losing the veil | part3/3
Title: Losing the Veil
Author: sunryder
Artist: artconserv
Verse: Sherlock BBC fusion
Word Count: 22,582
Rating: T
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock/Irene (offscreen), John/Sherlock (pre)
Warnings violence
Summary: John never would've suspected that there creatures out there in the world if he hadn't been shot. Of course, he never would've thought that knowing about those creatures would get him accused of murder either. And no one, absolutely no one, would ever have expected the Seer named Sherlock Holmes.
Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3
Go HERE, and make the biggest fuss that ever fussed over the art! It's stunning, and striking, and perfect.
John didn't see Mycroft for two days after their initial shouting match, and foolishly John thought that might be the end of it. And it was, until John stripped down to his pants and undershirt and curled up in bed, only to open his eyes and see Anthea had materialized out of nothing on top of the bed next to him. John groaned, "You couldn't have been visible before I got in bed?"
Anthea didn't both looking up from her phone, "I get my kicks where I can, Doctor."
John gave a pointed look to Anthea's short skirt and the miles of perfect leg that it revealed and replied, "I doubt I'm the best kick you can get."
"Mr. Holmes prefers that I restrain my flirting only to those that we can be sure will never be bought or convinced to report back on either of us for any reason."
"So, when I told the lads that Mycroft was a git and if I wasn't sure he'd disappear me I'd like to punch him in the face, that was a bad thing?"
Anthea gave a tiny smirk at that and replied, "I believe that is common enough information that you don't need to be concerned about revealing it."
John smiled, "Not that I'm not always happy to have a woman hangout out at my bedside, but is there something I can help you with?"
"Yes. You can consent to Mr. Holmes's request that you return to London."
"I'm pretty sure it wasn't a request," John snorted.
Anthea gave him a pointed and disapproving look. "It was, in fact, as polite a request as Mycroft Holmes is capable of managing."
"Well that's terrifying."
"Indeed. And yet, he made the attempt nonetheless."
"Uh huh. And why was Mr. Holmes attempting and failing to be polite to me?"
"The Oracle of London," she replied without looking up.
John buried his face in his pillow for a moment and silently wished that she could've sprung all this on him in the morning. Then he groaned, "And I suppose that means exactly what it sounded like?"
She quirked an eyebrow, "That the Oracle of London sent one of the most dangerous and powerful users of magic in her country to Afghanistan to retrieve you and bring you home?" She waited for John's replying grunt then finished, "Yes."
"And I don't suppose she decided to tell you why?"
"The Oracel did not see fit to reveal to Mr. Holmes the higher purpose behind your calling. However, if it is any consolation she has been very clear that you are to come home out of your own free will and choice rather than out of any bribery or blackmail on his part."
John looked at her in disbelief and Anthea shrugged, "He has had exceptional difficulty in adhering to those instructions. He has several plans involving your sister and her ex-wife, some good, some bad."
John popped up out of bed, "If you think-"
Anthea looked up from her blackberry just long enough to fix John with a look that she must have learned from Holmes that declared John was undoubtedly an idiot if he continued that sentence. She'd already explained to him that Mycroft was attempting to show restraint, there was no need for threats about how threatening him wouldn't work. John just sighed, "I belong here, Anthea. I'm not going back."
Anthea stood abruptly, and brushed out the nonexistent wrinkles in her jacket, "You are a far better man than I, Doctor Watson."
John snorted, "Any why is that?"
"Because I would spend the rest of my life wondering what it was fate had in store for me. What I might have been if I'd been willing to take the chance."
The woman instantly vanished into nothing, though it was difficult to disguise her presence when John's door seemingly opened of its own accord when she left. John heaved a great and irritated sigh and dropped back down on to the mattress, silently cursing because he knew she had got him.
XXXXX
The first thing John noticed when he regained consciousness was the smell. Or rather, the lack of it. He'd been captured before, imprisoned before, and places where they hold people prisoner don't smell like freshly laundered sheets. The second thing that John noticed -- which was really rather more disconcerting than the first -- was that he was naked. John sat up immediately, only to be confronted with a woman standing at the foot of his bed.
She was, John could admit, quite lovely, with a delicate green blouse that hugged her curves and a white skirt just short enough to show off her thighs but not nearly enough to be improper for a woman of her age. If John hadn't been unnerved by having nothing more than a sheet for protection, he certainly would have been by the way she was staring at him. Like Sherlock's ability to see straight into your soul, but she looked like she didn't want to know so much about John as she wanted to strip off his skin and wear it for a pair of boots. Which was quite concerning since John's lack of veil let him look at her know she wasn't just a beautiful woman, she was a rather powerful Succubus.
After a long moment of staring at one another across the length of the bed John fought the urge to draw the blankets up to his chest like the heroine of a BBC period drama and instead mildly asked, "I don't supposed you'd be willing to tell me where my pants are?"
That got him the smallest tick of a smile before she hiked up her skirt and began crawling on her knees up the bed. John had a brief moment to suppose she'd had practice with this sort of thing because she looked far more classy while doing it than John thought was possible, before he went to dive out of the bed, pants or no pants. Only, he found himself unable to move. With a quick word she'd bound John's hands to the headboard, keeping him sitting upright, and tendrils of magic holding his feet and thighs down right where they were. And best of all, his jaw was clamped shut preventing from the hope of screaming.
John tried very hard not to panic, but he couldn't stop himself from trying to press back and away from her. He'd seen soldiers die at the hands of Succubi and Incubi before, and it was a fate he wouldn't wish on anyone. Sometimes the spells protecting the doors and windows of hospitals would fail, and the demons would slip in, sucking the life out of patients who were already so close to death that the demon didn't even need sex, just one long kiss to end their life. (There'd been an Incubus in Afghanistan, there to kill patients that John had drug off the battlefield then spent twelve hours in surgery to put back together again. John had shot the bastard in cold blood and hadn't lost a moment's sleep.)
The woman settled herself on John's sheet-covered lap, skirt rucked up and thighs exposed, and began running her fingers through John's hair. Despite the fact he had been given only the slightest bit of room to maintain a struggle, he was working up a sweat, a sweat that the woman seemed to take great pleasure in. She titled forward, burying John's face in her breast while she gave an obscene sniff of his hair. She leaned forward and pressed her lips to John's ear, murmuring with hot breath on his skin, "You're not what I expected."
She dropped back to John's lap in what should've been a painfully arousing position, only in John's terror in couldn't even have pretended. "My dear Sherlock is not exactly one for people in general, let alone people who are quite so common. You're not handsome, you're not clever, you're not even inadvertently powerful. You're just human."
She'd left him enough freedom to twist his head away from her touch, which she seemed to be enjoying, so when she leaned in to kiss him with her obscenely red lips John had enough space to wrench his mouth away and ram his forehead into her nose. She reared back with the pain and quickly whipped around her elbow to smash into John's face. She caught him in the jaw, the force of the blow cutting open his lip on his teeth and sending a spray of blood down onto the sheets. She tightened her mental grip of John's face after that, holding him still while she leaned forward and licked up the thread of blood that was trailing down John's chin. She leaned back and spat the blood down with a sneer, "You don't even taste good. What could he possibly see in you?"
fxxx
The pressure on John's jaw decreased, letting him unclench his teeth just enough to mutter, "Sod off."
The woman gave him a leer of a smile before she pressed her mouth to John's and bit down on his bottom lip at the same moment she dug the knife-fine edge of one finger into John's chest. He tried to lean back from the shock, but her teeth dug into the tender flesh of his lip to keep him in place. After she'd made the mark, she ran her free hand through John's hair and crooned, “Don't you worry, Johnny-boy, the next one won't hurt any less,” and she buried her nail in again.
The doctor part of John was able to pull back from the experience and catalogue the injury. They were scalple-like cuts, clean and precise, slicing through muscle while managing not to nick the bone. John didn't like what the precision said about how many times she'd done this before. By the time she was done, there were three letters etched into the skin over John's heart, each throbbing and dribbling blood unable to clot. From upside down the two letters at the beginning and end appeared to be the same, both like uppercase L's with the vertical line tilted in, while the middle letter looked like a backwards F. Irene let John look his fill before she leaned forward and licked a long stripe up over the cuts, lapping up the blood and closing the wounds with her tongue
Finally she looked up and smirked, "Now Doctor Watson, lets try this again." John clenched his teeth and struggled against his inability to fight. Her nails lengthened into claws and she ran them along the side of John's face, scratching enough to make them felt but not enough to make him bleed this time. "I'm going to keep you here, little human, keep you tied to this bed and spend days sucking you dry until you regret that fate ever wanted a thing to do with you. Or," she paused and licked across his lips, "you can tell me now, and I can kill you quick."
John glowered at her, unwilling to use his little space to bother responding. The longer he held out the more likely that Sherlock would find him. She must've seen the resolve in his eyes, because she tutted, "Oh little human, he's not going to find you." She ran her hands through his hair, attempting and failing at faking the soothing gesture. "I know Sherlock's magic like I know every other aspect of him," she leered, "And I've kept this building from his Sight. He won't be able to find you until I change the runes on the windows to let him in."
John managed to glower at the woman, and she just leaned forward to suck on his earlobe, appreciating the way he fought, but couldn't pull back. And John did fight, because the most important thing in her mocking, the thing that John didn't think the woman didn't even realized that she'd admitted to, was that she assumed Sherlock was looking. she'd taken the precautions to keep Sherlock out, but those precautions meant she thought he would be trying, and the least John could do was try to stay alive as long as possible to give Sherlock a chance.
She ran her nails down John's chest and straight for the blanket that was keeping his lap covered and whispered, "I'll have every bit of you John Watson. Every bit of you that has sucked Sherlock in, every bit that makes you so special to the spirits. I'll take all that, and whatever it is that makes you worth notice, it'll be mine." She leaned in and licked a long stripe up John's cheek while she ran claws over the lowest part of his belly, "By the time I'm done I'll make you regret you'd ever been born."
Then, because the situation wasn't quite horrible enough, Mycroft's voice interrupted, "I'm sure the good Doctor already does."
The woman on him bared her teeth at John, teeth that rapidly devolved into fangs as she sprang off John's lap and straight for Mycroft's neck. Only she was struck mid-leap with the blunt end of his umbrella. John saw nothing special about the stick, but apparently there was magic to it because the woman went down like a bag of bricks. She slammed into a wall, hesitating there for a moment before she rolled over onto her back, enough presence of mind to slide up her leg, hiking up her skirt in what was meant to a beguiling pose. "Mycroft, my dear. Your brother will be so disappointed. You know how he hates when you meddle in his affairs."
"I do not believe you will be one of his affairs for much longer."
She put her weight back on her elbows and arched up in a way that made her breasts as prominent as possible before replying, "If you wanted a turn Mycroft, all you had to do was ask."
The woman very deliberately began to unbutton her already tenuously connected blouse, and while John's upbringing demanded that he look someplace that wasn't her chest, Mycroft simply cocked an eyebrow and stared at her like he wasn't impressed. "Your willingness to spread your legs and distract my brother when he gets bored notwithstanding, I doubt he will look kindly upon your attempts to suck the life out of the man who will be his mate."
Adler all but slithered to feet and thrust herself into Mycroft's space, hissing silent words through inhumanly-sharp teeth, "Sherlock has no. such. thing!"
Mycroft was unmoved, "Ah yes, because you're smitten with him that must mean that somehow Sherlock lacks a soul, like you?"
She slashed for Mycroft's throat with a demonic screech. Of course, Mycroft remained completely unruffled while he flipped around the umbrella like it was a baton and caught her wrist in the crook of the handle, wrenching it around with enough force to snap the bone before clubbing her in the throat and dropping her to the floor again. "My brother is human, Ms. Adler. Despite all his gifts he comes complete with a soul, for all he rarely uses it. And he will banish you with all the might of the gifts he pretends he doesn't have when he finds out what you tried to do here today."
She snarled and tried to push herself back up, but Mycroft kicked her in the ribs with his fine Italian leather shoes and this time she had the sense to stay down. Mycroft didn't even pause to make sure that she'd stay where he put her, and instead strode straight over to John who was still magically bound to the bed. With a waive of that -- obviously charmed -- umbrella, the invisible bindings on him released.
John shifted, experimenting with all his muscles to see that everything was still in its proper working order then gave Mycroft a nod and a, "Thanks for that."
Mycroft just cocked an eyebrow, then pointedly looked down at his watch, "Were you intending on coming with me, Doctor Watson, or are you quite comfortable where you are?"
John rolled his eyes, "I'm naked here, you git. So unless you want me running around starkers-"
Mycroft held up a hand, "No, no, that will not be necessary, thank you. However, I'm afraid I didn't think to bring any extra pants with me when I came to your rescue. So perhaps you could simply make due with the sheet for the duration of our teleportation. I'm sure someone in my employ will be able to retrieve a spare for you."
John sighed, but decided that since the man had just save him from having his life and soul sucked out of his body, now was not the time to call him on his derision. John flicked his fingers at Mycroft, which the man had the good grace to take as a sign to turn around so John could try and make a toga out of the blanket in peace. While he fiddled with the fabric John asked, "How did you find me, anyway?"
"CCTV, Doctor Watson. And when you passed out of our sight there, one of Anthea's assistants scried for you."
"Scry?"
Mycroft looked very much like he wanted to snap something at John that would've sounded more natural coming out Sherlock's mouth, but he restrained himself and answered calmly, "A vial of your blood is used by a Witch to track your location."
"But she said the wards were so powerful that you wouldn't be able to find me."
"In the process of threatening you, she spilled your blood." Mycroft poked at the edge of the blanket currently giving him some semblance of modesty and John noticed a few flecks of blood from his split lip. "Her runes were to protect against someone finding you by your blood, but magic gets particularly mutable when the you search for blood that has been spilled. Magic works for the preservation of all life, so even a spell so simple scrying can override the protection runes she had up on this apartment."
John 'hmm-ed' for a moment then awkwardly held out his hand. Mycroft just stared at the extended appendage before John snapped, "Aren't we supposed to be teleporting someplace?"
Mycroft puckered his nose in distaste, but extended the point of his umbrella anyway. John rolled his eyes, because if anyone got to be irritated about this situation, it was him. He grabbed the end of the umbrella at the exact moment that Irene reared up behind Mycroft, neither man having noticed her rapid recouperartion. Her beauty had grown terrible in the minute she'd been on the floor. Her black hair floated around her like a twisted halo, and her eyes glowed with an unnatural light. The bones in her right wrist had knitted together, and she silently drew back that hand to slash her claws across Mycroft's exposed back. John ripped the umbrella forward, pulling Mycroft off his feet and out of the way as the blow descended.
Irene hissed at them, a sillibant sound slipping from the now forked tongue nestled behind her pointed teeth. She lunged again, and John shifted Mycroft behind him while he surged forward. She cut out with her claws, and John ducked to avoid the blow, quickly accepting that she was fast and probably more dangerous than him, given that she had razor-edged claws and the practical reality that there was no place in John's sheet to tuck a Browning.
So, John did the only thing available to him at the moment and tossed that sheet in Irene's face when she lunged forward for her next strike. He took the distraction for what little good it did and tumbled back into Mycroft, getting a grip on the man's umbrella along the way. And from one heartbeat to the next, they were gone.
John suspected that somewhere along the way he must've blinked, because before his body could even recognize the change, they arrived in a well appointed sitting room that looked like it should have Jane Austen in a far corner frantically scribbling notes. There were only two disjointed things about the space. The first was the view outside the window showed a proper English garden, small hedge maze and all, on a balcony extended over The Strand. (John stared for a moment at the utter impossibility of the plants growing like that in planter boxes, let along the size and weight of the balcony itself. Then he remembered there was probably some sort of magical contractor who specialized in impossible architecture.)
The second was that Sherlock was in a shouting match with the most poised woman John had ever seen. She had blonde curls pulled into a high and stately bun, with one long line of white cutting through the otherwise perfect color and betraying her age. She sipped on her tea, paying Sherlock only the slightest amount of attention while he paced in front of her setee, shouting, “And Mycroft of all people! How could you tell Mycroft!”
John and Mycroft had appeared in front of the room's door, putting them directly before the woman, with a furiously pacing Sherlock between them. She paused in bringing her cup to her lips, fixing John with a raised eyebrow, though at his nakedness or the cuts on his chest he couldn't tell. It had been years since John had felt embarrassed about his own nudity, but this was like being naked in front of your Mum. John slowly moved the folds of the umbrella over his groin, which put Mycroft's hand unfortunately close to his bits.
That only made the eyebrow go higher.
Sherlock noticed that he wasn't even getting perfunctory attention anymore, and whirled around in a swirl of greatcoat to see who dared to interrupt. Then he froze.
Then he turned purple.
John had had a commanding officer who used to get so angry he'd turn that shade, but John had assumed that Sherlock of all people wouldn't have so obviously emotional a tell. Everyone in the room just paused for a moment, none of them daring to move while Sherlock made his deductions. And then Sherlock erupted.
For such a lanky thing he could move like a fury when he put his mind to it. He surged forward, ripping a throw off the back of a wingback chair as he went. Mycroft and his concealing umbrella were summarily shoved back, getting his hands as far away from John as possible. Sherlock tossed the throw around John's shoulders and drew it tight over his chest before he snarled at Mycroft, “Why would she do this?”
Mycroft fixed Sherlock with the same look he gave John when he thought the soldier was being particularly stupid and just snapped his fingers. The faintest of tinkling sounds filled the air, and Mycroft dryly replied, “I should think that was obvious, dear brother.”
John ignored the shift of Sherlock's face that meant he was about to pounce and asked, “How did you know where I was?”
“Reasonable deduction based upon the people who are simultaneously foolish enough to attack an associate of mine and powerful enough to hide it from me," Sherlock rambled.
“And that got you to Irene?”
Sherlock paused, then rushed out, “Accompanied by her preference for that brand of sheets.”
Sherlock pulled back just enough of the blanket around John's shoulders to examine the cuts she'd made in his skin, but John was undeterred, “She was a Succubus.”
“You are correct.” Sherlock traced the lines with his fingers, checking the depth and precision of the cuts.
“Succubi drain the life out of you.” John said it with such certainty that Sherlock looked up from where he was studying John's skin through a magnifying glass. He quirked one eyebrow in a way that obviously asked, 'What's your point?' and John just stared back with 'You know damn well what the point is.'
“Succubi can drain humans through sexual contact. The more involved the sexual contact, the more potent the draining. However, when they attempt to drain a fellow magical being, they have to be stronger than being to successfully drain.”
“And you're stronger than she is?”
Sherlock huffed, “Of course.”
Whatever else John might've asked or Sherlock might've said was interrupted by a precise knock on the door behind him. Only then did John realize that the tinkling from Mycroft's snap was their version of ringing a bell.
Mycroft called out, “Enter,” and in stepped a particularly wizened looking goblin, tufts of whispy white hair gathered in strips above his squarely pointed ears. “Ah, Carruthers,” Mycroft greeted, and handed over his umbrella. “Do see that gets sanitized, and perhaps we can get Doctor Watson some cover that is not an antique stitching gifted to the Marquess of Daltham by the Queen of France?”
In his finely pressed three-piece suit and bow tie Carruthers fixed John with the same eyebrow as his mistress before him and replied, “I shall see if we can find something suitable.”
Sherlock rolled his eyes, but before he could snap back something about how a particular ruffle on his sleeve meant he was stealing the silver or something, Carruthers reached out one spindly finger and nudged aside the blanket, completely exposing the mark on John's chest that Sherlock had tried to hide at the first sound of the knock. The goblin took a long look at the strange shape Irene had carved into John's chest before both fluffy eyebrows went up and his eyes widened. Carruthers turned to Sherlock and asked, “Will the royal magician be necessary?” There was a challenge to his tone, like the goblin was daring Sherlock to say yes. John once again expected something foul and insulting to follow, but Sherlock flushed and looked away from Caruruthers's unblinking stare. The goblin huffed in disappointment, then with a snap of his fingers, John was dressed. Thick woolen trousers and a fine, white shirt that, if they had been three sizes smaller, could've been from Sherlock's closet. The goblin kept his disapproving glower on Sherlock, then added, “Mistress Holmes, Miss Adler has arrived and requests an audience so that she may retrieve the property your eldest son stole from her.”
There were too many new pieces of information in that sentence that John didn't know who to interrogate first. The poised woman, Mrs. Holmes apparently, took it out of his hands and replied, “Of course, Carruthers. Show her up.” She paused, “Slowly, please.”
Carruthers gave his mistress a small nod, fixed one final glower on Sherlock, and strode out of the room. John turned on Sherlock and demanded, “'Mistress Holmes'?”
That seemed to break the stupor Sherlock had fallen under and he snapped, “Really, John? That's what you choose to focus on?”
“I have no idea what the rest of it means, so yes, I'm going to focus on that fact that your Mum saw me naked!”
“Mostly naked,” she interrupted, then paused to take a sip of her tea. “The umbrella was perfectly servicable for modesty purposes.” The last bit she delivered with a small smirk that made her sons twitch. She set down her cup and held out one lean, graceful hand and John felt like a cad to leave it hanging there, so he stumbled forward to shake. “Since neither of my sons seems to remember their manners Doctor Watson, I shall have to introduce myself. I am Lady Imogene Holmes, the Oracle of London.”
John paused for half a moment while all the necessary pieces took over his brain and suddenly slammed into place. He stumbled out, “Oh,” before he caught himself and replied, “I mean, Hello. I'm John Watson.”
Imogene smiled back far more genially than either of her sons seemed capable of, “I am aware.”
“Yes, well, I supposed you would, what with the telling Mycroft to bring me to London and all.” John tried not to let his irritation show at having his resignation from the military and every ounce of his life for the last three months be a product of this woman's meddling, but it was difficult. And John didn't even have to turn around to know that Sherlock had snapped into a glare at Mycroft for keeping back that piece of information.
Imogene gestured to the chair beside her, and John took a deep breath before sinking into the place, asking, “So, let me see if I've got this right. You think I'm important for some reason, and this Irene woman--”
“Miss Adler.” Imogene interrupted.
“What?”
“The 'Irene woman' is Miss Adler, who is on her way up.”
John puffed out a deep breath, “That's not good. And how is she walking around after Mycroft took the umbrella to her?”
“That, Doctor Watson, is an excellent question.” Imogene looked to her eldest son, who tensely replied, “She has the support of a higher level demon. They must be funneling power to her for her to survive the spells inherent in my umbrella.”
Imogene looked furious and even Sherlock pursed his lips, so John asked, “And that would be a bad thing?”
“What would make you think a more powerful demon would ever be a good thing?” Sherlock huffed. The detective dropped onto the chair across from John, crouched with his feet on the seat and sitting on the back.
“Feet off the chair Sherlock,” Imogene intoned in the same weary way as mothers everywhere. Sherlock kept his hands steepled before his mouth, but slipped onto the seat proper. After a day John knew no explanation would be coming from that quarter, so he turned back to Imogene and asked the question he wanted to since the first time Mycroft had turned up in his room, “What is it you think I am?”
“'Think' nothing my dear, I know.”
John did his very best not to look skeptical, and given all he'd seem Sherlock do today, he shouldn't. But Shelock himself didn't credit his own skill to any supernatural power. Imogene smirked at John like it was a response she'd heard so many times before she had passed through irritation and come straight through to bemusement on the other side. “I know, Doctor Watson, in the same way Sherlock knows.”
“Sherlock doesn't know,” John interrupted. “He deduces, there's a difference.”
Sherlock smirked, the expression on his face far more fierce and feral than on his mother's. Imogene looked at Sherlock with the sort of hopeful disapproval that only mother's could manage and added, “I know the future in the same way Sherlock knows the present. He could be omniscient about the subject, but instead he uses to utilize the human aspects of his Gift rather than the whole because he feels it demeans his science.”
“Which is a tragedy,” Irene interrupted,” because when you have the means to convince Sherlock Holmes to See for you, he's quite good.” Irene was just as she'd been ten minutes before when they'd teleported away. Her arm was still unbroken, the formerly darkening bruises were now gone, and neither a hair was out of place nor a crease in her white suit. In fact, she'd be picture perfect human if it wasn't for John's blood smeared across her mouth like lipstick.
Carruthers stepped in behind Irene, obviously having been overstepped by the Succubus to make her grand entrance. But still, the Goblin did his duty and announced, “Mistress Holmes, Irene Adler to see you.” Irene ignored how Carruthers quite obviously left out the introduction of 'Miss', while Imogene Holmes raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow at Irene's arrival, like she was surprised to find that her neighbor's dog had made its way into her garden once again. “Miss Adler, I do believe I have made my opinion on your presence in my home quite clear.”
With a pleasant smile Irene settled herself onto a padded bench across from Imogene's lounge, obviously putting herself in counterpoint to the Holmes matriarch. “If your opinion still held any weight in this matter I wouldn't have been able to pass the wards at the front door without turning into a husk. Since here I sit, We shall assume that whatever spells you've worked to keep me out of your family,” she paused and her smug smile turned lecherous, “or your family out of me, are no longer in effect.”
She crossed her legs, and now that she was secure in her victory she felt no need to bear more skin than she chose to. Instead she continued, “After all, Doctor Watson is tied to Sherlock. The efforts of various and assorted assassins both and home and abroad have been no match for the strings of fate that have been pulling the two of them together. It will be Sherlock Holmes and John Watson for as long as they both shall live, and now John belongs to me. If you want the good Doctor to keep on breathing and functioning with a will of his own, then you'll need to be in my good graces. And of course, if you kill me, you'll kill the good doctor. Beginning now.”
Mycroft and Imogene were completely blank, making Sherlock the only member of the Holmes family who was willing to show he was furious. Though, for Sherlock, furious was less of a facial expression and more the complete relaxation of all the tension in his shoulders. John had never been one to wait on other people to move first, so he demanded, “What in the hell are you talking about?”
Irene all but sneered, “Didn't they tell you?” she tutted, “Oh you poor boy, all wrapped up with this family and they didn't even care enough to tell you what they'd done. That lovely little mark on your chest means that you're mine.”
John laughed, “Are you serious? Some cuts on my chest make you think you have any say over me?”
She turned to Sherlock, white teeth between red lips showing the barest hint of fang, but it was Mycroft who answered. “The rune over your heart is a sigil for Thralls, creatures who have had their will subsumed by an Incubus or Succubus. They carve the sign into a Thrall with their own hands, and seal the bond with intercourse.”
“A Thrall?”
“A permanent source of life. The Succubus will call the Thrall to their side and feed on them when necessary.”
“What does bleeding the life out of me have anything to do with my will!” John demanded incredulously.
“Your life force and your will are tied together, Doctor Watson,” Imogene interrupted. “ A trait I'm sure you've noticed if your patients. Those who have the will to live continue to do so, those who do not, don't.”
John just stared at her, like she should have been the one with an ounce of common sense and telling the rest of them that that they were idiots. “But I never had sex with her!” he protested.
Irene was the one to answer this time, “Oh sex is just the sealing of the bond, John darling. The bond has already begun. You'll feel the pull to me in your veins, growing stronger and stronger the more your struggle. Eventually you'll succumb and find your way to my bed where the whole thing will be sealed. Or,” she re-crossed her legs to force attention to her exposed calves, “I can get bored and nab you again and just have my way with you.”
Mycroft was staring at the fire behind his mother, Imogene was looking at her tea, and Sherlock had relaxed completely against the chair. Every last one of them was furious, but not one of them seemed to have a plan. John however, was at peace. According to Soo Lin he was there to change magic, and according to Imogene he was there for Sherlock. For all their gifts in magic none of these people seemed to understand the common sense way of doing things. John just raised an eyebrow at the Succubus and replied, “There's a flaw in your plan.“
Irene grinned at John like he was a child scrambling for her attention and replied, “And what's that, John?”
John leaned forward in his chair, elbows on his knees to make her understand, “In my own right mind, I'd kill myself before I'd let you use me to control Sherlock.” Everyone in the room paused, as though they couldn't have possibly heard him right. The Holmeses glanced at one another to verify, then all turned in unison to stare at John in disbelief. Irene however, kept her eyes on John. When he felt the entire room looking at him, John continued, “You said yourself that the seal isn't complete, that I'll have who knows how long where I'm free of you, and all I need is a moment. All I need is one breath with my Browning to swallow my own sidearm and whatever hold you think you've got over him will be done. Shot out with my brain.”
It was obviously a possibility Irene had never thought of before, expecting John to value his own life quite as much as she valued her own. Of all the people to speak that John had been imagining, it hadn't been Sherlock, who demanded, “Why would you do that?” John turned to him and Sherlock continued, “You have no respect for fate, and you believe that death should be fought, not submitted to. So why are you doing this?”
John smiled at him, genuine and more at ease than he had been since he was in Afghanistan with his company, “Are you telling me the great Sherlock Holmes has found something he can't deduce?”
“Sentiment,” Sherlock replied, with none of his usual bite. Like it was an perfectly rational answer for why he was coming up blank.
“You believed I was innocent from the first moment you saw me. Lestrade said all the evidence pointed to me and Angelo said the magic was so convincing that no other Magican in London would've believed I didn't do it.”
“It was interesting.” Sherlock objected, but his heart wasn't really in it.
John snorted, “You don't take clients with you to Angelo's, and you don't let them boss you about and make you eat dinner. That's what you do with friends. And apparently if we had a bit more time you were going to be the best friend I ever had. So I'm doing this for the friends we might've been.” John shrugged, “Can't be much better than the man I met today.”
Carruthers had been silently padding through the routine of a properly prepared cup of tea throughout this whole conversation, the process unimpeded by the fact that a man was discussing his own suicide. The goblin carried over his tray and set down four cups of perfectly prepared tea beside their intended recipients (John's own was the straight black of Earl Grey, and he could see a splash of cream in Irene's). Sherlock's own, however, was the same mug that he had been drinking out of before the whole episode began. He'd left it half-empty on the side table beside his mother when he began his tantrum, and Carruthers had done nothing more than move it the three feet from that table to the one beside Sherlock's own chair.
John had no idea what the point behind that snub was, but Sherlock seemed to since he downed the rest of the cold tea in one motion and stared at the dregs of the cup like they held all the answers in the world. They must've told him something, because Irene slipped out of her comfortable stance and dropped both heeled feet to the floor to declare, “Really, Sherlock--”
“I didn't deduce you were innocent,” Sherlock interrupted. “Well,” he rotated the cup ever so slightly, “I did after a moment. But I didn't see it until I'd Seen it,” and John could hear the capitalization. “My gift, my Sight. It burst out the moment I laid eyes on you and I knew I couldn't let you go to prison.”
“John came across two assassins in Camden, and there were three more waiting,” Mycroft murmured. “On at New Scotland Yard, one in the holding facility, and one at the courthouse. Each with instructions to complete the task should their predecessor fail.”
Irene scoffed, “Really Sherlock. You're just making my case stronger. Your Sight wants him alive, which means you're not going to let him die for you.”
Sherlock plucked the compact magnifying glass out of his breast pocket to examine the dregs clumping at the bottom of the empty tea cup while he idly muttered, “No, I don't believe I will.”
Irene smirked, certain that whatever Sherlock had seen in his mug was the inevitability of her plan. Only, instead of resign himself to whatever she had in store, Sherlock tossed the mug to his mother. The flight of the china that probably cost as much as John's rent was enough of a distraction that Irene didn't even notice Carruthers standing behind her with a smoking mug. Carruthers poured the liquid that he'd prepared alongside the tea over Irene's head, and she screamed the moment it touched her skin.
Carruthers put the cup back on its saucer and mildly told Sherlock, “Two minutes, Sir.”
Sherlock hadn't bothered waiting for the confirmation, and had instead leapt across the space between the chairs to kneel before John. He gave no sign that he'd heard Carruthers, but the Goblin was obviously well adjusted to dealing with a Holmes in a snit. Sherlock ripped on the buttons covering John's mark and hesitated for half a moment. That moment was enough time for John to look at Sherlock and understand why the detective had kept his eyes down before he moved. The smokey grey that usually made up his iris had bled out, and the whole of his eyes were soaked in grey. That was all John had the chance to see before Sherlock pressed the palm of his right hand to the skin over John's heart.
It was not unlike being shot.
John fought back a scream at the sensation, and found himself braced against Sherlock's chest. His own hands were curled around Sherlock's biceps, clenching for all he was worth to avoid being bowled over by the pain, while the detective had his free hand threaded through John's hair. The man was whispering something low and soft in John's ear, closer to Latin than to English, and the burn in his chest grew.
John stopped trying to fight the scream and just let it out, a great bellow that he was a little ashamed he still had it in him to make after surviving basic training. Apparently the freedom of the scream was something that Sherlock needed, John turning himself over to the magic Sherlock was working on his chest, and with a great rip, the pain started to ebb. In exhaustion John dropped his chin to his chest and watched as the blackness floated off his chest and gathered on Sherlock's hand until the pain and any trace that Irene had ever touched him disappeared. Sherlock held his hand out to the side, fingertips down, and the blackness dripped down the line of his hand and puddled on the floor.
As seemed to be a theme for the day, Carruthers waltzed over and poured his latest cup of tea over the blackness, and at the touch of whatever he had in that cup the darkness retreated in on itself and went up in smoke.
John drew in and out several deep breaths and devoutly ignored that his head was resting in the cradle of Sherlock's throat. They sat together for several long moments before both men cleared their throats and separated with more than a little embarassment. They had to snap out of that natural response quickly when Irene came back to herself and reached out for John, only to be burned by the touch of his skin. She reared back with such force that she landed back in her chair and sent it reeling to the ground. It is difficult to make yourself look dignified when you were climbing off the floor, but Irene still tried. The glare she fixed on Sherlock lacked any and all affection that she had assumed in their conversation before and she hissed, “What did you do?”
Sherlock looked on her with his grey eyes and replied, “I know all things in the now, and at that exact moment I Saw into his heart, and I revealed the clean truth of him at the center.”
“You healed him of me?” she spat, aghast.
“There was nothing to heal. He wasn't yours. No matter what you did to him he would always be mine.” Sherlock rose to his feet, “I advise you to find something particularly good to appease your master, because the moment you leave here he'll know that John is no longer tied to you, and can no longer be tied to anyone else.”
I rene slid to her feet, every moment regaining her calm, “You're going to let me live?”
“It pays to have a Succubus owe you.” Irene gave Sherlock a smirk and strode out of the room, like there wasn't going to be a bounty on her head the moment she crossed the threshold. Sherlock smiled, like he found the whole thing terrible amusing and dropped a kiss to his mother's cheek before he started for the door.
From his spot still on the floor John demanded, “How did you know you could do that?”
“Do what?” Sherlock held out a hand and pulled John to his feet.
“Do what! Rip her out of me!”
Sherlock tossed on his coat, turning up the collar as he strode towards the door without so much as a goodbye to his brother. “Tea leaves, John. Tea leaves!”
“You read the damn tea leaves?” John followed after him, pausing at the door to look back and forth between Sherlock disappearing down the hall and the family who'd just helped Sherlock save John's life. Carruthers snapped his fingers and out pulled a much less battered version ofJohn's favorite coat out of thin air and fixed John with a look that said, 'Well, go on with you.'' John gave them all a nod before he started after Sherlock, who had apparently been explaining the entire time John hadn't been listening to him.
“I admit tea reading is one of the vaguer methods for telling the future, but it serves its purpose.”
“I thought you could only See the present, not the future?”
“The present is my natural inclination and where I am the strongest, but having the Sight at all means that to a lesser degree I can perceive the future as well as the past.”
John paused, thinking of Sherlock's description of how he'd Seen John's innocence when they'd first met, and asked, “Seeing like that, all in a rush, it's not common for you?”
“The last time my Sight took over my deductions was the last time I overdosed.”
John slouched back in his chair, not at all pleased with the information that Sherlock had been an addict. “And what did you See then?”
“My death.” Sherlock ignored the elevators and strode into the stairwell, long legs taking him down at a fast clip.
“But you're not dead,” John demanded, tailing after him through the door.
Sherlock's look declared John was an absolute idiot, but Sherlock had decided to trust him anyway and he replied, “Perfectly sound analysis, John, but I was expecting more.”
“You're supposed to 'know' everything about the present, but you didn't know your own death.”
“That's because 'fate' is doing just as must guessing as the rest of us. Except for me, of course. I never guess.”
“Yes you do,” John teased.
“Given the amount of cocaine in my system I should've stopped breathing before the paramedics ever had the chance of reaching me. It wasn't fate and it wasn't divine intervention, it was my own continual exposure to large doses of cocaine that kept me from responding in the way of a lesser addict.”
“'The way' being heart failure.”
"'The way' being luck and so such thing as fate."
John 'hmm-ed', but didn't comment. Sherlock signed, “You believe in fate.”
“Not in the slightest.”
Sherlock furrowed, “Then why aren't you agreeing with me?”
John stopped walking, forcing Sherlock to actually look at him rather than deduce things about the concrete walls they were passing. “Because I think you chose to live. I think there was a moment there where you could've left, and you chose to stay.”
“And what on earth does that have to do with fate?”
“If we're the masters of our own destiny, and you chose to live, then that's what you'll keep choosing to do. That's who you'll choose to be, and you've made your own fate.”
John shrugged and started back down the stairs until Sherlock interrupted, “Like you chose to die rather than betray me?”
“No different than finally accepting your gift to save me,” John called over his shoulder, not bothering to stop. Sherlock grinned and strode after John, his long legs covering the space in a few short moments.
At the top of the massive staircase behind them there stood Imogene and Mycroft, watching their Sherlock grin at his human like the man was fascinating. Mycroft sighed, “He'll be insufferable now, you know.”
Imogene ran a soothing hand along her firstborn's shoulder, “He was insufferable before, at least now there's a chance John might be the making of your brother.”
“Or make him worse than ever.” Mycroft retorted.
With a small, private smile Imogene's eyes faded to white and she whispered, “No, I believe they will something to adore, this Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson.”
Author: sunryder
Artist: artconserv
Verse: Sherlock BBC fusion
Word Count: 22,582
Rating: T
Characters/Pairings: Sherlock/Irene (offscreen), John/Sherlock (pre)
Warnings violence
Summary: John never would've suspected that there creatures out there in the world if he hadn't been shot. Of course, he never would've thought that knowing about those creatures would get him accused of murder either. And no one, absolutely no one, would ever have expected the Seer named Sherlock Holmes.
Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3
Go HERE, and make the biggest fuss that ever fussed over the art! It's stunning, and striking, and perfect.
John didn't see Mycroft for two days after their initial shouting match, and foolishly John thought that might be the end of it. And it was, until John stripped down to his pants and undershirt and curled up in bed, only to open his eyes and see Anthea had materialized out of nothing on top of the bed next to him. John groaned, "You couldn't have been visible before I got in bed?"
Anthea didn't both looking up from her phone, "I get my kicks where I can, Doctor."
John gave a pointed look to Anthea's short skirt and the miles of perfect leg that it revealed and replied, "I doubt I'm the best kick you can get."
"Mr. Holmes prefers that I restrain my flirting only to those that we can be sure will never be bought or convinced to report back on either of us for any reason."
"So, when I told the lads that Mycroft was a git and if I wasn't sure he'd disappear me I'd like to punch him in the face, that was a bad thing?"
Anthea gave a tiny smirk at that and replied, "I believe that is common enough information that you don't need to be concerned about revealing it."
John smiled, "Not that I'm not always happy to have a woman hangout out at my bedside, but is there something I can help you with?"
"Yes. You can consent to Mr. Holmes's request that you return to London."
"I'm pretty sure it wasn't a request," John snorted.
Anthea gave him a pointed and disapproving look. "It was, in fact, as polite a request as Mycroft Holmes is capable of managing."
"Well that's terrifying."
"Indeed. And yet, he made the attempt nonetheless."
"Uh huh. And why was Mr. Holmes attempting and failing to be polite to me?"
"The Oracle of London," she replied without looking up.
John buried his face in his pillow for a moment and silently wished that she could've sprung all this on him in the morning. Then he groaned, "And I suppose that means exactly what it sounded like?"
She quirked an eyebrow, "That the Oracle of London sent one of the most dangerous and powerful users of magic in her country to Afghanistan to retrieve you and bring you home?" She waited for John's replying grunt then finished, "Yes."
"And I don't suppose she decided to tell you why?"
"The Oracel did not see fit to reveal to Mr. Holmes the higher purpose behind your calling. However, if it is any consolation she has been very clear that you are to come home out of your own free will and choice rather than out of any bribery or blackmail on his part."
John looked at her in disbelief and Anthea shrugged, "He has had exceptional difficulty in adhering to those instructions. He has several plans involving your sister and her ex-wife, some good, some bad."
John popped up out of bed, "If you think-"
Anthea looked up from her blackberry just long enough to fix John with a look that she must have learned from Holmes that declared John was undoubtedly an idiot if he continued that sentence. She'd already explained to him that Mycroft was attempting to show restraint, there was no need for threats about how threatening him wouldn't work. John just sighed, "I belong here, Anthea. I'm not going back."
Anthea stood abruptly, and brushed out the nonexistent wrinkles in her jacket, "You are a far better man than I, Doctor Watson."
John snorted, "Any why is that?"
"Because I would spend the rest of my life wondering what it was fate had in store for me. What I might have been if I'd been willing to take the chance."
The woman instantly vanished into nothing, though it was difficult to disguise her presence when John's door seemingly opened of its own accord when she left. John heaved a great and irritated sigh and dropped back down on to the mattress, silently cursing because he knew she had got him.
XXXXX
The first thing John noticed when he regained consciousness was the smell. Or rather, the lack of it. He'd been captured before, imprisoned before, and places where they hold people prisoner don't smell like freshly laundered sheets. The second thing that John noticed -- which was really rather more disconcerting than the first -- was that he was naked. John sat up immediately, only to be confronted with a woman standing at the foot of his bed.
She was, John could admit, quite lovely, with a delicate green blouse that hugged her curves and a white skirt just short enough to show off her thighs but not nearly enough to be improper for a woman of her age. If John hadn't been unnerved by having nothing more than a sheet for protection, he certainly would have been by the way she was staring at him. Like Sherlock's ability to see straight into your soul, but she looked like she didn't want to know so much about John as she wanted to strip off his skin and wear it for a pair of boots. Which was quite concerning since John's lack of veil let him look at her know she wasn't just a beautiful woman, she was a rather powerful Succubus.
After a long moment of staring at one another across the length of the bed John fought the urge to draw the blankets up to his chest like the heroine of a BBC period drama and instead mildly asked, "I don't supposed you'd be willing to tell me where my pants are?"
That got him the smallest tick of a smile before she hiked up her skirt and began crawling on her knees up the bed. John had a brief moment to suppose she'd had practice with this sort of thing because she looked far more classy while doing it than John thought was possible, before he went to dive out of the bed, pants or no pants. Only, he found himself unable to move. With a quick word she'd bound John's hands to the headboard, keeping him sitting upright, and tendrils of magic holding his feet and thighs down right where they were. And best of all, his jaw was clamped shut preventing from the hope of screaming.
John tried very hard not to panic, but he couldn't stop himself from trying to press back and away from her. He'd seen soldiers die at the hands of Succubi and Incubi before, and it was a fate he wouldn't wish on anyone. Sometimes the spells protecting the doors and windows of hospitals would fail, and the demons would slip in, sucking the life out of patients who were already so close to death that the demon didn't even need sex, just one long kiss to end their life. (There'd been an Incubus in Afghanistan, there to kill patients that John had drug off the battlefield then spent twelve hours in surgery to put back together again. John had shot the bastard in cold blood and hadn't lost a moment's sleep.)
The woman settled herself on John's sheet-covered lap, skirt rucked up and thighs exposed, and began running her fingers through John's hair. Despite the fact he had been given only the slightest bit of room to maintain a struggle, he was working up a sweat, a sweat that the woman seemed to take great pleasure in. She titled forward, burying John's face in her breast while she gave an obscene sniff of his hair. She leaned forward and pressed her lips to John's ear, murmuring with hot breath on his skin, "You're not what I expected."
She dropped back to John's lap in what should've been a painfully arousing position, only in John's terror in couldn't even have pretended. "My dear Sherlock is not exactly one for people in general, let alone people who are quite so common. You're not handsome, you're not clever, you're not even inadvertently powerful. You're just human."
She'd left him enough freedom to twist his head away from her touch, which she seemed to be enjoying, so when she leaned in to kiss him with her obscenely red lips John had enough space to wrench his mouth away and ram his forehead into her nose. She reared back with the pain and quickly whipped around her elbow to smash into John's face. She caught him in the jaw, the force of the blow cutting open his lip on his teeth and sending a spray of blood down onto the sheets. She tightened her mental grip of John's face after that, holding him still while she leaned forward and licked up the thread of blood that was trailing down John's chin. She leaned back and spat the blood down with a sneer, "You don't even taste good. What could he possibly see in you?"
fxxx
The pressure on John's jaw decreased, letting him unclench his teeth just enough to mutter, "Sod off."
The woman gave him a leer of a smile before she pressed her mouth to John's and bit down on his bottom lip at the same moment she dug the knife-fine edge of one finger into John's chest. He tried to lean back from the shock, but her teeth dug into the tender flesh of his lip to keep him in place. After she'd made the mark, she ran her free hand through John's hair and crooned, “Don't you worry, Johnny-boy, the next one won't hurt any less,” and she buried her nail in again.
The doctor part of John was able to pull back from the experience and catalogue the injury. They were scalple-like cuts, clean and precise, slicing through muscle while managing not to nick the bone. John didn't like what the precision said about how many times she'd done this before. By the time she was done, there were three letters etched into the skin over John's heart, each throbbing and dribbling blood unable to clot. From upside down the two letters at the beginning and end appeared to be the same, both like uppercase L's with the vertical line tilted in, while the middle letter looked like a backwards F. Irene let John look his fill before she leaned forward and licked a long stripe up over the cuts, lapping up the blood and closing the wounds with her tongue
Finally she looked up and smirked, "Now Doctor Watson, lets try this again." John clenched his teeth and struggled against his inability to fight. Her nails lengthened into claws and she ran them along the side of John's face, scratching enough to make them felt but not enough to make him bleed this time. "I'm going to keep you here, little human, keep you tied to this bed and spend days sucking you dry until you regret that fate ever wanted a thing to do with you. Or," she paused and licked across his lips, "you can tell me now, and I can kill you quick."
John glowered at her, unwilling to use his little space to bother responding. The longer he held out the more likely that Sherlock would find him. She must've seen the resolve in his eyes, because she tutted, "Oh little human, he's not going to find you." She ran her hands through his hair, attempting and failing at faking the soothing gesture. "I know Sherlock's magic like I know every other aspect of him," she leered, "And I've kept this building from his Sight. He won't be able to find you until I change the runes on the windows to let him in."
John managed to glower at the woman, and she just leaned forward to suck on his earlobe, appreciating the way he fought, but couldn't pull back. And John did fight, because the most important thing in her mocking, the thing that John didn't think the woman didn't even realized that she'd admitted to, was that she assumed Sherlock was looking. she'd taken the precautions to keep Sherlock out, but those precautions meant she thought he would be trying, and the least John could do was try to stay alive as long as possible to give Sherlock a chance.
She ran her nails down John's chest and straight for the blanket that was keeping his lap covered and whispered, "I'll have every bit of you John Watson. Every bit of you that has sucked Sherlock in, every bit that makes you so special to the spirits. I'll take all that, and whatever it is that makes you worth notice, it'll be mine." She leaned in and licked a long stripe up John's cheek while she ran claws over the lowest part of his belly, "By the time I'm done I'll make you regret you'd ever been born."
Then, because the situation wasn't quite horrible enough, Mycroft's voice interrupted, "I'm sure the good Doctor already does."
The woman on him bared her teeth at John, teeth that rapidly devolved into fangs as she sprang off John's lap and straight for Mycroft's neck. Only she was struck mid-leap with the blunt end of his umbrella. John saw nothing special about the stick, but apparently there was magic to it because the woman went down like a bag of bricks. She slammed into a wall, hesitating there for a moment before she rolled over onto her back, enough presence of mind to slide up her leg, hiking up her skirt in what was meant to a beguiling pose. "Mycroft, my dear. Your brother will be so disappointed. You know how he hates when you meddle in his affairs."
"I do not believe you will be one of his affairs for much longer."
She put her weight back on her elbows and arched up in a way that made her breasts as prominent as possible before replying, "If you wanted a turn Mycroft, all you had to do was ask."
The woman very deliberately began to unbutton her already tenuously connected blouse, and while John's upbringing demanded that he look someplace that wasn't her chest, Mycroft simply cocked an eyebrow and stared at her like he wasn't impressed. "Your willingness to spread your legs and distract my brother when he gets bored notwithstanding, I doubt he will look kindly upon your attempts to suck the life out of the man who will be his mate."
Adler all but slithered to feet and thrust herself into Mycroft's space, hissing silent words through inhumanly-sharp teeth, "Sherlock has no. such. thing!"
Mycroft was unmoved, "Ah yes, because you're smitten with him that must mean that somehow Sherlock lacks a soul, like you?"
She slashed for Mycroft's throat with a demonic screech. Of course, Mycroft remained completely unruffled while he flipped around the umbrella like it was a baton and caught her wrist in the crook of the handle, wrenching it around with enough force to snap the bone before clubbing her in the throat and dropping her to the floor again. "My brother is human, Ms. Adler. Despite all his gifts he comes complete with a soul, for all he rarely uses it. And he will banish you with all the might of the gifts he pretends he doesn't have when he finds out what you tried to do here today."
She snarled and tried to push herself back up, but Mycroft kicked her in the ribs with his fine Italian leather shoes and this time she had the sense to stay down. Mycroft didn't even pause to make sure that she'd stay where he put her, and instead strode straight over to John who was still magically bound to the bed. With a waive of that -- obviously charmed -- umbrella, the invisible bindings on him released.
John shifted, experimenting with all his muscles to see that everything was still in its proper working order then gave Mycroft a nod and a, "Thanks for that."
Mycroft just cocked an eyebrow, then pointedly looked down at his watch, "Were you intending on coming with me, Doctor Watson, or are you quite comfortable where you are?"
John rolled his eyes, "I'm naked here, you git. So unless you want me running around starkers-"
Mycroft held up a hand, "No, no, that will not be necessary, thank you. However, I'm afraid I didn't think to bring any extra pants with me when I came to your rescue. So perhaps you could simply make due with the sheet for the duration of our teleportation. I'm sure someone in my employ will be able to retrieve a spare for you."
John sighed, but decided that since the man had just save him from having his life and soul sucked out of his body, now was not the time to call him on his derision. John flicked his fingers at Mycroft, which the man had the good grace to take as a sign to turn around so John could try and make a toga out of the blanket in peace. While he fiddled with the fabric John asked, "How did you find me, anyway?"
"CCTV, Doctor Watson. And when you passed out of our sight there, one of Anthea's assistants scried for you."
"Scry?"
Mycroft looked very much like he wanted to snap something at John that would've sounded more natural coming out Sherlock's mouth, but he restrained himself and answered calmly, "A vial of your blood is used by a Witch to track your location."
"But she said the wards were so powerful that you wouldn't be able to find me."
"In the process of threatening you, she spilled your blood." Mycroft poked at the edge of the blanket currently giving him some semblance of modesty and John noticed a few flecks of blood from his split lip. "Her runes were to protect against someone finding you by your blood, but magic gets particularly mutable when the you search for blood that has been spilled. Magic works for the preservation of all life, so even a spell so simple scrying can override the protection runes she had up on this apartment."
John 'hmm-ed' for a moment then awkwardly held out his hand. Mycroft just stared at the extended appendage before John snapped, "Aren't we supposed to be teleporting someplace?"
Mycroft puckered his nose in distaste, but extended the point of his umbrella anyway. John rolled his eyes, because if anyone got to be irritated about this situation, it was him. He grabbed the end of the umbrella at the exact moment that Irene reared up behind Mycroft, neither man having noticed her rapid recouperartion. Her beauty had grown terrible in the minute she'd been on the floor. Her black hair floated around her like a twisted halo, and her eyes glowed with an unnatural light. The bones in her right wrist had knitted together, and she silently drew back that hand to slash her claws across Mycroft's exposed back. John ripped the umbrella forward, pulling Mycroft off his feet and out of the way as the blow descended.
Irene hissed at them, a sillibant sound slipping from the now forked tongue nestled behind her pointed teeth. She lunged again, and John shifted Mycroft behind him while he surged forward. She cut out with her claws, and John ducked to avoid the blow, quickly accepting that she was fast and probably more dangerous than him, given that she had razor-edged claws and the practical reality that there was no place in John's sheet to tuck a Browning.
So, John did the only thing available to him at the moment and tossed that sheet in Irene's face when she lunged forward for her next strike. He took the distraction for what little good it did and tumbled back into Mycroft, getting a grip on the man's umbrella along the way. And from one heartbeat to the next, they were gone.
John suspected that somewhere along the way he must've blinked, because before his body could even recognize the change, they arrived in a well appointed sitting room that looked like it should have Jane Austen in a far corner frantically scribbling notes. There were only two disjointed things about the space. The first was the view outside the window showed a proper English garden, small hedge maze and all, on a balcony extended over The Strand. (John stared for a moment at the utter impossibility of the plants growing like that in planter boxes, let along the size and weight of the balcony itself. Then he remembered there was probably some sort of magical contractor who specialized in impossible architecture.)
The second was that Sherlock was in a shouting match with the most poised woman John had ever seen. She had blonde curls pulled into a high and stately bun, with one long line of white cutting through the otherwise perfect color and betraying her age. She sipped on her tea, paying Sherlock only the slightest amount of attention while he paced in front of her setee, shouting, “And Mycroft of all people! How could you tell Mycroft!”
John and Mycroft had appeared in front of the room's door, putting them directly before the woman, with a furiously pacing Sherlock between them. She paused in bringing her cup to her lips, fixing John with a raised eyebrow, though at his nakedness or the cuts on his chest he couldn't tell. It had been years since John had felt embarrassed about his own nudity, but this was like being naked in front of your Mum. John slowly moved the folds of the umbrella over his groin, which put Mycroft's hand unfortunately close to his bits.
That only made the eyebrow go higher.
Sherlock noticed that he wasn't even getting perfunctory attention anymore, and whirled around in a swirl of greatcoat to see who dared to interrupt. Then he froze.
Then he turned purple.
John had had a commanding officer who used to get so angry he'd turn that shade, but John had assumed that Sherlock of all people wouldn't have so obviously emotional a tell. Everyone in the room just paused for a moment, none of them daring to move while Sherlock made his deductions. And then Sherlock erupted.
For such a lanky thing he could move like a fury when he put his mind to it. He surged forward, ripping a throw off the back of a wingback chair as he went. Mycroft and his concealing umbrella were summarily shoved back, getting his hands as far away from John as possible. Sherlock tossed the throw around John's shoulders and drew it tight over his chest before he snarled at Mycroft, “Why would she do this?”
Mycroft fixed Sherlock with the same look he gave John when he thought the soldier was being particularly stupid and just snapped his fingers. The faintest of tinkling sounds filled the air, and Mycroft dryly replied, “I should think that was obvious, dear brother.”
John ignored the shift of Sherlock's face that meant he was about to pounce and asked, “How did you know where I was?”
“Reasonable deduction based upon the people who are simultaneously foolish enough to attack an associate of mine and powerful enough to hide it from me," Sherlock rambled.
“And that got you to Irene?”
Sherlock paused, then rushed out, “Accompanied by her preference for that brand of sheets.”
Sherlock pulled back just enough of the blanket around John's shoulders to examine the cuts she'd made in his skin, but John was undeterred, “She was a Succubus.”
“You are correct.” Sherlock traced the lines with his fingers, checking the depth and precision of the cuts.
“Succubi drain the life out of you.” John said it with such certainty that Sherlock looked up from where he was studying John's skin through a magnifying glass. He quirked one eyebrow in a way that obviously asked, 'What's your point?' and John just stared back with 'You know damn well what the point is.'
“Succubi can drain humans through sexual contact. The more involved the sexual contact, the more potent the draining. However, when they attempt to drain a fellow magical being, they have to be stronger than being to successfully drain.”
“And you're stronger than she is?”
Sherlock huffed, “Of course.”
Whatever else John might've asked or Sherlock might've said was interrupted by a precise knock on the door behind him. Only then did John realize that the tinkling from Mycroft's snap was their version of ringing a bell.
Mycroft called out, “Enter,” and in stepped a particularly wizened looking goblin, tufts of whispy white hair gathered in strips above his squarely pointed ears. “Ah, Carruthers,” Mycroft greeted, and handed over his umbrella. “Do see that gets sanitized, and perhaps we can get Doctor Watson some cover that is not an antique stitching gifted to the Marquess of Daltham by the Queen of France?”
In his finely pressed three-piece suit and bow tie Carruthers fixed John with the same eyebrow as his mistress before him and replied, “I shall see if we can find something suitable.”
Sherlock rolled his eyes, but before he could snap back something about how a particular ruffle on his sleeve meant he was stealing the silver or something, Carruthers reached out one spindly finger and nudged aside the blanket, completely exposing the mark on John's chest that Sherlock had tried to hide at the first sound of the knock. The goblin took a long look at the strange shape Irene had carved into John's chest before both fluffy eyebrows went up and his eyes widened. Carruthers turned to Sherlock and asked, “Will the royal magician be necessary?” There was a challenge to his tone, like the goblin was daring Sherlock to say yes. John once again expected something foul and insulting to follow, but Sherlock flushed and looked away from Caruruthers's unblinking stare. The goblin huffed in disappointment, then with a snap of his fingers, John was dressed. Thick woolen trousers and a fine, white shirt that, if they had been three sizes smaller, could've been from Sherlock's closet. The goblin kept his disapproving glower on Sherlock, then added, “Mistress Holmes, Miss Adler has arrived and requests an audience so that she may retrieve the property your eldest son stole from her.”
There were too many new pieces of information in that sentence that John didn't know who to interrogate first. The poised woman, Mrs. Holmes apparently, took it out of his hands and replied, “Of course, Carruthers. Show her up.” She paused, “Slowly, please.”
Carruthers gave his mistress a small nod, fixed one final glower on Sherlock, and strode out of the room. John turned on Sherlock and demanded, “'Mistress Holmes'?”
That seemed to break the stupor Sherlock had fallen under and he snapped, “Really, John? That's what you choose to focus on?”
“I have no idea what the rest of it means, so yes, I'm going to focus on that fact that your Mum saw me naked!”
“Mostly naked,” she interrupted, then paused to take a sip of her tea. “The umbrella was perfectly servicable for modesty purposes.” The last bit she delivered with a small smirk that made her sons twitch. She set down her cup and held out one lean, graceful hand and John felt like a cad to leave it hanging there, so he stumbled forward to shake. “Since neither of my sons seems to remember their manners Doctor Watson, I shall have to introduce myself. I am Lady Imogene Holmes, the Oracle of London.”
John paused for half a moment while all the necessary pieces took over his brain and suddenly slammed into place. He stumbled out, “Oh,” before he caught himself and replied, “I mean, Hello. I'm John Watson.”
Imogene smiled back far more genially than either of her sons seemed capable of, “I am aware.”
“Yes, well, I supposed you would, what with the telling Mycroft to bring me to London and all.” John tried not to let his irritation show at having his resignation from the military and every ounce of his life for the last three months be a product of this woman's meddling, but it was difficult. And John didn't even have to turn around to know that Sherlock had snapped into a glare at Mycroft for keeping back that piece of information.
Imogene gestured to the chair beside her, and John took a deep breath before sinking into the place, asking, “So, let me see if I've got this right. You think I'm important for some reason, and this Irene woman--”
“Miss Adler.” Imogene interrupted.
“What?”
“The 'Irene woman' is Miss Adler, who is on her way up.”
John puffed out a deep breath, “That's not good. And how is she walking around after Mycroft took the umbrella to her?”
“That, Doctor Watson, is an excellent question.” Imogene looked to her eldest son, who tensely replied, “She has the support of a higher level demon. They must be funneling power to her for her to survive the spells inherent in my umbrella.”
Imogene looked furious and even Sherlock pursed his lips, so John asked, “And that would be a bad thing?”
“What would make you think a more powerful demon would ever be a good thing?” Sherlock huffed. The detective dropped onto the chair across from John, crouched with his feet on the seat and sitting on the back.
“Feet off the chair Sherlock,” Imogene intoned in the same weary way as mothers everywhere. Sherlock kept his hands steepled before his mouth, but slipped onto the seat proper. After a day John knew no explanation would be coming from that quarter, so he turned back to Imogene and asked the question he wanted to since the first time Mycroft had turned up in his room, “What is it you think I am?”
“'Think' nothing my dear, I know.”
John did his very best not to look skeptical, and given all he'd seem Sherlock do today, he shouldn't. But Shelock himself didn't credit his own skill to any supernatural power. Imogene smirked at John like it was a response she'd heard so many times before she had passed through irritation and come straight through to bemusement on the other side. “I know, Doctor Watson, in the same way Sherlock knows.”
“Sherlock doesn't know,” John interrupted. “He deduces, there's a difference.”
Sherlock smirked, the expression on his face far more fierce and feral than on his mother's. Imogene looked at Sherlock with the sort of hopeful disapproval that only mother's could manage and added, “I know the future in the same way Sherlock knows the present. He could be omniscient about the subject, but instead he uses to utilize the human aspects of his Gift rather than the whole because he feels it demeans his science.”
“Which is a tragedy,” Irene interrupted,” because when you have the means to convince Sherlock Holmes to See for you, he's quite good.” Irene was just as she'd been ten minutes before when they'd teleported away. Her arm was still unbroken, the formerly darkening bruises were now gone, and neither a hair was out of place nor a crease in her white suit. In fact, she'd be picture perfect human if it wasn't for John's blood smeared across her mouth like lipstick.
Carruthers stepped in behind Irene, obviously having been overstepped by the Succubus to make her grand entrance. But still, the Goblin did his duty and announced, “Mistress Holmes, Irene Adler to see you.” Irene ignored how Carruthers quite obviously left out the introduction of 'Miss', while Imogene Holmes raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow at Irene's arrival, like she was surprised to find that her neighbor's dog had made its way into her garden once again. “Miss Adler, I do believe I have made my opinion on your presence in my home quite clear.”
With a pleasant smile Irene settled herself onto a padded bench across from Imogene's lounge, obviously putting herself in counterpoint to the Holmes matriarch. “If your opinion still held any weight in this matter I wouldn't have been able to pass the wards at the front door without turning into a husk. Since here I sit, We shall assume that whatever spells you've worked to keep me out of your family,” she paused and her smug smile turned lecherous, “or your family out of me, are no longer in effect.”
She crossed her legs, and now that she was secure in her victory she felt no need to bear more skin than she chose to. Instead she continued, “After all, Doctor Watson is tied to Sherlock. The efforts of various and assorted assassins both and home and abroad have been no match for the strings of fate that have been pulling the two of them together. It will be Sherlock Holmes and John Watson for as long as they both shall live, and now John belongs to me. If you want the good Doctor to keep on breathing and functioning with a will of his own, then you'll need to be in my good graces. And of course, if you kill me, you'll kill the good doctor. Beginning now.”
Mycroft and Imogene were completely blank, making Sherlock the only member of the Holmes family who was willing to show he was furious. Though, for Sherlock, furious was less of a facial expression and more the complete relaxation of all the tension in his shoulders. John had never been one to wait on other people to move first, so he demanded, “What in the hell are you talking about?”
Irene all but sneered, “Didn't they tell you?” she tutted, “Oh you poor boy, all wrapped up with this family and they didn't even care enough to tell you what they'd done. That lovely little mark on your chest means that you're mine.”
John laughed, “Are you serious? Some cuts on my chest make you think you have any say over me?”
She turned to Sherlock, white teeth between red lips showing the barest hint of fang, but it was Mycroft who answered. “The rune over your heart is a sigil for Thralls, creatures who have had their will subsumed by an Incubus or Succubus. They carve the sign into a Thrall with their own hands, and seal the bond with intercourse.”
“A Thrall?”
“A permanent source of life. The Succubus will call the Thrall to their side and feed on them when necessary.”
“What does bleeding the life out of me have anything to do with my will!” John demanded incredulously.
“Your life force and your will are tied together, Doctor Watson,” Imogene interrupted. “ A trait I'm sure you've noticed if your patients. Those who have the will to live continue to do so, those who do not, don't.”
John just stared at her, like she should have been the one with an ounce of common sense and telling the rest of them that that they were idiots. “But I never had sex with her!” he protested.
Irene was the one to answer this time, “Oh sex is just the sealing of the bond, John darling. The bond has already begun. You'll feel the pull to me in your veins, growing stronger and stronger the more your struggle. Eventually you'll succumb and find your way to my bed where the whole thing will be sealed. Or,” she re-crossed her legs to force attention to her exposed calves, “I can get bored and nab you again and just have my way with you.”
Mycroft was staring at the fire behind his mother, Imogene was looking at her tea, and Sherlock had relaxed completely against the chair. Every last one of them was furious, but not one of them seemed to have a plan. John however, was at peace. According to Soo Lin he was there to change magic, and according to Imogene he was there for Sherlock. For all their gifts in magic none of these people seemed to understand the common sense way of doing things. John just raised an eyebrow at the Succubus and replied, “There's a flaw in your plan.“
Irene grinned at John like he was a child scrambling for her attention and replied, “And what's that, John?”
John leaned forward in his chair, elbows on his knees to make her understand, “In my own right mind, I'd kill myself before I'd let you use me to control Sherlock.” Everyone in the room paused, as though they couldn't have possibly heard him right. The Holmeses glanced at one another to verify, then all turned in unison to stare at John in disbelief. Irene however, kept her eyes on John. When he felt the entire room looking at him, John continued, “You said yourself that the seal isn't complete, that I'll have who knows how long where I'm free of you, and all I need is a moment. All I need is one breath with my Browning to swallow my own sidearm and whatever hold you think you've got over him will be done. Shot out with my brain.”
It was obviously a possibility Irene had never thought of before, expecting John to value his own life quite as much as she valued her own. Of all the people to speak that John had been imagining, it hadn't been Sherlock, who demanded, “Why would you do that?” John turned to him and Sherlock continued, “You have no respect for fate, and you believe that death should be fought, not submitted to. So why are you doing this?”
John smiled at him, genuine and more at ease than he had been since he was in Afghanistan with his company, “Are you telling me the great Sherlock Holmes has found something he can't deduce?”
“Sentiment,” Sherlock replied, with none of his usual bite. Like it was an perfectly rational answer for why he was coming up blank.
“You believed I was innocent from the first moment you saw me. Lestrade said all the evidence pointed to me and Angelo said the magic was so convincing that no other Magican in London would've believed I didn't do it.”
“It was interesting.” Sherlock objected, but his heart wasn't really in it.
John snorted, “You don't take clients with you to Angelo's, and you don't let them boss you about and make you eat dinner. That's what you do with friends. And apparently if we had a bit more time you were going to be the best friend I ever had. So I'm doing this for the friends we might've been.” John shrugged, “Can't be much better than the man I met today.”
Carruthers had been silently padding through the routine of a properly prepared cup of tea throughout this whole conversation, the process unimpeded by the fact that a man was discussing his own suicide. The goblin carried over his tray and set down four cups of perfectly prepared tea beside their intended recipients (John's own was the straight black of Earl Grey, and he could see a splash of cream in Irene's). Sherlock's own, however, was the same mug that he had been drinking out of before the whole episode began. He'd left it half-empty on the side table beside his mother when he began his tantrum, and Carruthers had done nothing more than move it the three feet from that table to the one beside Sherlock's own chair.
John had no idea what the point behind that snub was, but Sherlock seemed to since he downed the rest of the cold tea in one motion and stared at the dregs of the cup like they held all the answers in the world. They must've told him something, because Irene slipped out of her comfortable stance and dropped both heeled feet to the floor to declare, “Really, Sherlock--”
“I didn't deduce you were innocent,” Sherlock interrupted. “Well,” he rotated the cup ever so slightly, “I did after a moment. But I didn't see it until I'd Seen it,” and John could hear the capitalization. “My gift, my Sight. It burst out the moment I laid eyes on you and I knew I couldn't let you go to prison.”
“John came across two assassins in Camden, and there were three more waiting,” Mycroft murmured. “On at New Scotland Yard, one in the holding facility, and one at the courthouse. Each with instructions to complete the task should their predecessor fail.”
Irene scoffed, “Really Sherlock. You're just making my case stronger. Your Sight wants him alive, which means you're not going to let him die for you.”
Sherlock plucked the compact magnifying glass out of his breast pocket to examine the dregs clumping at the bottom of the empty tea cup while he idly muttered, “No, I don't believe I will.”
Irene smirked, certain that whatever Sherlock had seen in his mug was the inevitability of her plan. Only, instead of resign himself to whatever she had in store, Sherlock tossed the mug to his mother. The flight of the china that probably cost as much as John's rent was enough of a distraction that Irene didn't even notice Carruthers standing behind her with a smoking mug. Carruthers poured the liquid that he'd prepared alongside the tea over Irene's head, and she screamed the moment it touched her skin.
Carruthers put the cup back on its saucer and mildly told Sherlock, “Two minutes, Sir.”
Sherlock hadn't bothered waiting for the confirmation, and had instead leapt across the space between the chairs to kneel before John. He gave no sign that he'd heard Carruthers, but the Goblin was obviously well adjusted to dealing with a Holmes in a snit. Sherlock ripped on the buttons covering John's mark and hesitated for half a moment. That moment was enough time for John to look at Sherlock and understand why the detective had kept his eyes down before he moved. The smokey grey that usually made up his iris had bled out, and the whole of his eyes were soaked in grey. That was all John had the chance to see before Sherlock pressed the palm of his right hand to the skin over John's heart.
It was not unlike being shot.
John fought back a scream at the sensation, and found himself braced against Sherlock's chest. His own hands were curled around Sherlock's biceps, clenching for all he was worth to avoid being bowled over by the pain, while the detective had his free hand threaded through John's hair. The man was whispering something low and soft in John's ear, closer to Latin than to English, and the burn in his chest grew.
John stopped trying to fight the scream and just let it out, a great bellow that he was a little ashamed he still had it in him to make after surviving basic training. Apparently the freedom of the scream was something that Sherlock needed, John turning himself over to the magic Sherlock was working on his chest, and with a great rip, the pain started to ebb. In exhaustion John dropped his chin to his chest and watched as the blackness floated off his chest and gathered on Sherlock's hand until the pain and any trace that Irene had ever touched him disappeared. Sherlock held his hand out to the side, fingertips down, and the blackness dripped down the line of his hand and puddled on the floor.
As seemed to be a theme for the day, Carruthers waltzed over and poured his latest cup of tea over the blackness, and at the touch of whatever he had in that cup the darkness retreated in on itself and went up in smoke.
John drew in and out several deep breaths and devoutly ignored that his head was resting in the cradle of Sherlock's throat. They sat together for several long moments before both men cleared their throats and separated with more than a little embarassment. They had to snap out of that natural response quickly when Irene came back to herself and reached out for John, only to be burned by the touch of his skin. She reared back with such force that she landed back in her chair and sent it reeling to the ground. It is difficult to make yourself look dignified when you were climbing off the floor, but Irene still tried. The glare she fixed on Sherlock lacked any and all affection that she had assumed in their conversation before and she hissed, “What did you do?”
Sherlock looked on her with his grey eyes and replied, “I know all things in the now, and at that exact moment I Saw into his heart, and I revealed the clean truth of him at the center.”
“You healed him of me?” she spat, aghast.
“There was nothing to heal. He wasn't yours. No matter what you did to him he would always be mine.” Sherlock rose to his feet, “I advise you to find something particularly good to appease your master, because the moment you leave here he'll know that John is no longer tied to you, and can no longer be tied to anyone else.”
I rene slid to her feet, every moment regaining her calm, “You're going to let me live?”
“It pays to have a Succubus owe you.” Irene gave Sherlock a smirk and strode out of the room, like there wasn't going to be a bounty on her head the moment she crossed the threshold. Sherlock smiled, like he found the whole thing terrible amusing and dropped a kiss to his mother's cheek before he started for the door.
From his spot still on the floor John demanded, “How did you know you could do that?”
“Do what?” Sherlock held out a hand and pulled John to his feet.
“Do what! Rip her out of me!”
Sherlock tossed on his coat, turning up the collar as he strode towards the door without so much as a goodbye to his brother. “Tea leaves, John. Tea leaves!”
“You read the damn tea leaves?” John followed after him, pausing at the door to look back and forth between Sherlock disappearing down the hall and the family who'd just helped Sherlock save John's life. Carruthers snapped his fingers and out pulled a much less battered version ofJohn's favorite coat out of thin air and fixed John with a look that said, 'Well, go on with you.'' John gave them all a nod before he started after Sherlock, who had apparently been explaining the entire time John hadn't been listening to him.
“I admit tea reading is one of the vaguer methods for telling the future, but it serves its purpose.”
“I thought you could only See the present, not the future?”
“The present is my natural inclination and where I am the strongest, but having the Sight at all means that to a lesser degree I can perceive the future as well as the past.”
John paused, thinking of Sherlock's description of how he'd Seen John's innocence when they'd first met, and asked, “Seeing like that, all in a rush, it's not common for you?”
“The last time my Sight took over my deductions was the last time I overdosed.”
John slouched back in his chair, not at all pleased with the information that Sherlock had been an addict. “And what did you See then?”
“My death.” Sherlock ignored the elevators and strode into the stairwell, long legs taking him down at a fast clip.
“But you're not dead,” John demanded, tailing after him through the door.
Sherlock's look declared John was an absolute idiot, but Sherlock had decided to trust him anyway and he replied, “Perfectly sound analysis, John, but I was expecting more.”
“You're supposed to 'know' everything about the present, but you didn't know your own death.”
“That's because 'fate' is doing just as must guessing as the rest of us. Except for me, of course. I never guess.”
“Yes you do,” John teased.
“Given the amount of cocaine in my system I should've stopped breathing before the paramedics ever had the chance of reaching me. It wasn't fate and it wasn't divine intervention, it was my own continual exposure to large doses of cocaine that kept me from responding in the way of a lesser addict.”
“'The way' being heart failure.”
"'The way' being luck and so such thing as fate."
John 'hmm-ed', but didn't comment. Sherlock signed, “You believe in fate.”
“Not in the slightest.”
Sherlock furrowed, “Then why aren't you agreeing with me?”
John stopped walking, forcing Sherlock to actually look at him rather than deduce things about the concrete walls they were passing. “Because I think you chose to live. I think there was a moment there where you could've left, and you chose to stay.”
“And what on earth does that have to do with fate?”
“If we're the masters of our own destiny, and you chose to live, then that's what you'll keep choosing to do. That's who you'll choose to be, and you've made your own fate.”
John shrugged and started back down the stairs until Sherlock interrupted, “Like you chose to die rather than betray me?”
“No different than finally accepting your gift to save me,” John called over his shoulder, not bothering to stop. Sherlock grinned and strode after John, his long legs covering the space in a few short moments.
At the top of the massive staircase behind them there stood Imogene and Mycroft, watching their Sherlock grin at his human like the man was fascinating. Mycroft sighed, “He'll be insufferable now, you know.”
Imogene ran a soothing hand along her firstborn's shoulder, “He was insufferable before, at least now there's a chance John might be the making of your brother.”
“Or make him worse than ever.” Mycroft retorted.
With a small, private smile Imogene's eyes faded to white and she whispered, “No, I believe they will something to adore, this Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson.”