Chapter Text
BAZ
I watch silently as Bracknell, with sweat and blood dripping down his face and matted hair, retrieves containers of motor oil from the back of the room. I hear a rhythmic thumping upstairs, and I can only assume that the numpties have lumbered their way out of the house. Good for them; even those glorified rocks and my co-kidnappers deserve a break.
I try very hard not to move or fidget in any way. There’s a very large possibility that whatever had happened to kill those guards (Normal? Vampiric?), leaving just him and me in a dungeon of a basement, had left Bracknell suicidal.
Bracknell pours oil all over the basement grounds, and a stream of it is slowly approaching where I sit. As quietly as possible, I slide away towards the walls. I can’t die like this. I owe Simon an explanation. I need to tell him that no matter what, I’m still his and I want him for sure.
Bracknell heads out with two more large jugs, and from the doorway I see that he’s drizzled just a touch of oil, sadistically artistic with it, over the fallen guardsmen. He hauls one into the room, staring pointedly at me. He pulls it out again and swaps it for another one, a tall and lanky guard. His footsteps echo as he goes up the stairs, apparently satisfied now.
The stairs! I’d never seen the stairs before. I’d never had the chance to look out the door properly until now. And it must only be him standing in the way of my escape.
I excitedly stand up, or I attempt to. As soon as I hop us to my feet, my mangled left leg makes a disturbing squelching sound and I collapse on the cold granite, blood mixing with oil. My left thigh’s puffy and purplish. I’m thinking that it must be infected with more than Bracknell's damning vampirism.
I’m not certain that my supernatural healing can save me in time. And I guess both my gammy leg and Bracknell are in the way of freedom.
I smell a stronger scent of oil, somewhere upstairs.
From one depressed as fuck vampire, I must say that using the traditional methods makes it just a touch scarier.
When I stopped thinking in the woods, back before Simon stupidly and bravely and stupidly bravely kissed me away from the fire around and within me, I never thought to do it in any way other than magic. I loved magic, and it seemed appropriate to light a match in my heart and blow on the tinder, just like my mother did in the nursery.
How much does a mage have to hate magic to be able to burn a house down with motor oil and a lighter?
I resort to crawling on my belly, military-style, and my left leg protests with every slow drag I manage. When I find myself finally at the staircase, out of breath and panting from exhaustion and pain, I rely on my right knee pushing down to give myself leverage to reach the next level of stairs.
It’s a slow journey, and a delirious, pain-driven part of me has selected Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony to be the song stuck in my head at this timely moment. My legs are moving so slowly and jerkingly that it really isn’t on beat to the music mimicking fate knocking on the door in my head.
Learning classical music is a gift. Having one of the more popular and therefore lesser pieces playing on repeat as your left leg dribbles blood all over your kidnapper’s carpeted staircase while you’re down in your tattered underwear in a very unsexy way is a fucking nightmare.
When I’ve made it to the top of the stairs, I let out a slow sigh and push again with my right leg. I’m finally on the ground floor.
This escape is possible. All I have to do is to make it out of the house and steal a phone somewhere! I can wash up at Fiona’s and make it back for supper at Penny and Simon’s! I can tell Simon that I’ve always and will always be incorrigibly, unfathomably, inexorably in love with him!
I hear it before I see it. A loud, distinct snap sounds, and a long, grinding crunch follows. There’s a sharp pain, and then numbness. My right hand’s been stepped on very deliberately, and my thoughts are too coherent for my taste. I’d have thought that something like this would render me screaming, but after these long weeks? I can only morbidly think oh would you look at that-- another debilitating injury from Bracknell, how lovely .
“Going somewhere?” He reeks of oil, and his voice is like sandpaper, scratchy, vile, and sounding as if it would hurt if it crawled all over your skin and disappeared down your throat. It certainly sounds raw, like it had a hard time emerging from his throat, the snake.
I, Tyrannus Basilton Grimm-Pitch, am royally fucked.
SIMON
When we pull up on the driveway by the house, it’s very early in the morning. The house is in the middle of nowhere. Chickens squawk angrily from a nearby farm, and we’re surrounded by fields that make me feel a bit warm inside.
“I thought it would look sketchy or something, honestly,” Micah pipes up cheerfully.
“Dodgy,” says Penny lightly, correcting the American’s Americanism. I hear Nicodemus sigh and Fiona hooting up front, and I know that they’re trying to make this easier than it is. Visiting the Mage’s house, I mean. And Micah’s right, because the Mage’s house doesn’t even look half as evil as Baz’s Hampshire home does.
I exit the car first, and I can’t help but stand still and stare at the scene in front of me. It’s a lovely, quaint little cottage complete with a respectable backyard that’s just a touch overgrown with weeds. There’s even two tiny ditches of dirt that haven’t quite been rained over. Tire tracks? An animal’s stashed-away bones? One’s certainly bigger than the other, and a raised bump instead of a proper ditch.
Fiona starts hysterically giggling, wheezing out her words between laughs, saying something like “Davy. Fucking Davy with his secret lair looking like a cute romantic getaway. Typical.”
The grass crunches under my feet and the morning dew slips down and wets my trainers slightly in a not really uncomfortable kind of way as we walk to the front door. I feel a bit at home, and the air smells just a fraction fresher. It’s peaceful here, and I’ve always envisioned the Mage running around busy during the summers, preparing himself for war with the Old Families. But he’s always retired to this place. Home base.
As we walk up to the porch, Nicodemus rushes forward with one hand on the door knob and another backwards towards us as a warning. “Get behind me. Just in case.”
“I thought that this house was abandoned! No one’s at home, you said.” Penny exclaims, just as Fiona laughs and says to Nicodemus, “Nonsense, you self-sacrificing twat,” and hops up the low stairs and helps Nicodemus pick the lock.
Micah asks Fiona a little timidly on why we can’t just use magic for the door. “ Open sesame always lands a solid one.”
“No magic, Mic. The lock could be enchanted. Knowing Davy, that’d probably mean anything from an attack of enraged chickens to a horde of evil spirits.”
“Ah,” Micah says in a very soft exhale, and Penny hugs him around the waist.
I’ve been silent all this time because I don’t know how to feel about this. I’m not sure if agreeing to Nicodemus’ plan of getting me out here in Lancashire was a good idea.
The door abruptly swings open when Fiona gets through with the lock, and we sneak inside. It’s good for us that it’s so early that no one in the vicinity of the property is awake, and that we’re in “one of the most sparsely populated countryside areas in all of England,” as Penny wisely put it somewhere around 3 A.M. last night when I’d voiced the concern of us practically breaking and entering. Not practically. Literally.
We decide to split up when we see a set of stairs going up, even after Micah protests under his breath a bit jokingly, “If Hollywood has taught me one thing, it’s to never separate from a group when you’re doing something sketchy.”
“Dodgy!” This time, both Penny and Fiona yell it quite enthusiastically.
“Oi, bugger off!” is Micah’s very creative and overly British response.
I’m still keeping quiet, tagging along with Penny and Micah as Fiona and Nicodemus head upstairs, Fiona having grabbed a shovel from the truck of the car. Nicodemus says that that must be where the Mage’s study’s at, and thus is the most likely place to seek out a clue on Bracknell’s past. I don’t think I’d like to be reminded of how much I didn’t know about the Mage’s past. I don’t want to know what else he’s done besides taking Baz’s mum away from him, and burning up a Watford nursery full of innocent kids.
Thinking of Baz now makes my heart squeeze a bit. I miss him, and I don’t know if he even thinks of me anymore. It’s been two weeks and a day now since I told him to get out of the flat. Since he’s gone missing.
Penny heads towards the kitchen, rifling her hands through everything as she works at magically cataloging all she sees. While holding her wand aloft, she sings softly to herself, “Now I know my ABC’s,” a little out of tune, and a hologram of the twenty-six letters pops up at eye-level.
“A: Jar of black fluid. Likely for sorcery. Why the kitchen as a storage place, though? Curious. File away for later,” Penny says, and the words write themselves in the air for the first entry.
“Penny,” Micah calls out from the far cupboard, and Penny hops over. He procures another jar, this one covered with opaque parchment paper all over, hiding its contents. Micah peels the paper and masking tape away, and he gags while Penny swears colourfully and fumbles with the jar he’s almost dropped on the floor. I walk over, bracing for the worst.
It’s a baby dragon. A pink, fleshy embryo, frozen and stagnant in time, stuck in its gestational stages. Its beak hadn’t been fully formed, and its small figure looks twisted in a grotesque mask of horror and pain. It doesn’t even have scales yet, and has tiny nubs growing out of its back.
It never had a chance to fly, breathe fire, or spread its wings. Baz would be horrified if he saw this. I remember him insisting on saving the dragon with the nursery rhyme. He’s always said he’s never felt so powerful as when I poured my magic into him. I loved to tell him that I’d never felt as balanced and at peace with myself as I did then in that moment, and it’s true. And now I’ve lost him, I find myself looking blankly at a baby dragon for clues to the man who took Baz.
Baz would feel sickened and find a way to bring the Mage back from the dead to kill him for robbing the dragon from its life.
I don’t feel sick though, because I can feel an almost slow, looming sense of dread instead of disgust.
Penny’s put the jar down and moved to other, more um, controversial assortments of materials in the kitchen when I look around at the kitchen tiles and notice the faint pencilled lines on the wall by the stove. They’re neatly marked with dates, just the month and year. Soft lines and a woman’s handwriting. There are several of them, ending just below the height of the countertop. Penny’s rattling off detailed descriptions on the impressive inventory in her hologram, but I’m barely listening because I realize something with a jolt.
Because I remember those lines. Mummy taking my height measurements, and I remember saying that I’d grow big and strong to protect her from the monsters Papa said would come for us and the World of Mages.
I remember this place.
I don’t understand. I’ve been here before.
Everything falls away, and I feel awfully empty. It’s like with the Humdrum again, with the sucking, panicked feeling. I want to get away but I can’t.
Faraway, like static, I hear Penny asking if I need water or hot tea, and then correcting herself because I’m being absurd, sorry Simon, of course there wouldn’t be tea here , if I’m okay, and telling me that it’s okay, I’ll be okay, that it’s absolutely normal to take a break before continuing. I slide down by the wall and my legs go slack. I’ve my head in my hands, and everything is too loud, too much, too bright all of a sudden. I can barely breathe, but I force myself to go through the motions with my chest heaving anyway, because I have to survive this. For Baz to have a chance.
I’m barely listening to Penny, who’s trying her best to gauge my responses and calm my panic attack. I shut off and focus on my breathing myself.
I can’t hear anything.
NICODEMUS
Fiona rummages through the Mage’s personal bookshelf and I choose to rifle through the papers on his desk. She’s telling me half-heartedly about Malcolm Grimm’s decision to start enlisting the help of the Old Families. They’ve the resources but not necessarily the manpower to seek out Baz. Fiona says that she’s unsure on whether or not to let Malcolm know about Bracknell, but with the Old Families anything’s possible. As soon as one elder member of these wealthy families remembers Davy’s past, the truth will tell itself.
The knicknacks that Davy had kept on his desk are miscellaneous, and most of them look as if they’re for dark magic.
I’ll call the children up later to let them know. Perhaps they’ve found something similar downstairs.
I call Rodrigo, my right-hand man, thinking that it’s best I get an update on Operation Willow. It’s not normal for them to remain out of contact with me this long.
The call goes directly to voicemail.
I try not to let the panic show on my face. Better to not frighten Fiona or burden her with this. Did I send my men to a kill zone?
I dial the number again frantically.
There’s a click, and he picks up.
“Boss, they’re all gone. Everything’s gone.”
“What?” I stop myself, take a breath, and continue, “What exactly do you mean?”
“There was a massacre, and he used a fire. We’re certain that Baz Pitch was held in the basement.”
“Pardon?”
“I put a tracker on his car, I did, Sir. He drove away, but he’d burnt up our cars. He used motor oil all over the house. They’re all gone. Dead, Sir. He buried them all. He didn’t see me.”
I struggle to absorb all this. I look over at Fiona, who has stopped with the searching and is studying my expression, and I can’t think of what to say to her.
“The hostage. Is he . . .?” I simply can’t bring myself to say it, or for that matter, say his name. The fear I feel betrays any semblance of the walls I’d built throughout these years as an outcast of the World of Mages.
“I’m afraid I didn’t see him, Sir. I only saw the target get in the car and drive away.”
“You said you put a tracker on the vehicle.”
“Yes, Sir. I also checked the basement, Sir. One body. Matching the description you gave me. It’s burnt beyond recognition, but from the size and the fact that it was the only one in the basement with another corpse outside the room, by the door, like he was a lookout . . .” he trails off.
“Sir, it’s just that I think you shouldn’t give up. That we can at least bring Bracknell to justice. We can trace his route.”
“Thank you, Rodrigo. I’ll let you know if I have further instructions. Can you pass along this information, all that you’ve just told me, to those back at the pub?”
“Yes, yes, I can do that. Of course, Sir.”
“Good.” I hang up the call, and look at Fiona. She mouths the word, “How?” and I know that she knows. She’s always been able to read me. She knows me best, and I failed Fiona.
I failed my men by sending them straight into a bloody massacre.
I failed Baz, and now his body is lying in Bracknell’s burnt-up crisp of a house. Just a few kilometers away from here.
God, what will Malcolm Grimm say? How will he recover from this, after losing Natasha? And to think that we’ve been doing all this, playing a child’s game and thinking that a few vamps could track Bracknell down to find Baz.
I hold my gaze with Fiona’s as she takes hold of my arm and shakes it violently in knowing grief, and I break.
We both do.
BAZ
In the end, he makes me watch the house burn. He hastily throws me into the backseat of his car, a black, beat-up Land Rover, and speeds away, the two of us smelling like the oil and fire.
He tells me how Nicodemus had almost succeeded in besting him, but had made the fatal mistake of not bringing Simon over.
“If he had brought the boy, I wouldn’t have killed his men. Well, not all of them, anyway. They’re all buried in the backyard now. The fire’s not for them. They don’t deserve it. They were just playthings, just dogs, of Nicodemus’. I belonged to that life once.”
I don’t respond.
He rolls the windows down and lets the wind roar by our ears. I’m tied down with ropes and all three seatbelts at the backseat.
I think of screaming, because perhaps, just perhaps, someone would notice and bring me home.
But it’s at the break of dawn and no one’s awake in Lancashire. Absolutely no one would be here. Bracknell’s said it himself: even Nicodemus isn’t here and he sent only his men, who are all fallen now. The only other person who could possibly be at Lancashire is the Mage, but he’s dead.
Did anyone think to relay back to Nicodemus that I’m here and I’m alive?
I don’t scream, because who am I kidding? No one will be able to hear me.
SIMON
Sunshine, rosebud, softly pattering rain on the tin roof, a baby dragon whose mother had been killed, many chickens that I could feed in the yard, eggs, grass, a woman’s soft, fair hair, and her voice. Her voice saying, “Be careful when you feed the chickens! Be gentle. Here,” and a firm grasp on my wrist, chubby and pale.
Her voice saying, “Simon, Simon my rosebud boy” as I ask for one more lullaby before bed.
Her voice saying, “Simon, Simon my rosebud boy” as I lie awake, shivering in Watford after Baz’s mum had a Visiting.
I don’t know her name. She was just Mummy to me, and I remember toddling after her and Papa.
Papa. I remember the Mage, but without a mustache. Younger. Young without the wrinkles, the gelled hair, and the pained look. Young without the blood on his face and the loosening grip on my hand when I told him to stop hurting me at the Weeping Tower.
The Mage with kind hands and a soft voice, saying that it won’t be long, that foster care will be good to me.
The Mage saying, “My boy. I found you” after I’d gone off that first time near here in Lancashire. After I’d dreamed myself sick of wanting to a footballer mansion or just a mother and father. Before he’d taken me to Watford and made me his legal father.
Long after he’d christened me his birth son.
I feel as though I’m about to burst and my skin is on fire. It’s very warm, and my fingertips are scratching at my sword, which is still snug in my scabbard. The cool of the metal burns upon my touch, and I’m up to the brim with memories that aren’t possible, with fragments that were blocked off somehow. It’s a trip down a memory minefield.
But now I know, and I’m irretrievably ruined.
I’m not sure if I would have liked to know.