference, and Robert is grateful: if Mum’s depressed when he’s gone, it’s worse when he’s home.
One thing to ignore them by not being there; another to be there and do it on purpose. Oh, he’ll promise all kinds of things-‘We’ll have a night out, Anne,’-he never uses her proper name-‘just the two of us.’ Or sometimes it’ll be, ‘Of course I’d love to come to your football match, Robert,’ but he never, never follows through.
Robert’s learnt his father’s word isn’t worth anything, and that takes some of the sting out of the disappointment. Mum still feels it full-strength, because a long time ago-before there was a marriage or Robert was even planned-Dad made promises and kept them.
At least, she says that’s how it was. It’s hard to imagine, but there has to be some reason she married him in the first place.
Love is blind, Kylie says, her cat’s eyes glowing like twin lamps in the dark. It makes you marry people you shouldn’t even trust.
In Mum’s stories, the God and Goddess love each other, and neither one of them gets locked up and controlled by the other. They’re equals.
Maybe that’s how love’s supposed to be, but it’s not how it actually works: he knows deep down that marrying Dad, staying with him, was the most stupid thing Mum ever did.
She’s never been happy, really-well, when she’s being herself, teaching him in Circle-then she’s happy. But all the rest of the time…she’s too quiet, looks sad. Zeru spends more and more time away from her-“Visiting my sisters,” she says-and it’s rare that he finds them together when he gets home from school.
She’s not sleeping well, either: he went to bed at least an hour ago, but he can hear her moving around downstairs, even without using Kylie’s ears; and it’s been that way all week. But tonight…
She’s talking to someone, he says, straining to catch the sound of the second, unfamiliar voice. It’s quiet, but Kylie can tell it’s male and pick up the rises and falls. They’re not close enough to get the words. Come on, he tells her, slipping as quietly as he can out of bed. I want to hear.
They pad into the hallway, and Kylie moves to the top of the stairs. Now the words are clear, not just the tones.
“-romeda, please!” It’s the male voice speaking, low but intense, and he guesses it’s one of her sisters’ dæmons. “What in Artemis’ name are you staying for?”
Definitely one of her sisters’ dæmons: her clan uses the Greek names for the Goddess and God. Tradition, rooted in something to do with the history between England and Australia. (He hadn't paid complete attention when she'd explained it.)
“It would be one thing if the man were reasonable,” the dæmon continues, “but he has you all but locked up in this damned-”
“You know exactly why I’m staying, and you can tell Callisto: Rowan has nothing to do with it and hasn’t for years.”
“Then it’s the child.”
He creeps a little closer, reaches out to pet Kylie’s fur, satin-soft warmth under his hand. They’re talking about him, and it makes him nervous.
“I don’t owe my husband anything, but I won’t walk out on Robert. He needs me and I need him.”
“So take him with you!” the dæmon insists. “He doesn’t care about his father any more than you do; he’s not going to fight about it. Tell him to get his things together, wrap him up warm and come home.”
“We can’t.” Zeru’s voice now, mixed frustration and pain. “Rowan-he’d come home and find us gone eventually. He might let us go, but he’d hunt us down if we took Robert, too.”
Then it’s his fault: he’s the one she’s staying for; he’s the reason she’s miserable. He takes Kylie into his arms, clutches her against him and tries to swallow the painful lump in his throat.
“Then hunt him first,” the dæmon says coldly. “You could do it any number of ways-cut his throat, take your bow and shoot him-or if you want to be subtle, there’re foxgloves in the yard; make a strong tea of the leaves of the upper stem and his heart would-”
“I’m not going to murder my husband just because I’m homesick!”
“You’re not homesick, you’re heartsick-and if you don’t stop this charade and remember who and what you really are, the captivity is going to kill you.”
He bites his lip hard to stifle a cry, thinks that if it’s going to be a choice between Mum’s life and Dad’s-well, that’s no choice at all.
We’re the only one stopping her, Kylie says. So…maybe we can convince her to go. Without us.
The idea of Dad as his only parent until he’s old enough to go to university and take care of himself makes him feel sick, but he’d rather have Mum gone and alive, and she could send Zeru to visit him sometimes… And he can go back to her once he’s grown up, because then Dad won’t have a say in what he does.
It’ll be all right.
“I appreciate your concern,” Mum says in clipped tones, “but this is my life now and I’m not turning away from it.”
“’Meda…” The dæmon’s voice is pleading, but Mum won’t budge.
“Go,” Zeru says. “We love you and we know you mean well, but-go.”
He doesn’t hear the rustle of departing wings, but the dæmon must have left, because he hears Mum shutting the window with a scrape and a clunk as it settles into the frame. He lets Kylie go, and they move downstairs. Mum hears them and looks up.
“Robert? What are you doing up? You were supposed to be in bed over an hour ago-”
“You were talking,” he says. “I didn’t recognize the voice.”
“Aeolus,” Mum says, sinking onto a chair. Zeru rises to perch on its arm. “My sister Callisto’s dæmon. A raven,” she adds as an afterthought.
He sits down on the ottoman in front of the chair, and Kylie springs lightly onto his lap. His stomach feels like it’s tied in a knot, and he knows she’s tempted to take her glider shape and hide, reflecting his fear. “We were listening when you were talking to him,” she says instead. “And he was right. You should go.”
“Oh, Robert…” She reaches forward, clasps his shoulder. “Callisto means well, really, but she’s not always-”
“She is right!” He shrugs her hand off, surges to his feet so Kylie falls to the floor, whisper-light as she lands on her paws. “You’re miserable in this house; and if your sisters aren’t here enough to see it, I bloody well am!”
“Language,” Zeru chides, but he’s not listening. His heart skips and Kylie’s a dingo, fur bristling and teeth bared.
“You’re not supposed to be stuck inside pretending to be what you’re not! And except when we’re in Circle, you’re-”
“Robert-”
“-sticking everything that’s important to you in the closet, like it doesn’t even matter-”
“Of course it matters!” she says sharply, shocking him silent. Then, letting the edge go out of her tone, “It matters. But whatever else I am, I will always be your mother first. And I will not walk or run or fly away from that.”
“Not even to save your life?”
She sighs. “Robert, Callisto’s always been a bit dramatic. It’s nothing to worry a-”
“But what if she’s right?” he shouts. “What if she’s right and you just let him keep you in here like-like furniture or something and I lose you because you were too stubborn to get out when you had the chance?”
She’s reaching out again, trying to gather him close, make him be quiet, but he steps back. Kylie’s making an eerie sub-vocal keening sound and he feels himself shaking, like there’s something inside him trying to get loose, and he’s too upset to ground himself and stop it.
“If that happens it’ll be my fault!”
And with that the-whatever it is explodes outward, heat and pain and fury, and sends him rocking back on his heels-Kylie howls-and the picture window behind Mum cracks into a billion shards, coating the yard in what looks like fragments of ice.
For an endless moment everything is dead still, and then the world starts moving again and Mum rises and pulls him against her, her arms as safe a circle as anything she’s ever cast. His heartbeat catches again, but he doesn’t look up to see what Kylie is; it’s enough that Zeru’s comforting her like Mum is him.
“Did I do that?” he manages. He’s half-afraid of the answer: if he did, what if it happens again?
“You always were precocious,” Mum says. “Although this is a bit early for active magic…perhaps it’s developing differently in you than it generally would. It would balance out the late start…”
“You don’t know?”
“I know how it would go in a girl your age,” she says, “but that doesn’t seem to be the timetable you’re following. So I have to guess a little bit.”
“But you can fix it?”
“The window?” She laughs, shakes her head. “I’m afraid you did too thorough a job on it for that.”
“Not the window, us!” Kylie says. “We were upset and we didn’t ground the power and it exploded-”
“And that can sometimes happen,” Mum says calmly, looking over his shoulder at her. “Especially when you’re hurt and angry.” Letting him go, she takes his hands, gives them a reassuring squeeze. “When you’re a few years older-about when Kylie settles-we’ll be able to channel that power into something constructive. For now, though, the best thing to do is let me bind it.”
“Tie it up?”
“Put it away for a while, to keep you and everyone around you safe until you can control it.”
If it had just been a small thing that’d broken, he might have asked her to let him keep his new ability-some part of him is proud he’s managed to actually do something that showed up as more than just energy-but as it is, he knows better: that would be like letting him carry a bomb around. “All right.”
“Good.” Mum steps back, Zeru rising to perch on her shoulder, and he bends down to pick up Kylie. She’s in her glider form now: he’s not frightened anymore, but when he’s calming down she likes to be small enough to fit in his hands.
What’s she going to do about the window? Kylie asks.
She’ll come up with something, he says. Dad won’t be back for two more days, anyway; there’s time.
Mum leads the way into his room and flicks on the light. “Do you have string somewhere? Knots are the simplest way to do a binding spell.”
“What about the sewing basket?”
“Thread’s too fragile,” she says.
“Oh.” He pauses, thinking. “I haven’t got string, but…” He sets Kylie down and goes over to the closet, pulls out the pair of new (too small) sneakers Dad gave him as an apology for not showing up at last month’s school play and holds one up by the laces.
Mum laughs. “Not quite what I had in mind,” she says, “but close enough. You might as well use them for something.”
He works the lace out of the shoe and gives it to her. She closes her hand around it and murmurs something-probably a consecration, because anything he gets from Dad he automatically hates a little bit.
His sight flickers as he watches her-he learnt to see auras a little too well; he started about two years ago, and they’re bright and clear but he can’t control when he sees them and when he doesn’t-and he takes in her rainbow, bright yellow and green streaked with red, violet and deep blue. (There used to be silver, but it went away, and when he asked she didn’t answer why.)
The shoelace in her hands has black around it, which he knows is the color for binding.
“I need you to focus on that power, love. Exactly what it felt like before it broke loose.”
Kylie scampers up to sit on his shoulder, and he closes his eyes, concentrates on the memory of vibration, heat, control that snapped like a thread-and he feels Mum take his hands, press them together and tie the shoelace around them; then the subtle tugs of a series of knots. She’s chanting low under her breath, and this time he can hear:
“Let this power be restrained until the time it can be trained.”
She repeats that, Zeru’s voice joining hers, over and over and faster and faster until the words lose meaning, waver and blur into rhythmic sound; and then there’s a little shock of energy like unearthed static. Then they fall silent, Mum’s hands dropping, and he opens his eyes to see the loop of the shoelace tied loosely around his own, hints of vibrant red showing through the black. She slips it off and tucks it into a pocket of her dress (hard to see, since these aren’t the clothes Dad makes her wear, but she pointed out where they were once). “I’ll have to cast that every month or two until we can leave it off, but that’s all right; it doesn’t take long.”
“You’re sure it’s bound tight enough? The shoelace was sort of loose…”
“It’s just a symbol, Robert,” she says with a smile. “There was no need to cut your circulation off to make the spell work.” Turning, she pulls his covers back and pats the mattress. “Bed. And stay in it, this time.”
“Yes, Mum.” He gets in, and Kylie changes back into her cat form for sleep-small enough to hold on to comfortably and big enough that he doesn’t have to worry about hurting her if he moves around at night. She molds herself to his body and purrs so he can feel the faint, soothing vibration against his own chest, and Mum turns off the light and bends to press a kiss to his cheek.
“Mum?”
“Yes, love?”
“I’m sorry I yelled. And I’m sorry about the window.”
She sits down on the edge of the bed and reaches to rub gentle circles on his back. “The window doesn’t matter. I’m sorry I upset you enough that it broke.”
He’s quiet for a long moment, then, “I’m still scared for you.”
Her hand stills, and she sighs softly. “I wish I could take that fear away. It’s not your job to worry about me; it’s mine to worry about you.”
He wants to tell her that that’s silly, because he’s all right and she’s not; she’s the one who needs worrying about, but he doesn’t. “I wish Dad would forget all about us, and you could go home and take me with you.”
Kylie’s eyes can see her smile in the dark, but her voice is sad. “I know.”
He swallows hard, makes himself ask, “Was your sister right? Will staying here…?”
“No matter what,” she says, “I will never leave you.”
That’s not the same as ‘No.’ That’s an answer that sounds like one thing and means something else, and he’s not sure what the ‘something else’ is yet. “Promise?”
“Promise,” she says, and kisses him again before rising. “I love you, Robert.”
“I love you, too, Mum.”
He’s about to ask if she’ll sing his lullaby for him when the front door bangs open, and Dad’s voice carries up the stairs like a crash of thunder or breaking glass. “Anne! What the bloody hell happened to this window?”
Robert feels himself tense and Kylie's fur stand on end: why, why did he have to pick tonight to come home early?
“No matter what you hear him say,” Zeru warns him as Mum leaves the room, “stay in bed and don’t make noise.” Then he follows her, and Mum shuts the door.
Robert pulls the covers over his head, but he can still hear Dad’s voice.
“And what are you wearing? I told you to give up that heretical nonsense-suppose our son had seen you dressed like a-” He can’t even say it. “And breaking the window-how could you possibly have taken that for a sane idea? You might have-”
“It was necessary.”
“I say what is and isn’t necessary!”
Sing, please, he says to Kylie, so we can’t hear him.
He feels her nod, and then the lilting notes of Mum’s lullaby begin in his head and blot out everything else. Moon-glow lights the sky… Night songs play soft and low…
He doesn’t know whether the yelling stops before he falls asleep or after.
Faith, Hope and Love
“And you feel guilty she stayed for you,” Wilson says.
He doesn’t look up, but Kylie nudges his hand and he reaches to stroke her back, trying to calm himself with the touch. “Of course I do. It was always in her power to go; the only reason she didn’t-”
“Was that she never thought she could,” Wilson says simply.
“Of course she did! She-”
“Loved you,” he breaks in, still in that same level tone. “And when you love someone enough, you don’t care about risks to yourself.”
Chase meets his gaze, and Wilson asks, “Did you ever think what would’ve happened to you if she’d left you with your father?”
He hadn’t, actually; but before he can say as much, House answers for him. “The child-safety lock she’d put on your magic wasn’t going to last forever. If she’d gone and it had come off and you’d been with him-how long would it really have taken for him to piss you off enough that something else blew up?”
Hours, he thinks. Even less.
House doesn’t give him time to dwell on that; they all know the penalties for witchcraft. “Given your perfect control of your temper in face of my best provocation, I’m guessing you never learned to do that spell yourself.”
He shakes his head. “Mum couldn’t do magic when she was drunk. I had the binding for two or three years after she first cast it, but after that… I learnt to do without it.” Except that once, Kylie says grimly. We could’ve used it then.
“You learned to put yourself in an emotional choke-collar,” House says bluntly.
“It was either that or be a danger to myself, others and any breakable objects I came across.”
“Does it go off with any strong emotion, or just anger?”
“Anger’s the only one that’s problematic. Any other kind of upset ruins what control over the witch-sight I have and throws off my ability to focus on what little magic I can do, but I don’t need to worry about making things explode.” He’s quiet for a moment. “Should I keep going?”
“Take a break,” House says. “You want dinner?”
Wow, Kylie says. Taking away the pain puts him in a really good mood. I think we just caught him being hospitable.
He actually should eat; Mum taught him that’s what one does after any kind of large-scale work, and he hadn’t tried to pull off so much in nearly a decade. “Sure.”
House nods, then turns to Wilson. “Are you cooking, or are we ordering out?”
“Cooking,” Wilson says. “Remember? I spent an hour last night hunting down your crock-pot and put a stew in early this morning.”
“Oh, that’s what that was. I thought all the banging around was your goddamn hairdryer blowing a gasket.”
“Yes, because hairdryers are notorious for mimicking the melodious calls of kitchen implements.”
“It has multiple settings and an attachment-thingy. It can make whatever noise it wants.” He narrows his eyes at Wilson and adds, “And at seven A.M., I’m not lucid enough to know what I’m hearing anyhow.”
Rona half-bares her teeth, but her eyes are smiling, and Minerva reaches to bat her muzzle with a paw.
Are we seeing what I think we’re seeing? Kylie asks.
He knows what it looks like: the couples on television, that companionable fairytale image of a husband and wife, bickering without really meaning it. But…isn’t that just a fairytale?
Not with what he did for House, it’s not, Kylie says. You risk your soul for someone, it’s either out of insanity or love.
And Wilson’s not mad.
Goddess, no wonder he’d been in so much pain. Horror enough to lose a friend to that hell, but a partner… Not just someone you cared about, but someone you shared mind and heart, soul and body with…
He thinks back over the times he’s seen them together at work-they’re careful about personal space there, careful to give the appearance of compliance with societal norms, but with this new lens to look through…suddenly it’s obvious that they’re closer than mere friends are permitted to be.
“You’re together,” he says matter-of-factly.
They both tense. House straightens up, lifts his chin, squares his shoulders. “And?”
“And I think you trained him a little too well,” Wilson mutters, but House isn’t listening.
“Is there something wrong with that?” Narrowed eyes flash, dare him to find out what’ll happen if he says ‘Yes.’
“No,” he says, showing open hands in a pacifying gesture. “I just didn’t know, that’s all.”
Wilson raises his eyebrows, skeptical, but House nods slightly and relaxes. “The Pagan system doesn’t care.”
“No.” What it would have found perverted was his parents’ relationship, perfection on the surface and twisted into the bars of a cage underneath. “And neither do I.”
“’Course not,” House says cheerfully. “After all, a male witch is weirder than a same-sex couple.”
“Half-witch,” he corrects. “I age normally, I can’t fly, I haven’t been through a witch’s ordeal-”
“And yet you’re the most effective analgesic since the chemical coma,” House says. “Half’s enough.”
He smiles, pleased, because this is the first time it has been enough: always before, he was too much a witch to be human and too human to be a proper witch.
Sometimes he really has to wonder what Mum had been thinking. He can’t imagine being other than what he is and wouldn’t really want to be, but it had to have taken audacity worthy of House to decide to imbue an unborn son with magical power. Genetics, tradition, history had all said witches’ sons were meant to be human, and Mum had tossed it all aside.
After a minute House gets up, Minerva alongside for the first time all night, and he hears the sound of dishes and cutlery rattling around in the kitchen. Wilson turns to him.
“Is it difficult for you to do that?” he asks in a low voice. “Take the pain away?”
“Not as much as I thought it was going to be,” Chase answers. “But then, most of the practice I did years ago…his pain’s different.”
“How so?”
“He didn’t bring it on himself,” Kylie says. “So the effect might last longer than what we could do for Mum. At least, it was easier in the first place.”
“Would you be willing to do it again?” Rona asks.
“If he lets me,” Chase says. “It’s not that draining, and I don’t want him in pain any more than you do.” Every Vicodin House takes brings inevitable thoughts of hepatic failure, and if he’s plagued by those thoughts, it must be much worse for Wilson. “And it’d probably get easier with enough repetition, so I wouldn’t need an entire meditation beforehand.”
“This is the happiest I’ve seen him since…” Wilson doesn’t complete the thought, but he doesn’t need to. “Thank you.”
He looks down. “I wish I could do more. It’s not-”
“It’s relief that doesn’t do damage,” Wilson breaks in. “One or two fewer doses of Vicodin, a couple of hours when he’s not miserable and won’t do crazy, self-destructive things to take his mind off the pain. Don’t undervalue that.”
House’s return with the food, savory meat and vegetables with the utensils dropped unceremoniously into the dishes, saves him having to answer. As they eat (and House was absolutely right that Wilson’s an excellent cook), House complains about his clinic patients, Wilson shares a rare success story-a pediatric patient who’ll now live to see adulthood-and it’s comfortable. He doesn’t feel like he’s intruding or unwanted.
And by the time the table’s cleared and the dinner things put away, he’s calm enough to return to the couch and resume.
Continue...
Author’s Notes:
“Aeolus” (pronounced EE-o-lus) means ‘quick-moving, nimble.’ It was the name of the Greek god of the winds. Ravens symbolize transformation, magic, intelligence, perceptiveness, and cycles of death and rebirth.
The colors of Andromeda’s aura indicate intelligence, sensitivity, compassion, will, passion, spirituality, honesty and devotion. The missing silver would signify the divine feminine energies (illumination, creativity and intuition).
The full lyrics of Andromeda's lullaby can be read here. The tune it was based on is linked in that post.
Author: dominus_trinus
Rating: R
Characters/Pairings: Chase, House/Wilson (established).
Genre: Alternate alternate universe, à la Pullman's His Dark Materials.
Summary: Secrets and stories shared among heretics.
Notes: My sincere thanks to ruby_took for various R & D conversations and assuring me this story wasn't too bizarre to post, and to bluerosefairy for the truly excellent beta.
Coming a Terrible Storm
Dad’s out again-yet another conference, and Robert is grateful: if Mum’s depressed when he’s gone, it’s worse when he’s home.
One thing to ignore them by not being there; another to be there and do it on purpose. Oh, he’ll promise all kinds of things-‘We’ll have a night out, Anne,’-he never uses her proper name-‘just the two of us.’ Or sometimes it’ll be, ‘Of course I’d love to come to your football match, Robert,’ but he never, never follows through.
Robert’s learnt his father’s word isn’t worth anything, and that takes some of the sting out of the disappointment. Mum still feels it full-strength, because a long time ago-before there was a marriage or Robert was even planned-Dad made promises and kept them.
At least, she says that’s how it was. It’s hard to imagine, but there has to be some reason she married him in the first place.
Love is blind, Kylie says, her cat’s eyes glowing like twin lamps in the dark. It makes you marry people you shouldn’t even trust.
In Mum’s stories, the God and Goddess love each other, and neither one of them gets locked up and controlled by the other. They’re equals.
Maybe that’s how love’s supposed to be, but it’s not how it actually works: he knows deep down that marrying Dad, staying with him, was the most stupid thing Mum ever did.
She’s never been happy, really-well, when she’s being herself, teaching him in Circle-then she’s happy. But all the rest of the time…she’s too quiet, looks sad. Zeru spends more and more time away from her-“Visiting my sisters,” she says-and it’s rare that he finds them together when he gets home from school.
She’s not sleeping well, either: he went to bed at least an hour ago, but he can hear her moving around downstairs, even without using Kylie’s ears; and it’s been that way all week. But tonight…
She’s talking to someone, he says, straining to catch the sound of the second, unfamiliar voice. It’s quiet, but Kylie can tell it’s male and pick up the rises and falls. They’re not close enough to get the words. Come on, he tells her, slipping as quietly as he can out of bed. I want to hear.
They pad into the hallway, and Kylie moves to the top of the stairs. Now the words are clear, not just the tones.
“-romeda, please!” It’s the male voice speaking, low but intense, and he guesses it’s one of her sisters’ dæmons. “What in Artemis’ name are you staying for?”
Definitely one of her sisters’ dæmons: her clan uses the Greek names for the Goddess and God. Tradition, rooted in something to do with the history between England and Australia. (He hadn't paid complete attention when she'd explained it.)
“It would be one thing if the man were reasonable,” the dæmon continues, “but he has you all but locked up in this damned-”
“You know exactly why I’m staying, and you can tell Callisto: Rowan has nothing to do with it and hasn’t for years.”
“Then it’s the child.”
He creeps a little closer, reaches out to pet Kylie’s fur, satin-soft warmth under his hand. They’re talking about him, and it makes him nervous.
“I don’t owe my husband anything, but I won’t walk out on Robert. He needs me and I need him.”
“So take him with you!” the dæmon insists. “He doesn’t care about his father any more than you do; he’s not going to fight about it. Tell him to get his things together, wrap him up warm and come home.”
“We can’t.” Zeru’s voice now, mixed frustration and pain. “Rowan-he’d come home and find us gone eventually. He might let us go, but he’d hunt us down if we took Robert, too.”
Then it’s his fault: he’s the one she’s staying for; he’s the reason she’s miserable. He takes Kylie into his arms, clutches her against him and tries to swallow the painful lump in his throat.
“Then hunt him first,” the dæmon says coldly. “You could do it any number of ways-cut his throat, take your bow and shoot him-or if you want to be subtle, there’re foxgloves in the yard; make a strong tea of the leaves of the upper stem and his heart would-”
“I’m not going to murder my husband just because I’m homesick!”
“You’re not homesick, you’re heartsick-and if you don’t stop this charade and remember who and what you really are, the captivity is going to kill you.”
He bites his lip hard to stifle a cry, thinks that if it’s going to be a choice between Mum’s life and Dad’s-well, that’s no choice at all.
We’re the only one stopping her, Kylie says. So…maybe we can convince her to go. Without us.
The idea of Dad as his only parent until he’s old enough to go to university and take care of himself makes him feel sick, but he’d rather have Mum gone and alive, and she could send Zeru to visit him sometimes… And he can go back to her once he’s grown up, because then Dad won’t have a say in what he does.
It’ll be all right.
“I appreciate your concern,” Mum says in clipped tones, “but this is my life now and I’m not turning away from it.”
“’Meda…” The dæmon’s voice is pleading, but Mum won’t budge.
“Go,” Zeru says. “We love you and we know you mean well, but-go.”
He doesn’t hear the rustle of departing wings, but the dæmon must have left, because he hears Mum shutting the window with a scrape and a clunk as it settles into the frame. He lets Kylie go, and they move downstairs. Mum hears them and looks up.
“Robert? What are you doing up? You were supposed to be in bed over an hour ago-”
“You were talking,” he says. “I didn’t recognize the voice.”
“Aeolus,” Mum says, sinking onto a chair. Zeru rises to perch on its arm. “My sister Callisto’s dæmon. A raven,” she adds as an afterthought.
He sits down on the ottoman in front of the chair, and Kylie springs lightly onto his lap. His stomach feels like it’s tied in a knot, and he knows she’s tempted to take her glider shape and hide, reflecting his fear. “We were listening when you were talking to him,” she says instead. “And he was right. You should go.”
“Oh, Robert…” She reaches forward, clasps his shoulder. “Callisto means well, really, but she’s not always-”
“She is right!” He shrugs her hand off, surges to his feet so Kylie falls to the floor, whisper-light as she lands on her paws. “You’re miserable in this house; and if your sisters aren’t here enough to see it, I bloody well am!”
“Language,” Zeru chides, but he’s not listening. His heart skips and Kylie’s a dingo, fur bristling and teeth bared.
“You’re not supposed to be stuck inside pretending to be what you’re not! And except when we’re in Circle, you’re-”
“Robert-”
“-sticking everything that’s important to you in the closet, like it doesn’t even matter-”
“Of course it matters!” she says sharply, shocking him silent. Then, letting the edge go out of her tone, “It matters. But whatever else I am, I will always be your mother first. And I will not walk or run or fly away from that.”
“Not even to save your life?”
She sighs. “Robert, Callisto’s always been a bit dramatic. It’s nothing to worry a-”
“But what if she’s right?” he shouts. “What if she’s right and you just let him keep you in here like-like furniture or something and I lose you because you were too stubborn to get out when you had the chance?”
She’s reaching out again, trying to gather him close, make him be quiet, but he steps back. Kylie’s making an eerie sub-vocal keening sound and he feels himself shaking, like there’s something inside him trying to get loose, and he’s too upset to ground himself and stop it.
“If that happens it’ll be my fault!”
And with that the-whatever it is explodes outward, heat and pain and fury, and sends him rocking back on his heels-Kylie howls-and the picture window behind Mum cracks into a billion shards, coating the yard in what looks like fragments of ice.
For an endless moment everything is dead still, and then the world starts moving again and Mum rises and pulls him against her, her arms as safe a circle as anything she’s ever cast. His heartbeat catches again, but he doesn’t look up to see what Kylie is; it’s enough that Zeru’s comforting her like Mum is him.
“Did I do that?” he manages. He’s half-afraid of the answer: if he did, what if it happens again?
“You always were precocious,” Mum says. “Although this is a bit early for active magic…perhaps it’s developing differently in you than it generally would. It would balance out the late start…”
“You don’t know?”
“I know how it would go in a girl your age,” she says, “but that doesn’t seem to be the timetable you’re following. So I have to guess a little bit.”
“But you can fix it?”
“The window?” She laughs, shakes her head. “I’m afraid you did too thorough a job on it for that.”
“Not the window, us!” Kylie says. “We were upset and we didn’t ground the power and it exploded-”
“And that can sometimes happen,” Mum says calmly, looking over his shoulder at her. “Especially when you’re hurt and angry.” Letting him go, she takes his hands, gives them a reassuring squeeze. “When you’re a few years older-about when Kylie settles-we’ll be able to channel that power into something constructive. For now, though, the best thing to do is let me bind it.”
“Tie it up?”
“Put it away for a while, to keep you and everyone around you safe until you can control it.”
If it had just been a small thing that’d broken, he might have asked her to let him keep his new ability-some part of him is proud he’s managed to actually do something that showed up as more than just energy-but as it is, he knows better: that would be like letting him carry a bomb around. “All right.”
“Good.” Mum steps back, Zeru rising to perch on her shoulder, and he bends down to pick up Kylie. She’s in her glider form now: he’s not frightened anymore, but when he’s calming down she likes to be small enough to fit in his hands.
What’s she going to do about the window? Kylie asks.
She’ll come up with something, he says. Dad won’t be back for two more days, anyway; there’s time.
Mum leads the way into his room and flicks on the light. “Do you have string somewhere? Knots are the simplest way to do a binding spell.”
“What about the sewing basket?”
“Thread’s too fragile,” she says.
“Oh.” He pauses, thinking. “I haven’t got string, but…” He sets Kylie down and goes over to the closet, pulls out the pair of new (too small) sneakers Dad gave him as an apology for not showing up at last month’s school play and holds one up by the laces.
Mum laughs. “Not quite what I had in mind,” she says, “but close enough. You might as well use them for something.”
He works the lace out of the shoe and gives it to her. She closes her hand around it and murmurs something-probably a consecration, because anything he gets from Dad he automatically hates a little bit.
His sight flickers as he watches her-he learnt to see auras a little too well; he started about two years ago, and they’re bright and clear but he can’t control when he sees them and when he doesn’t-and he takes in her rainbow, bright yellow and green streaked with red, violet and deep blue. (There used to be silver, but it went away, and when he asked she didn’t answer why.)
The shoelace in her hands has black around it, which he knows is the color for binding.
“I need you to focus on that power, love. Exactly what it felt like before it broke loose.”
Kylie scampers up to sit on his shoulder, and he closes his eyes, concentrates on the memory of vibration, heat, control that snapped like a thread-and he feels Mum take his hands, press them together and tie the shoelace around them; then the subtle tugs of a series of knots. She’s chanting low under her breath, and this time he can hear:
“Let this power be restrained until the time it can be trained.”
She repeats that, Zeru’s voice joining hers, over and over and faster and faster until the words lose meaning, waver and blur into rhythmic sound; and then there’s a little shock of energy like unearthed static. Then they fall silent, Mum’s hands dropping, and he opens his eyes to see the loop of the shoelace tied loosely around his own, hints of vibrant red showing through the black. She slips it off and tucks it into a pocket of her dress (hard to see, since these aren’t the clothes Dad makes her wear, but she pointed out where they were once). “I’ll have to cast that every month or two until we can leave it off, but that’s all right; it doesn’t take long.”
“You’re sure it’s bound tight enough? The shoelace was sort of loose…”
“It’s just a symbol, Robert,” she says with a smile. “There was no need to cut your circulation off to make the spell work.” Turning, she pulls his covers back and pats the mattress. “Bed. And stay in it, this time.”
“Yes, Mum.” He gets in, and Kylie changes back into her cat form for sleep-small enough to hold on to comfortably and big enough that he doesn’t have to worry about hurting her if he moves around at night. She molds herself to his body and purrs so he can feel the faint, soothing vibration against his own chest, and Mum turns off the light and bends to press a kiss to his cheek.
“Mum?”
“Yes, love?”
“I’m sorry I yelled. And I’m sorry about the window.”
She sits down on the edge of the bed and reaches to rub gentle circles on his back. “The window doesn’t matter. I’m sorry I upset you enough that it broke.”
He’s quiet for a long moment, then, “I’m still scared for you.”
Her hand stills, and she sighs softly. “I wish I could take that fear away. It’s not your job to worry about me; it’s mine to worry about you.”
He wants to tell her that that’s silly, because he’s all right and she’s not; she’s the one who needs worrying about, but he doesn’t. “I wish Dad would forget all about us, and you could go home and take me with you.”
Kylie’s eyes can see her smile in the dark, but her voice is sad. “I know.”
He swallows hard, makes himself ask, “Was your sister right? Will staying here…?”
“No matter what,” she says, “I will never leave you.”
That’s not the same as ‘No.’ That’s an answer that sounds like one thing and means something else, and he’s not sure what the ‘something else’ is yet. “Promise?”
“Promise,” she says, and kisses him again before rising. “I love you, Robert.”
“I love you, too, Mum.”
He’s about to ask if she’ll sing his lullaby for him when the front door bangs open, and Dad’s voice carries up the stairs like a crash of thunder or breaking glass. “Anne! What the bloody hell happened to this window?”
Robert feels himself tense and Kylie's fur stand on end: why, why did he have to pick tonight to come home early?
“No matter what you hear him say,” Zeru warns him as Mum leaves the room, “stay in bed and don’t make noise.” Then he follows her, and Mum shuts the door.
Robert pulls the covers over his head, but he can still hear Dad’s voice.
“And what are you wearing? I told you to give up that heretical nonsense-suppose our son had seen you dressed like a-” He can’t even say it. “And breaking the window-how could you possibly have taken that for a sane idea? You might have-”
“It was necessary.”
“I say what is and isn’t necessary!”
Sing, please, he says to Kylie, so we can’t hear him.
He feels her nod, and then the lilting notes of Mum’s lullaby begin in his head and blot out everything else. Moon-glow lights the sky… Night songs play soft and low…
He doesn’t know whether the yelling stops before he falls asleep or after.
Faith, Hope and Love
“And you feel guilty she stayed for you,” Wilson says.
He doesn’t look up, but Kylie nudges his hand and he reaches to stroke her back, trying to calm himself with the touch. “Of course I do. It was always in her power to go; the only reason she didn’t-”
“Was that she never thought she could,” Wilson says simply.
“Of course she did! She-”
“Loved you,” he breaks in, still in that same level tone. “And when you love someone enough, you don’t care about risks to yourself.”
Chase meets his gaze, and Wilson asks, “Did you ever think what would’ve happened to you if she’d left you with your father?”
He hadn’t, actually; but before he can say as much, House answers for him. “The child-safety lock she’d put on your magic wasn’t going to last forever. If she’d gone and it had come off and you’d been with him-how long would it really have taken for him to piss you off enough that something else blew up?”
Hours, he thinks. Even less.
House doesn’t give him time to dwell on that; they all know the penalties for witchcraft. “Given your perfect control of your temper in face of my best provocation, I’m guessing you never learned to do that spell yourself.”
He shakes his head. “Mum couldn’t do magic when she was drunk. I had the binding for two or three years after she first cast it, but after that… I learnt to do without it.” Except that once, Kylie says grimly. We could’ve used it then.
“You learned to put yourself in an emotional choke-collar,” House says bluntly.
“It was either that or be a danger to myself, others and any breakable objects I came across.”
“Does it go off with any strong emotion, or just anger?”
“Anger’s the only one that’s problematic. Any other kind of upset ruins what control over the witch-sight I have and throws off my ability to focus on what little magic I can do, but I don’t need to worry about making things explode.” He’s quiet for a moment. “Should I keep going?”
“Take a break,” House says. “You want dinner?”
Wow, Kylie says. Taking away the pain puts him in a really good mood. I think we just caught him being hospitable.
He actually should eat; Mum taught him that’s what one does after any kind of large-scale work, and he hadn’t tried to pull off so much in nearly a decade. “Sure.”
House nods, then turns to Wilson. “Are you cooking, or are we ordering out?”
“Cooking,” Wilson says. “Remember? I spent an hour last night hunting down your crock-pot and put a stew in early this morning.”
“Oh, that’s what that was. I thought all the banging around was your goddamn hairdryer blowing a gasket.”
“Yes, because hairdryers are notorious for mimicking the melodious calls of kitchen implements.”
“It has multiple settings and an attachment-thingy. It can make whatever noise it wants.” He narrows his eyes at Wilson and adds, “And at seven A.M., I’m not lucid enough to know what I’m hearing anyhow.”
Rona half-bares her teeth, but her eyes are smiling, and Minerva reaches to bat her muzzle with a paw.
Are we seeing what I think we’re seeing? Kylie asks.
He knows what it looks like: the couples on television, that companionable fairytale image of a husband and wife, bickering without really meaning it. But…isn’t that just a fairytale?
Not with what he did for House, it’s not, Kylie says. You risk your soul for someone, it’s either out of insanity or love.
And Wilson’s not mad.
Goddess, no wonder he’d been in so much pain. Horror enough to lose a friend to that hell, but a partner… Not just someone you cared about, but someone you shared mind and heart, soul and body with…
He thinks back over the times he’s seen them together at work-they’re careful about personal space there, careful to give the appearance of compliance with societal norms, but with this new lens to look through…suddenly it’s obvious that they’re closer than mere friends are permitted to be.
“You’re together,” he says matter-of-factly.
They both tense. House straightens up, lifts his chin, squares his shoulders. “And?”
“And I think you trained him a little too well,” Wilson mutters, but House isn’t listening.
“Is there something wrong with that?” Narrowed eyes flash, dare him to find out what’ll happen if he says ‘Yes.’
“No,” he says, showing open hands in a pacifying gesture. “I just didn’t know, that’s all.”
Wilson raises his eyebrows, skeptical, but House nods slightly and relaxes. “The Pagan system doesn’t care.”
“No.” What it would have found perverted was his parents’ relationship, perfection on the surface and twisted into the bars of a cage underneath. “And neither do I.”
“’Course not,” House says cheerfully. “After all, a male witch is weirder than a same-sex couple.”
“Half-witch,” he corrects. “I age normally, I can’t fly, I haven’t been through a witch’s ordeal-”
“And yet you’re the most effective analgesic since the chemical coma,” House says. “Half’s enough.”
He smiles, pleased, because this is the first time it has been enough: always before, he was too much a witch to be human and too human to be a proper witch.
Sometimes he really has to wonder what Mum had been thinking. He can’t imagine being other than what he is and wouldn’t really want to be, but it had to have taken audacity worthy of House to decide to imbue an unborn son with magical power. Genetics, tradition, history had all said witches’ sons were meant to be human, and Mum had tossed it all aside.
After a minute House gets up, Minerva alongside for the first time all night, and he hears the sound of dishes and cutlery rattling around in the kitchen. Wilson turns to him.
“Is it difficult for you to do that?” he asks in a low voice. “Take the pain away?”
“Not as much as I thought it was going to be,” Chase answers. “But then, most of the practice I did years ago…his pain’s different.”
“How so?”
“He didn’t bring it on himself,” Kylie says. “So the effect might last longer than what we could do for Mum. At least, it was easier in the first place.”
“Would you be willing to do it again?” Rona asks.
“If he lets me,” Chase says. “It’s not that draining, and I don’t want him in pain any more than you do.” Every Vicodin House takes brings inevitable thoughts of hepatic failure, and if he’s plagued by those thoughts, it must be much worse for Wilson. “And it’d probably get easier with enough repetition, so I wouldn’t need an entire meditation beforehand.”
“This is the happiest I’ve seen him since…” Wilson doesn’t complete the thought, but he doesn’t need to. “Thank you.”
He looks down. “I wish I could do more. It’s not-”
“It’s relief that doesn’t do damage,” Wilson breaks in. “One or two fewer doses of Vicodin, a couple of hours when he’s not miserable and won’t do crazy, self-destructive things to take his mind off the pain. Don’t undervalue that.”
House’s return with the food, savory meat and vegetables with the utensils dropped unceremoniously into the dishes, saves him having to answer. As they eat (and House was absolutely right that Wilson’s an excellent cook), House complains about his clinic patients, Wilson shares a rare success story-a pediatric patient who’ll now live to see adulthood-and it’s comfortable. He doesn’t feel like he’s intruding or unwanted.
And by the time the table’s cleared and the dinner things put away, he’s calm enough to return to the couch and resume.
Continue...
Author’s Notes:
“Aeolus” (pronounced EE-o-lus) means ‘quick-moving, nimble.’ It was the name of the Greek god of the winds. Ravens symbolize transformation, magic, intelligence, perceptiveness, and cycles of death and rebirth.
The colors of Andromeda’s aura indicate intelligence, sensitivity, compassion, will, passion, spirituality, honesty and devotion. The missing silver would signify the divine feminine energies (illumination, creativity and intuition).
The full lyrics of Andromeda's lullaby can be read here. The tune it was based on is linked in that post.