Rocky Road, "Basement" -- "Dark Places"
Author: Kowareta
Challenge: Rocky Road, “Basement”
Title: “Dark Places”
Word Count: 1,134
Rating: PG-13
Story: EndFiction
A/N: Introducing Mr. Spiderwick and the very beginning of Adrienne's coffee addiction. Adrienne hangs out with a lot of dudes who are creepers. A lot a lot of creepers.
Adrienne flipped through the Necromancy journal, her eyes glued to the pages, one hand on the book, one hand clenching the handle on her mug of coffee. There were her own personal notebooks off to the side of the desk with neat cursive script with important notes scribbled in the margins and five more leather bound journals stacked beside them.
She sat at a desk in the basement in Mr. Spiderwick’s workshop and behind her is a cadaver. It isn’t hers and she doesn’t like it, but Mr. Spiderwick insists on keeping it. It is always here and the star-eater gets cranky whenever it is touched. Sometimes new cadavers would come to be operated on (“At least they are dead,” Ruen told her darkly once, which was all she would say on the matter.”) but this particular one is never touched. He lays there, mouth agape, with a sheet pulled up to his shoulders.
Whenever Adrienne was in the basement, she wondered if this particular corpse had a personal connection to Mr. Spiderwick. They looked nothing alike-they can’t be related. The dead man is well-built, stocky, and blonde; he was probably an athlete at some point in time, possibly died as one. His clothes, hat, and shoes lay in the corner of the room, his jacket hung up on a precisely hammered nail, just as if he lived here and would come down any minute for it when he felt the weather was chilly. His last possessions were in the very desk Adrienne was sitting at, which consisted of an empty wallet, a stick of gum, and a paper clip.
Where do you go when you have an empty wallet, a piece of gum, and a paper clip? Adrienne wondered.
Conversely The star-eater was tall, sickly thin, with sharp cheekbones and hollowed eyes. He was balding on top but had a crown of long, curly white hair that reached just above his shoulders. And he never wore hats. Mr. Spiderwick despised hats.
Adrienne wondered a lot about the boy under the cloth in the basement, and she worried about the others that Mr. Spiderwick brought down. Instruments lined the walls, all terrifying, most sharp. Adrienne talked to a woman once, who lived in a wall, who praised Mr. Spiderwick for his help and his work. Sometimes, Adrienne just wished she knew what it was that he did so that it didn’t look like he was a serial killer.
That was why she was here, right now. She was snooping for evidence, for records, for anything that might give her a clue to Mr. Spiderwick’s profession. But then… she’d found the journals and the snooping stopped. She’d sat down, on the floor where she found them and made her way through the first one in under an hour, pale fingers turning aged pages written in tight, concise script. Halfway through the second one she went upstairs, grabbed her notebooks, and made coffee, taking very special care not to wake Ruen, who slept in the fireplace, or Vesa, who slept in the attic, but who had uncanny hearing.
She moved to the desk crammed into the corner of the room near the floor lamp. She kept reading and continued until her coffee grew cold from inattention. In the journals, there were instructions, recipes, insignia, incantations, Wizard’s Circles, theories, tests, conclusions, facts, and names. Names of pets, names of children, names of adults-humans, witches, wizards, it didn’t matter-, names of Nagas, Valkyries, the antlered, and even a dragon. Names of those who… were successes.
“It’s an addiction,” said a voice from over her shoulder. Adrienne jumped, hands on desk, and nearly spilled coffee all over the journals.
Whirling around, Adrienne found herself face to face with Mr. Spiderwick, his beady black eyes staring at her mug of coffee. He nods at it.
Adrienne sighed in relief, hand on chest, and picked up the mug.
“I thought you were… gone.”
Adrienne knew that Mr. Spiderwick was never gone. After the will-reading, Mr.Spiderwick was bound to the house, but Adrienne knew that he had other… talents. Talents neither she nor Ruen knew the true extent of.
“The stars are bright tonight, Miss Adrienne,” said Mr. Spiderwick, picking up an incision tool from the tray closest to the nearest corpse. He inspects it, as though looking for its soul, and carefully turns it over and watches the way the basement lights reflect. “They seem to call to me.”
He looked at her, still holding the tiny blade. “You’re reading my necromancy journals.”
Adrienne turned around in her chair uncomfortably, put down the mug, and looked at and closed the journals.
“I’m sorry, I really shouldn’t have-“
“Read them,” interrupted the star-eater, putting down the instrument. “Enjoy them like I have enjoyed them. Love them. Use them even. Be careful, however. Those journals wander dark places and sometimes there is no coming back. Once you walk that starless path and the dark claws its home into your skin, you lose a part of you that you can never get back. Or you lose a part of someone else.”
Adrienne stood up, pushing the chair in under the desk.
“Oh, no, that’s alright, um, they’re yours. I-I shouldn’t have touched them at all anyway. Really.”
Mr.Spiderwick reached over her, gathered the books, and dropped them in her arms. He steadied her when she nearly fell over. Gray hands on her shoulders, bone-thin fingers digging into her flesh. He gives her a smile.
“Read them,” he said with deliberate concession. “You want to. Everyone wants to sometime in their lives.”
He stared at her expectantly with eyes Adrienne would swear could see into her very core.
Adrienne also swore that sometimes you could see the universe in those eyes, which wasn’t nearly as romantic as it should be. There were a thousand lonely planets with a thousand lonely stars all of which burned bright and hot and sad.
“O-Okay,” she said.
With his hands still on her shoulders he steered her out the door and up the creaking steps. Before he turns right around to the basement, the star-eater leans over and whispers in her ear.
“Just make sure they don’t find their way into Bhavishya’s library or into the… wrong hands, alright, Miss Adrienne? And give up the coffee, you indulge in it far too often as of late.”
He gives her a friendly pat on the back and then leaves.
“Whose hands would those be?” Adrienne asked when Mr.Spiderwick was out of earshot. She rounded the hallway and walked into the living room just as Ruen crawled out of the fireplace. The demon spotted Adrienne and grinned.
“Oh,” said Adrienne. “Right.”
When she woke in the morning the next day she discovered her coffee mug, cleaned, washed, and with teabags beside it.
-Kowareta
Challenge: Rocky Road, “Basement”
Title: “Dark Places”
Word Count: 1,134
Rating: PG-13
Story: EndFiction
A/N: Introducing Mr. Spiderwick and the very beginning of Adrienne's coffee addiction. Adrienne hangs out with a lot of dudes who are creepers. A lot a lot of creepers.
Adrienne flipped through the Necromancy journal, her eyes glued to the pages, one hand on the book, one hand clenching the handle on her mug of coffee. There were her own personal notebooks off to the side of the desk with neat cursive script with important notes scribbled in the margins and five more leather bound journals stacked beside them.
She sat at a desk in the basement in Mr. Spiderwick’s workshop and behind her is a cadaver. It isn’t hers and she doesn’t like it, but Mr. Spiderwick insists on keeping it. It is always here and the star-eater gets cranky whenever it is touched. Sometimes new cadavers would come to be operated on (“At least they are dead,” Ruen told her darkly once, which was all she would say on the matter.”) but this particular one is never touched. He lays there, mouth agape, with a sheet pulled up to his shoulders.
Whenever Adrienne was in the basement, she wondered if this particular corpse had a personal connection to Mr. Spiderwick. They looked nothing alike-they can’t be related. The dead man is well-built, stocky, and blonde; he was probably an athlete at some point in time, possibly died as one. His clothes, hat, and shoes lay in the corner of the room, his jacket hung up on a precisely hammered nail, just as if he lived here and would come down any minute for it when he felt the weather was chilly. His last possessions were in the very desk Adrienne was sitting at, which consisted of an empty wallet, a stick of gum, and a paper clip.
Where do you go when you have an empty wallet, a piece of gum, and a paper clip? Adrienne wondered.
Conversely The star-eater was tall, sickly thin, with sharp cheekbones and hollowed eyes. He was balding on top but had a crown of long, curly white hair that reached just above his shoulders. And he never wore hats. Mr. Spiderwick despised hats.
Adrienne wondered a lot about the boy under the cloth in the basement, and she worried about the others that Mr. Spiderwick brought down. Instruments lined the walls, all terrifying, most sharp. Adrienne talked to a woman once, who lived in a wall, who praised Mr. Spiderwick for his help and his work. Sometimes, Adrienne just wished she knew what it was that he did so that it didn’t look like he was a serial killer.
That was why she was here, right now. She was snooping for evidence, for records, for anything that might give her a clue to Mr. Spiderwick’s profession. But then… she’d found the journals and the snooping stopped. She’d sat down, on the floor where she found them and made her way through the first one in under an hour, pale fingers turning aged pages written in tight, concise script. Halfway through the second one she went upstairs, grabbed her notebooks, and made coffee, taking very special care not to wake Ruen, who slept in the fireplace, or Vesa, who slept in the attic, but who had uncanny hearing.
She moved to the desk crammed into the corner of the room near the floor lamp. She kept reading and continued until her coffee grew cold from inattention. In the journals, there were instructions, recipes, insignia, incantations, Wizard’s Circles, theories, tests, conclusions, facts, and names. Names of pets, names of children, names of adults-humans, witches, wizards, it didn’t matter-, names of Nagas, Valkyries, the antlered, and even a dragon. Names of those who… were successes.
“It’s an addiction,” said a voice from over her shoulder. Adrienne jumped, hands on desk, and nearly spilled coffee all over the journals.
Whirling around, Adrienne found herself face to face with Mr. Spiderwick, his beady black eyes staring at her mug of coffee. He nods at it.
Adrienne sighed in relief, hand on chest, and picked up the mug.
“I thought you were… gone.”
Adrienne knew that Mr. Spiderwick was never gone. After the will-reading, Mr.Spiderwick was bound to the house, but Adrienne knew that he had other… talents. Talents neither she nor Ruen knew the true extent of.
“The stars are bright tonight, Miss Adrienne,” said Mr. Spiderwick, picking up an incision tool from the tray closest to the nearest corpse. He inspects it, as though looking for its soul, and carefully turns it over and watches the way the basement lights reflect. “They seem to call to me.”
He looked at her, still holding the tiny blade. “You’re reading my necromancy journals.”
Adrienne turned around in her chair uncomfortably, put down the mug, and looked at and closed the journals.
“I’m sorry, I really shouldn’t have-“
“Read them,” interrupted the star-eater, putting down the instrument. “Enjoy them like I have enjoyed them. Love them. Use them even. Be careful, however. Those journals wander dark places and sometimes there is no coming back. Once you walk that starless path and the dark claws its home into your skin, you lose a part of you that you can never get back. Or you lose a part of someone else.”
Adrienne stood up, pushing the chair in under the desk.
“Oh, no, that’s alright, um, they’re yours. I-I shouldn’t have touched them at all anyway. Really.”
Mr.Spiderwick reached over her, gathered the books, and dropped them in her arms. He steadied her when she nearly fell over. Gray hands on her shoulders, bone-thin fingers digging into her flesh. He gives her a smile.
“Read them,” he said with deliberate concession. “You want to. Everyone wants to sometime in their lives.”
He stared at her expectantly with eyes Adrienne would swear could see into her very core.
Adrienne also swore that sometimes you could see the universe in those eyes, which wasn’t nearly as romantic as it should be. There were a thousand lonely planets with a thousand lonely stars all of which burned bright and hot and sad.
“O-Okay,” she said.
With his hands still on her shoulders he steered her out the door and up the creaking steps. Before he turns right around to the basement, the star-eater leans over and whispers in her ear.
“Just make sure they don’t find their way into Bhavishya’s library or into the… wrong hands, alright, Miss Adrienne? And give up the coffee, you indulge in it far too often as of late.”
He gives her a friendly pat on the back and then leaves.
“Whose hands would those be?” Adrienne asked when Mr.Spiderwick was out of earshot. She rounded the hallway and walked into the living room just as Ruen crawled out of the fireplace. The demon spotted Adrienne and grinned.
“Oh,” said Adrienne. “Right.”
When she woke in the morning the next day she discovered her coffee mug, cleaned, washed, and with teabags beside it.
-Kowareta