(Sherlock/White Collar) Artisan of Fortune Part 2 for daymarket

[aurilly]

to Artisan of Fortune - Part 1

Sherlock always woke instantly; he never lingered in a "drowse" or a "doze". However, he'd learned from earliest childhood to impeccably imitate a slow return to consciousness: those moments before the observed was aware of the observation often gave him critical information.

Yesterday's happenings flashed through his mind, attaching Neal and not a threat to the soft rhythmic scratch of pencil across paper on the desk, the odour of overbrewed coffee. Writing a note? No, something else... Sherlock wanted to frown but didn't. Not just an engraver, he remembered, an artist of many stripes: yes, Neal must be sketching.

The mattress next to Sherlock was cool, no lingering warmth from another presence, and he was disturbed to acknowledge Neal had left the bed, the room, and the building half an hour or more before - and returned - without waking him; exceptional situation or not, this was more unwelcome evidence that the injury was going to interfere with his survival skills. The pain in his knee had temporarily dimmed to a dull throb, but the joint was stiff and taut with leaking blood and synovial fluid, and the rest of his body ached from sleeping unnaturally in one position all night.

His mind was clearer, at least, without the overconfidence or maudlin confusion that came with the drug. Perspective was a good thing.

"Morning. How bad's the knee?"

"I'm not awake yet, you idiot," he replied, without opening his eyes.

"Oh, right. Sorry." Neal didn't quite laugh, but the breadth of his smile was plain in his voice.

Slowly, Sherlock stretched his neck against the stiffness and tilted his head up, squinting at the desk where Neal had put his drawing aside. He looked impossibly well-groomed, considering their adventures; he'd even acquired a new hat, resting on the desk beside him. Sherlock let his head drop back, sourly pulled his blanket to the side and attempted to locate the left-hand pocket on his rumpled and twisted coat.

"I picked up some paracetamol while I was out." Neal worked at opening the bottle of painkillers. "Oh, and your trousers are still at the foot of the mattress."

"Fat lot of good they'll do me there. Did you forget that the whole point of bringing you here was to keep your face off of the streets?" Sherlock dug into the pocket, came up with a crumpled and useless packet of cigarettes, wadded it tighter and threw it past his feet.

"Not at all. You're the one who told me I'd need to put my 'fancy skin' back on. Hard to do that without some basic toiletries. Besides, the art of disguise is knowing how to hide in plain sight." He tilted a couple of tablets into his palm and deftly used the same hand to pick up a second coffee cup, then got up and paused at the foot of the mattress to retrieve the worn jeans. "I didn't know how you took your coffee, so it's black with various packets available."

"Black is good, black is just fine, thank a deity for small favours."

Neal knelt next to his mattress. Sherlock accepted the pair of tablets from him and pressed them to the roof of his mouth with his tongue before steeling himself to push up on his elbow. He took the takeaway cup Neal held out, took off the lid and judged it drinkable by the steam, and washed the paracetamol down with one burning, bitter gulp.

Sherlock took another breath or two before going back for a second swig, forcibly ignoring both the tedious pain and the part of his brain already plotting the morning's difficult doings, then looked up into Neal's patient blue gaze.

"The knee is bad and getting worse. But." He cleared his throat gruffly. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." Neal gestured toward the desk, grimacing when he overstretched his shoulder. "I think I remember offering to teach you to pick a lock last night, and while we have plans I'm absolutely certain you're a quick study."

"I am," he nodded. "The time? Best for both of us to get moving early."

"A little before seven. Minicab will be out front of the pub for you at quarter to eight." Sherlock nodded, appreciating Neal's own shrewd planning. He waited for Sherlock to finish his third deep swallow of the awful coffee, then took the cup back and lifted the trousers. "You want to wrestle these on yourself, or do you want my help?"

He exhaled harshly. "Neither. Let's get it over with."

By the time Sherlock was clothed and upright, leaning on the desk and pretending he was neither sweating nor trembling, it was seven fifteen. Neal, mercifully ignoring the effort it took him to recover, followed Sherlock's instructions for gathering the hidden things he wanted to take with him and hiding the things he didn't. Sherlock smiled wryly to himself, watching Neal take mental notes on useful ways to cache things in an ordinary room.

Meanwhile, he shifted gingerly until he was sitting on the surface of the desk and studied the almost-complete drawing Neal had left there: his own sleeping face, captured with surprising subtlety in ordinary 2B pencil on a lined pad Neal had turned up somewhere. Sherlock's freckled, mismatched features - catty eyes, snub nose, angular lips - had somehow been smoothed into something...well, interesting, at least.

"Mirrors lie," Neal observed, setting the neatly folded blanket back in the file cabinet drawer. Responding to his frown, Sherlock realized.

"And art doesn't?"

"Only rarely. Only if you force it to."

Sherlock looked thoughtfully at Neal, mind leapfrogging ahead. "But sometimes, you might need it to, yes?"

He leaned down and rummaged in the center desk drawer until he found the permanent marker he'd needed a couple of months before.

"Where was your meeting?" Sherlock asked. "Somewhere in Mayfair?"

Neal paused, with a sigh that was more resignation than consternation, and gave Sherlock an inquisitive look.

"It's where all the best galleries are, the most likely place to find experts on engraving. Also, Russians own about twenty percent of the real estate in the area. I just need the name of the gallery or building. Or at least the street."

Neal hesitated; trust between them wasn't the problem, so clearly there was someone else he was concerned about protecting. "Bruton Street."

Sherlock gazed into space, slotting information and probabilities into place, holding his forefingers across his lips with the pen clasped in between. Finally he nodded, and blinked over at Neal.

"The lower right drawer, there's a bottle of distilled water and a box of syringes." He squinted, not quite apologetically. "Please?"

Neal stepped to the corner of the room, watching Sherlock; he even frowned prettily. He tugged the futon up enough to pull the drawer open and gather the syringe and bottle, while Sherlock made sure there was room behind him on the desk, then leaned back until he was almost flat on his back.

Sherlock uncapped the pen and made a quick spiral pattern on his jeans to test the ink flow on the faded denim, then immediately rubbed his finger across the circle to smudge the quick-drying ink. He reached down as far as he could on his leg, closed his eyes, and dashed a quick awkward scrawl across his thigh. When he opened his eyes again, Neal was there to help him back to a full sitting position, but he tilted his head to inspect what Sherlock had written.

"Vik...Viktor? Mar...Mary...something. Bruton, I get, but....No Mat? What is this?"

"Something to keep both of our enemies busy," Sherlock smirked, tugging his little kit from the inner pocket of his coat, holding it up. "Viktor Margolin is - was - my 'supplier'. Conveniently, he also happens to be from the same oblast as our pursuers from yesterday - they're bound to be connected in some way, so 'No Mat' is actually 'Novgorod Mafiya'. And the street name will tie counterfeiting into it, which should keep whoever sent the thugs after you busy for the next few months."

Neal's eyebrows lifted skeptically, half-lidded eyes gazing down at the scribbles on the denim. "Okay...tie it together for who?"

"It's better if you don't know." Sherlock emptied his injection kit, palmed the cocaine packet, and filled the vial with clean water from the bottle Neal had left on the desktop. "With bigger fish to fry, he won't bother your friends on Bruton Street, by the way, if they're halfway competent at covering their tracks - but don't try to contact them."

Neal digested that, studiously ignoring the drugs, vial and fresh syringe going back into their case; and the needle that Sherlock turned inside the used syringe before dropping it into the takeaway bag where Neal had collected their rubbish.

"So...if this is information you want to share, why write almost illegibly?"

Sherlock lifted an eyebrow, all arch innocence. "Can't make the puzzle too easy."

Neal shook his head, mouth curled in a bemused half-smile - then snapped his fingers. "You want this dangerous soul to think you wrote it lying on your back, in the dark. You smeared the ink because touch would be the only way for you to test the pen was working."

Sherlock grinned wonderingly at Neal. "Good."

"You want y- " a hitch in his speech as he caught something back behind his teeth - "him to think you feared for your life, and were taking the only chance you had to tell someone what happened. And it had to be obscure enough for the criminals to miss it, but decipherable by someone who knew you."

A silent sigh; too much to hope Neal wouldn't have fitted Sherlock's hypothesized brother into this.

"Well, if I'd managed to escape, I'd have a pretty good reason to jump off a building, wouldn't I? One that doesn't imply the presence of an accomplice, and that gives him a reason to go hunting the people who are hunting you."

At least Sherlock was sure he could trust Neal to heed his implied warnings. Unless he was very careful, digging enough to identify his brother by name would bring him to Mycroft's attention.

Neal chewed on his lip briefly, then chased down the last thread.

"And you're implicating your dealer in all this because...?"

Sherlock shrugged. "It ties up a loose end that could become inconvenient."

Neal sobered. "I think I'd rather we were always on the same side."

"I don't have a side."

"Well, if you ever pick one, let me know." He stepped over to the cabinets again, scooped off a handful of the thick dust covering their tops. "Let's age that up a bit, shall we?"

He returned to the desk, rubbing his hands together. "May I?"

"Be my guest." Sherlock spread a hand, curious; and intrigued by Neal's habit of asking permission to touch, except in the thick of an emergency.

Neal pondered, artistically, Sherlock presumed, before placing careful hands near his hips and brushing downwards, leaving an even film of dust over both thighs, remembering not to place undue pressure on the knee. He took the napkin from under his coffee cup and rubbed the residue off, leaving the jeans dirtier and the ink slightly less black; convincingly older than the injury.

Sherlock grinned again - he'd never picked up so many useful things from another human being in such a short time.

Neal smiled back, borrowing some water from the bottle to finish cleaning his hands on the napkin. "Ready to learn something new?"

"Always."

Neal swept the hat off the table, knocking a battered silver padlock from underneath it into his own hand. He leaned on the desk near Sherlock, picking up his small leather case.

"You can do this with any two things thin enough to fit in the keyway," he said, pulling out a pick and a flat-headed tension wrench. "Like anything else, though, having the right tool for the job does make it easier. Hold this for me."

He handed the lock over and paused to study Sherlock for a moment. "This will probably work better if we treat it like learning to tie a Windsor knot. If you don't mind."

"I'm beginning to think you're looking for ulterior motives to get up close and personal," Sherlock teased, without rancour. He slid off the desk onto his good leg, allowed Neal to slip behind him so he could wrap arms around him and guide his hands.

"Maybe I am, a little. Maybe it's just a relief to touch someone who doesn't read a thousand things into it. Here."

Sherlock leaned back against Neal's chest, taken aback by a new angle on an old problem: the Holmeses were never a family for close physical contact but he held himself aloof elsewhere, as well, because people did attach too much meaning to touch, expectations that he wanted neither to fulfil nor disappoint. Neal lifted his arms beneath Sherlock's, bringing the picks into play, and having the warmth without the complications was... pleasant.

Perhaps Neal had understood him better than he'd thought, under cover of darkness.

Sherlock was a quick study, concentrating on matching what he felt from outside the lock, as Neal picked it once, with the diagrams and vocabulary he had stored away in his memory, but the quality of his instructor also mattered, and Neal was a clever teacher. He moved at a speed appropriate to their time constraints, picking the lock once more before handing the picks over and guiding Sherlock's uncertain hands. Making sure he felt what the pins were doing, the difference between one locked in position and one still floating, and explaining the whole time how he'd deal with such a simple lock under usual circumstances. When he was certain he had enough of the feel that he could solve the puzzle himself with enough practice, Sherlock offered the lock to Neal.

"No, you keep it. No one will miss it, and it'll give you something to do while you're laid up." Neal slipped away from him, tucking his tools back in his case. "Which I'm sure will be hell for you. And your nurses."

The look in his blue eyes when he met Sherlock's gaze was sympathetic, but Neal held his coat for him without further comment.

"About a mile to the dock, you said?"

Sherlock dropped the padlock in with his gloves, nodding, then tucked his kit into the breast pocket. "Under the railway and bear southwest towards money."

"I can manage that. Let's get you out front." They really shouldn't be seen together this morning, but Sherlock didn't see another option.

The two of them made their halting way out into the morning gloom, Neal dropping their trash into a bin along the way. Sherlock had Neal lean him against a post outside the pub, then watched him trot down the street to the newsagent, heard the lilt in Neal's voice while he spoke to someone there. Cheerful. Charming.

He returned shortly with a lit cigarette dangling from his lips, stood alongside Sherlock without looking at him before handing it over. It was even the right brand.

"Bless you..." he murmured, taking a deep drag. "Do you ever stop trying to charm people?"

"It's part of who I am," Neal answered without hesitation or dissembling, "how I survive. So, no, not really, not unless it won't work or the grift calls for something different."

Neal looked at him sidelong. "Most times, though, it's habit; not about the con. And some people I just like to be charming for. Some people are worth the effort."

Sherlock grimaced, tapping his ashes onto the kerb. "Some people aren't."

Neal's smile was soft, and maybe a little sad; Sherlock's taxi came around the corner.

"Trust me, I know the difference. Take care of yourself, Sean. Or find someone who'll do it for you." Neal reached out and clapped him on the shoulder, then gave a jaunty stroke to the brim of his hat and headed down toward the railway underpass.

"You too, George," he murmured under his breath, shaking his head.

Sherlock gave his brother's address to the driver, certain Neal had left enough cash in his pocket to pay for the ride. He managed to push off from the post and pivot into the seat of the taxi without help, and honestly, he'd had enough of the pain. He fidgeted, trying to arrange the long coat more comfortably, worried that Mycroft might well confiscate and burn it - and he'd damn well buy Sherlock a replacement, if he did - when he realized there was an extra bulge in his pocket.

Neal had very deft hands indeed, to plant something on him without his noticing. He recognized the leather case by touch even before he tugged it out into the light, but it felt too heavy for the lockpicks alone. After a quick glance in the rearview mirror, he unzipped it and pulled out a roll of crackling lined paper, then caught at the bundle of banknotes in a worn elastic band that slid from the centre - the entire contents of Neal's money clip, it looked like. With an exasperated sigh, he palmed the notes and unrolled the two sheets of paper.

SH -

Stop scowling - I didn't give you all my cash. You know as well as I do I had more than what was in the clip.

Thank you, again, for your help. Please take the money as a symbolic stand-in for all the other things I wish I could do in return. And I doubt this will ever be of more value than a curiosity, but I like the thought of you having it.

I meant it when I said take care of yourself. It's good to think we'll encounter each other again.

NC

The other sheet was, of course, the sketch.



Sherlock closed his eyes. Unfair, to have finally found a kindred spirit in his last hours of freedom. From this day forward everything was going to be different, and he already felt the walls of propriety and expectation closing in, Mycroft's inevitable interrogation, and inexorable control.

Well. There were some things Sherlock intended would remain a mystery for his brother. He rolled the sketch carefully back into the lockpick case, peeled off enough notes to pay the driver for the ride and for helping him up to Mycroft's doorstep, and tucked the rest into his breast pocket.

Neal's note he ripped up, and he fed the pieces one at a time out into the slipstream of London.

London, 2005

Sherlock's phone sounded an unfamiliar chime, and he frowned, lifting his hip off the passenger seat of the cramped police car to retrieve the BlackBerry from his pocket.

Detective Inspector Lestrade glanced over at him curiously, then went back to watching the door across the street. The price Sherlock had to pay to get the police to take his assistance seriously - and perhaps to get the drugs indiscretion for which Lestrade had arrested him dismissed - was proving he knew which of the club kids had graduated from date rape to date murder, but sitting here like this was a damnable waste of his time.

He read the system message on the small screen.

ak4a78jnfqc438@faeijj33.to (George D) is requesting to be added to your contact list.

Sherlock sat up straighter. His thumbs danced over the keys, invoking a blank profile, adding a new name, and then routing the traffic through a proxy before accepting the request.

He lifted his head for a moment, gazing unseeing out at the wet tarmac before typing briefly.

Sean H: Da?

He waited.

George D: I bet you didn't know that Kestrels sometimes cache their kills for a later day.

Sherlock exhaled.

Of course he'd followed the notorious Neal Caffrey's career, over the years; what he could, anyway, without tipping anyone to aliases that weren't yet linked with him. But he'd been shocked earlier this year to hear that Neal had been arrested on a number of spectacular charges, and convicted for bond forgery. Sherlock had never expected to hear from him like this; as far as he knew, Neal should be sitting in an American gaol, awaiting sentencing.

Sean H: I did, actually. And I've been reading about falcons in the news.

George D: Bloody know-all. No need to be coy, I just wanted you to be sure it was me.

"Would you pay attention, please?" Lestrade said testily.

Sherlock's eyes flicked up toward the club door. "I told you he wouldn't be coming out until midnight, and this is important."

He didn't know how long Neal would have access to a computer or phone, and wasn't willing to miss this chance.

Sean H: Neal, Neal, Neal... How could you let some ordinary mortal catch you? We both know *I* could have caught you, had anyone asked me, but an FBI agent?

Sean H: What's really going on?

He waited; not long.

George D: Peter Burke is...not in your league, but not an ordinary mortal, either. Also, I am in love and was an idiot.

His phone chimed again before he could begin to come up with a proper response.

George D: Not with Peter.

Sherlock unpursed his lips.

'Peter,' not 'Agent Burke.' There was more of a story there, something he might be able to unravel if only he could see Neal.

George D: He's obsessed with me, though. Been chasing me for three years. But that's his job.

Sherlock snorted.

Sean H: You've evaded him for years, and you finally made a mistake because you, of all people, were in love? I disbelieve, Neal.

"Sherlock," Lestrade said.

"Hush," he snapped.

Sean H: Are you finally getting tired?

"Sherlock," Lestrade repeated. "Is that him?"

He looked up, exasperated. "No, of course not, his feet are too big. Do you not have eyes?"

The DI huffed angrily, bracing his arm against the steering wheel. His graying hair was rumpled, his cuticles worn where he'd dug at them with his thumbnail; this case was important to him, for whatever reason.

Waiting, Sherlock placated him by keeping his eyes on the street for the time being, trying with limited success to stretch the knee that sometimes ached in the cold. Lestrade wasn't actually dim, Sherlock knew, but for a trained detective he didn't seem to have the knack of interpreting everything he saw.

Four messages chimed in quick succession, and he looked back down.

George D: Believe me or don't, it's the truth. Kate and I fought; Peter used her as a lure, without her knowledge. Yes, I'm sure.

George D: Really, though - between the two of us - I deserved to be caught. I needed to see her again so badly. I was warned, and I was still careless.

George D: But it'll be a shortish sentence. Probably as well you're not here, for my sake. Allegedly.

George D: And I'll get tired when you do, which is to say: never.

Sherlock smiled sadly, imagining the twinkle that would dance in Neal's eyes if they were having this conversation face to face. But that wasn't going to happen in the near future.

He tongued his lip thoughtfully, began typing again.

Sean H: Hey, high roller - would you like your fortune told?

George D: I'll email you a fiver...

The club door opened; the laughing couple emerging with arms around each other's waists caught Sherlock's attention. His heartbeat quickened, but he wasn't yet certain; everything depended on which way the suspect turned at the corner. Lestrade watched Sherlock closely.

"Yes, follow him," Sherlock said, and Lestrade snapped orders into his radio before pulling out in a tight turn. Sherlock concentrated on typing accurately in the swaying car, not about to be accused of being unable to spell his Latin.

Sean H: Remember: "Faber est suae quisque fortunae."

Sherlock glanced down for a fraction of a second at the phone's next chime.

George D: I'm better at Russian. We make our own misfortune?

"Stay here," Lestrade ordered, pulling the car to the kerb at a reckless diagonal and leaping out the door. Sherlock's lips twisted sourly, but there was nothing to see beyond the mouth of a dark alley. Police lights strobed the area, making it difficult to see what he typed.

Sean H: "Fortuna" is like "fatum", fate - neither positive nor negative. You are the artisan of your own fortune as well, Neal.

Neal took a long time to answer. Sherlock held the phone tightly, watching the frantic activity outside: a belligerent man in handcuffs and a shaken woman, drawn into the light by Lestrade.

George D: I'll keep it in mind. Take care of yourself, Sean.

Sean H: You too, George. You too.

-END-

- asexuality
- Sherlock/White Collar, Neal-Sherlock gen shenanigans
- hurt/comfort