Chapter Text
SIMON
It’s so cold and dark. The cold seeps into me, surrounds me, cradles me. It feels like icy fingers brushing my cheek, combing through my hair.
I can’t see anything, but I can feel. I can hear.
A voice is shouting at me, high and thin.
‘Hear me,’ it says.
‘I hear you,’ I tell it. ‘What do you want?’
‘I want to tell you about him. About me. About yourself. Where you come from.’
I’m confused. What could this voice tell me about myself? Nobody knows anything about me or where I come from.
‘I have so much I want to tell you. But time is short, and I can’t stay long.’
‘So tell me,’ I shout at the voice. ‘Tell me where I come from.’
‘Simon,” the voice is smaller now, thinner, a whisper on the wind.
~*~*~*~*
I wake to cold hands on my cheek. I’m not sure that I’m actually awake, or if this is still part of the dream.
“Wake up, Snow,” his voice is a low whisper. “It was just a dream. Wake up.”
I squeeze my eyes shut tighter, thrashing my head back and forth against the pillows. I want to evict the voice from my head. The feeling of being so close to some vital truth about myself, just to have it ripped from me.
“You’re okay,” he’s still whispering soothing words, which I should find concerning, but I don’t.
I sit bolt upright. I feel shaky, startled from my dream. I can feel the cold sweat from my fever clinging to me. My whole body aches, like I had been fighting a pack of polecats instead of sleeping, and my nose won’t stop running.
The dream hadn’t scared me, but I have an overwhelming urge to cry.
“You’re okay,” he says again, pushing my damp curls back from my forehead.
I’m struggling to catch my breath, to pull myself back together. The dream left me feeling raw.
I lurch into Baz, burying my face into his shoulder and wrapping my arms around him. This isn’t something we’ve ever done in our eight years together– comfort each other– but I don’t even give myself a moment to think about it. He came to me, after all.
I can feel him freeze beneath my touch. I expect him to shove me off, call me a stupid coward, or at the very least to pretend none of this happened. But he hasn’t yet. Instead, he slowly puts a hand on my back. Such a light touch I’m not entirely convinced I’m not imagining it. Part of a fever dream.
“It’s alright, Snow,” he whispers to me. “Let it go. Nothing can touch you in here.”
He has no idea what I dreamed. Why it affected me.
I don’t understand why he’s being so kind. This is nothing like Baz.
I force myself to take a deep breath. Another. Then I pull back to look at him, but I can’t manage to look him in the eye. To let him see me like this.
“I– I’m sorry, Baz,” I say, looking at his chin. His nose. Anywhere but his eyes. “I’m okay. ‘S just a dream. Sorry I bothered you.”
“It isn’t a bother, Snow.” he says quietly. “You’re still sick. It’s okay to fall apart a little.”
BAZ
What was I thinking? Letting myself soothe him in his sleep, touching him, whispering words I’ve only ever imagined telling him when he battles his nightmares.
He sniffles, which I think is from his sudden crying fit until he lets out a string of sneezes that reminds me of the time in fourth year that he fought a Sneezle in Astronomy class.
He is a barbarian, not even attempting to cover his face. But at least he attempted to turn his head, I suppose.
I must make a face, because he’s saying “I’m sorry, but you are sitting on my bed. I should be allowed to sneeze in my own bed.”
Be nice, Basilton. You can do this. You don’t have to attack him at every turn. Make this year different.
Instead of saying anything cruel, I hand him a tissue.
“Do you want to talk about the dream? You’ve been talking in your sleep a lot more than normal.”
I should feel ashamed of this admission. Telling him that I listen to him while he sleeps. But in a room this small, it’s impossible to not wake to the nightmares that have plagued him for years.
“I– I don’t know. They’ve been different. Fever dreams maybe. I heard a voice, a lady. Said she had so much to tell me about ‘him’. And her. And about myself.” He swallows hard. “She said she knows where I come from.” He takes another shaky breath, his head dropping a fraction in defeat, “But that’s impossible.”
“Finding where you came from can’t be impossible, Snow. Have you tried?”
“Well, no. Not really,” he admits. “I asked the Mage once shortly after he brought me here, but he said that where I come from isn’t important, it’s where I’m going. What I can do for the world now that matters.”
“Of course he did,” I mutter under my breath. “Listen, Snow. At the risk of being accused of plotting, I’m going to offer this piece of advice. Learn to use the library.”
Fuck. That’s not what I wanted to say. I try to revise, “I’m sure there’s a heritage spell of some sort, if you really want to find out where you come from. Maybe you can find out who your parents were, when you’re ready.”
“Yeah, okay,” He throws himself back among his pillows again. He looks so pale still. Too pale and gaunt, worn down from this illness and apparently from trying to track me down, if Bunce is to be believed. This is my fault, he wouldn’t be sick like this if I had just been able to come back to school on time.
Whoever kidnapped me, I’m going to find them and kill them. Twice. Once for me, and another for doing this to Snow.
“Go to sleep, Snow.” I stand from his bed, making my way toward the en suite. “I’ll get you up for breakfast.”
“Thanks,” he mumbles into the pillows, pulling the blankets back up to his chin. He looks so small like this.
SIMON
“Simon. Simon. My rosebud boy,” the voice is still thin, but I know it’s her.
She sounds impossibly sad.
“I would never have left you.”
“Who are you?” I shout. I can feel the rapid beating of my heart in my ears, my panic rising. She’s back. She’s here. She’s called me by my name. She’s called me hers. Her rosebud boy. I’ve never been called that before. I’ve never been anything special to anyone.
“I loved you,” she says. She sounds miles away. “I loved you before I met you, and I loved you more the moment I held you.”
“Who are you?” I shout again. “Why are you telling me any of this?”
“I never would have left you, Simon. My love. My rosebud boy.”
“Are you–” I can’t finish the thought. Is she– Could she be?
“My son, I love you. He loves you too, he always has.”
I’m crying, I can feel the tears track down my cheek. My mother. I have a mother, and she’s come back to tell me.
“He’s always been dedicated to you. To creating you and keeping you safe.” Her voice is even thinner now. “To doing what he thought was best for you. For our world. He’s always been dedicated to changing our world for the good of all.” She’s barely a whisper now. I know she’s leaving. Leaving me. Again. When she’s only just come back to me.
~*~*~*~*
I startle awake to a haze of red settling around the room.
Fuck. No.
I try to focus on my breathing, think about disappearing. Shrinking in on myself. Being nothing.
The door to the en suite flies open and I vaguely hear Baz shouting spells, trying to cast my impending magickal implosion away.
“Stay cool! Keep it together!”
He’s striding toward me, casting as he approaches.
“Get back!” I snarl at him. Even the Mage won’t approach when I’m about to go off. But Baz doesn’t back down. He never does.
“Deep breaths, Simon. Let it go. Some of it, at least.” He’s not afraid of me. Of being too close to me when I go off.
I close my eyes, try to focus on defusing myself.
“Hold fast!”
When I open my eyes, Baz is standing over me with a look of worry in his eyes. I try not to think about that. He just didn’t want me to blow up half of Watford.
The room smells of smoke. I check to see if my bed is smoldering.
It’s not.
“What was that about, Snow?” He bites the words out. I knew his goodwill wouldn’t last long. I can’t blame him really, I did almost go off in our room.
“Just– another dream. Like the one last night.” I turn over in my bed to face the wall. I can’t look at him. See the disgust on his face because I can’t keep myself in check. I let my emotions dictate my life, unlike him. He never lets his emotions get the best of him. He’s always so fucking cool.
“Snow,” his voice sounds softer than I would have guessed it would be. I don’t turn to face him. I hate being a disappointment. I don’t know why it bothers me to disappoint Baz, but it does.
“I don’t think they’re really dreams,” I confess to the wall. “I think it’s my mum.” I needed to say it aloud. To feel the shape of the words rolling off my tongue.
What I’ve experienced doesn’t feel like a dream. It feels like a visiting. Like–
“Baz!” I sit up, perhaps a little too fast. My head is swimming, but I have to tell him. I can’t believe I forgot.
I grab his wrist and pull him down to sit on the edge of my bed.
“Baz,” I say again, “your mum. The veil lifted while you were gone.”
He freezes, staring me down when I say it.
“My mother was here while I was gone, and she talked to you?” He figured it out without me even having to say much. He’s so fucking smart, of course he figured it out. I just wish he had been smart enough to actually be here when the veil lifted instead of off planning his rebellion.
“She couldn’t find you. She waited, looking for you, until she couldn’t stay any longer.” His look is so intense, I feel like he might be trying to set me on fire just with his eyes. “She gave me a message for you. After she accused me of hurting you.”
“Unbelievable,” he sounds incredulous. As if I was the one who kept him from being here. “Well, what’s the message?”
I reach over to my bedside table and rifle through the drawer. Pulling out the notebook I’ve kept in there, I find the page with the notes I took from the visiting.
“Find her killer, bring her peace.” I say, reading over my notes.
“But she killed the vampires that attacked. I was there, I remember.”
“I know,” I say.
“What else? There must be more.”
“Her killer walks, but Nicodemus knows. Find Nicodemus, bring her peace.”
“Who’s Nicodemus?”
“Dunno,” I shrug. I don’t have much to go on, I can’t answer his questions. “She didn’t say.”
“Why are you telling me this now?” he asks.
“I’ve been kind of out of it, if you hadn’t noticed,” I’m getting defensive. I know. But he’s not going to blame me for him not being here to talk to his mum himself. “And I’m telling you now. Because she’s your mum. And I–” And I think I just talked to my own mum. But I don’t know how to say that to Baz. Not when he’s processing the message from his mum.
I look down, focusing on the blankets. I pick at a loose thread there. Anything to keep from looking at him right now.
“Fuck. Snow, your dream. Do you really think it was your mother coming through?” He’s so fucking smart, I don’t know how he could tell what I was thinking.
Is mind reading a vampire trait? I don’t think so, but sometimes he can read me like he knows exactly what I’m thinking. It’s downright creepy sometimes.
“I do,” I’m not sure what else to say. I know it was my mum, I can feel it in my bones.
“What did she say this time?” He sounds genuinely curious. He probably only cares because a spirit coming through the veil in dreams isn’t a common occurrence. This is an opportunity for him to learn something new, the tosser. He can’t really care.
“She called me her son, her rosebud boy.” My voice is barely a whisper. It’s hard to repeat what she said. But I need to say it. If I say it, it’ll be more real. “She said that she loved me before I was born, and more after she held me. Said she didn’t want to leave me.”
Baz reaches out and tentatively pats my arm. It’s a reassuring gesture, and coming from him, it’s out of place.
“She said ‘he loves me too. He always has.’ Baz,” I look at him, starting to feel my eyes prickle and my heart constrict. “What did she mean? Is he– Is my father still alive?”
“I don’t know, Snow. But we’ll find out.”
We. He said we will find out.
“Is this a setup?” I blurt out. I can’t imagine a world where Basilton Grimm-Pitch is willingly offering to help me with anything.
“What? No. Of course not.”
“Well, you’ve never so much as offered to help me with homework. You’ve pushed me down the stairs, and set a fucking Chimera on me. Sorry if I don’t entirely trust your sudden willingness to help me.”
“Truce,” he says, putting his right hand out to me.
“Truce?”
“Yes, Snow. Truce. I’m sure even with your limited vocabulary you know the word.”
“Don’t be a tosser. I mean, I can’t trust you if you’re still planning to feed me to the merwolves or lock me in a room with a polecat.”
“Fine,” he concedes with an annoyed sigh. “Truce. We’ll swear it with magic. No acts of aggression on either of our parts. I will help you find who your parents are, if your father is still alive, and what happened to your mother. You will help me find this Nicodemus and bring my mother peace.”
“Until we know the truth for both of us,” I add. If we find Nicodemus and his mother’s killer first, I don’t want him to have the opportunity to back out on me and kill me while I’m distracted.
I thrust my hand at him this time, more sure now that we have a magical agreement.
He rolls his eyes at me, but pulls out his wand.
I take his hand as he casts “An Englishman’s word is his bond!”
I feel his magic slide up my arm as it settles into me. His magic is hot, like a grease fire. I don’t like to have spells cast on me, but I don’t hate the feeling of his magic. It somehow feels familiar.
“Alright, Snow. Are you well enough to get up and come down to breakfast?” He stands, smoothing out a few wrinkles from his trousers. “Bunce will have my head if I don’t bring you down in the next few minutes. Or at least head down myself to give her permission to come check on you.”
I smile, knowing he’s right. “I’m feeling good enough to go down. I could definitely eat.” I still feel achy, but my appetite is back at least. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m feeling better, or because I finally feel settled knowing that Baz is here.
I decide not to think about it right now. I just know that if the Yorkshire pudding is gone by the time I get down there, I will not be happy.
Baz waits for me to get up and dressed, ushering me through our door.
We’ve never done this– going anywhere on campus together. We are often headed in the same direction, but we never go together. I don’t know how so much has changed over the past couple of days, but I’m not entirely mad about it.