Chapter Text
McDuck Manor was an uncharacteristically minimalist Queen Anne-style mansion. The original construction had been completed in 1903, and the grand estate had been designed to accommodate the then-current Clan McDuck, with room to grow. Three wings, each with a full master suite, one for each of the McDuck siblings plus space for any extended family, spouses or children they might acquire or produce.
Although it had been state of the art at the time of its building, the mansion had been renovated five times in its life, 1915, 1953, 1970, 1987 and 2005. Each renovation had offered various modern conveniences and improvements, and so despite the home’s age, it had little to envy in comparison to more modern dwellings. It had been built for a man who demanded solid stone where some might have cut corners and resorted to plywood and drywall, so it had survived catastrophic mudslides, forest fires and earthquakes without so much as a scratch, while other mansions along the wealthy and picturesque Calisota coast had been reduced to matchsticks and rubble.
But the fact was that a family had not lived in McDuck Manor since the 1930s. The mansion had spent a majority of its life only sporadically occupied by five people at most, and never the two or three families of children, parents and grandparents that had been originally envisioned. Lacking family to house, it became a repository for hoarded treasure, artwork and mementos from a life lived one adventure after another. In many ways it was more museum than house, and for long stretches of time it had stood empty of life entirely.
It was a historic institution, it was titanic, it was beautiful, it was ornate and eloquent all at once, it was…
“In shambles,” Duckworth moaned, adding another line on his list of repairs, touch-ups and cleaning tasks he desired to carry out in the near future. The ghost had occupied the living room outside of Scrooge’s master suite, and Scrooge couldn’t help but be amused by all his moaning and groaning about the condition of the manor. It wasn’t that bad!
“I saw homes directly bombed in the Blitzkrieg that were in better shape than this,” Duckworth insisted.
“Don’t you think you’re being a wee bit melodramatic?” Scrooge asked, smiling from his spot on the sofa.
“I’m dead!” Duckworth threw his arms out, his voice dropping several octaves. Somewhere overhead, a single light bulb popped. “The dead are supposed to be melodramatic! If I have to be a ghost I may as well get to enjoy it.”
“What you are is silly,” Scrooge laughed, his voice oozing with fondness in a way that would have embarrassed him had anyone caught him at it. Duckworth looked away, avoiding eye contact, acting as if there was something very important in his notes that required his immediate attention.
Normally Scrooge would have been at the office, you didn’t get to be the world’s richest man by taking days off! But Duckworth had barely been back with him in the realm of the living for 24 hours, and Scrooge couldn’t bring himself to leave the ghost unattended. What if he took his eyes off him and he vanished? The money could manage itself for awhile until Scrooge sorted this ghost business out.
Since yesterday’s failed attempt at a birthday party, Scrooge had spent his time eyebrows deep in every book he owned on magic, trying to unravel what Black Arts Beagle had done, how permanent it was, and if it wasn’t permanent, how to make it so. He had lost Duckworth once already. He wasn’t going to lose the man a second time.
Scrooge had been about to say something else when the triplets wandered in. Blast. Was it already past four? They were home from school. So much for teasing Duckworth. That was a little too personal to do in front of them, even if it was likely to go over their heads.
"We heard demonic roaring, did Duckworth go crazy?" Dewey asked, "Do we need to call an exorcist?"
"Nah," Scrooge replied. "He's just throwing a fit aboot the state the mansion's in."
"Is it not supposed to be in Calisota?" Louie asked.
"Very witty, young Sir," Duckworth said dryly. "The mansion is a mess. I can't believe I was only gone seven years. This level of destruction and filth seems---"
"To be honest," Scrooge interrupted Duckworth's commentary, "Most of the damage only started about five months ago when these three and Donald moved in. It wasn’t that bad before."
Although Duckworth’s ghostly appearance didn’t change, the lights in the room began flickering wildly, and a deep growling sound filled the air. “Really?” Duckworth said, voice echoing ominously. “So much mess in so little time?”
“Uhh, you know what? We’ve got...homework---” Huey didn’t even bother to finish his sentence as he grabbed at his brothers, and the three boys tripped over each other in their rush to leave the room at the same time. Duckworth watched them leave, and Scrooge gave an amused little snort as the lights returned to normal and the growling ceased once the boys were out of earshot.
“I wonder how long you’ll be able to keep them afraid of you before they realize what a creampuff you are?” Scrooge asked, getting to his feet and stretching, his back popping. “Come on. Let’s go check on the binding circles. I want to watch what the runes do as the sun sets.”
“Creampuff?” Duckworth repeated to himself, a touch indignantly, though he gathered up his papers and his pen and floated after Scrooge dutifully.
While it was true that Scrooge hated magic and in most cases, considered it a shortcut used by people trying to get out of good old-fashioned hard work, that didn’t mean that he wouldn’t use it as needed. This was a case of ‘as needed’. There were some things, after all, that only magic could do.
The problem was that no matter how many books he read or talismans he recovered from ancient ruins, Scrooge was no magician. He could follow a spell the same way one followed a recipe from a cookbook, but if it was anything overly complicated he would fare no better than Black Arts Beagle had.
Scrooge would, eventually, have to contract a professional of some sort (and pay them). That or become a bloody wizard himself, rather than just stumbling his way through like the amateur he was.
At any rate, with his current level of knowledge he’d set up a protective circle in his bedroom last night, carved it into the wooden floorboards and activated it with a small offering of blood, ignoring Duckworth’s incessant hand-wringing and complaining about how he was irreparably damaging the floors Duckworth had spent a lifetime polishing and waxing.
Scrooge knew that the pentagram was working when the ghost became stronger inside its protective boundaries, but unsurprisingly, when sunrise came, Duckworth had started to fade. He was still present - but ghosts were never at their strongest during daylight hours. Would he have vanished entirely if Scrooge hadn’t put anything down? Scrooge couldn’t be sure. But the pentagram in the bedroom was a little extra insurance that Duckworth had something to cling to in the land of the living.
So that morning, after the boys had left for school, Scrooge had rolled up the carpet in his study and made a similar pentagram there. Once he was certain the ink and blood were dry he’d covered it up and gone and added a third one in Duckworth’s old room, and the resulting triangle had created an area of…
Well, this just showed how Scrooge wasn’t a wizard, because he knew there was probably a technical term for what he’d created, but he had no clue what to call it. A region between the three pentagrams that enhanced Duckworth’s connection to the corporeal world. Inside of it, the ghost was stronger, found it easier to manifest himself as a ghostly vision, even during the day. Outside of it, when the sun was up, he was barely visible and he could hardly make his presence felt more than a chilly breeze.
As for how much stronger that region would make Duckworth during the night, Scrooge didn’t know, but he would find out.
“How are you feeling?” Scrooge asked, pacing back and forth in his study. The sun felt like it was stubbornly sticking to the horizon, a tiny sliver of gold that refused to drop away from the edge of the world.
“The same way I was feeling five minutes ago when you last asked,” Duckworth replied. “Please sit down. I don’t imagine the results will be that dramatic.”
Scrooge gave a huff of annoyance but did as Duckworth asked, though he scowled the whole time, arms crossed over his chest.
“Oh, don’t sulk. You’re too old for sulking,” Duckworth said as he settled in Scrooge’s lap, draping his arms around the duck’s neck. Duckworth could, with some effort, make himself semi-solid, but they had learned through experimentation that he could not feel the things that he touched in any meaningful way, inanimate objects were cold, living things were hot.
Scrooge hadn’t expected to get a lap full of ice-cold ghost, and he shivered, feathers standing on end as his skin prickled with the chill. The inability to touch was supremely frustrating, but he tried to stroke the ghost’s face anyway, focusing on placing his hand on what looked like Duckworth’s cheek. He felt the pins-and-needles numbing sensation surrounding his hand as it sank into Duckworth’s essence.
“Please try not to be too disappointed if the spell doesn’t work the way you’re hoping,” Duckworth said
“You don’t expect much from my efforts, do you?”
“It’s not that,” Duckworth said. “It’s just… As much as I admire you, Sir, there are some things even you can’t do.”
You can’t cheat death, rich and poor, brave and cowardly, it comes for all of us sooner or later, Scrooge thought bitterly.
“We’ll see aboot that,” Scrooge said. The grandfather clock in the corner began to chime the hour and Scrooge watched Duckworth intently.
“I think something’s gone wrong,” Duckworth said, his voice a deep growl. The sun had finally set and, contrary to the specter’s predictions, there had been a noticeable change. In Scrooge’s lap was no longer the familiar form of his deceased butler, but instead the more ghastly form Duckworth had occasionally taken on during the party: a black, shadowy thing with a horned skull for a head and glowing eyes.
Scrooge, who had dealt with many a monster in his life, was not frightened by this development. What did interest him was the fact that this monstrous form felt… almost as if it had weight in his lap. That unpleasant ghostly chill was still there, but there was a sense of mass as well!
“Interesting,” Scrooge said, mostly to himself, as he began to curiously start patting at Duckworth’s sides, feeling at him to see how solid he was. At first brush he seemed solid, but when Scrooge applied more pressure his hands started to sink into the opaque-looking blackness that made up Duckworth’s body.
“McDuck?” The booming quality of Duckworth’s demonic voice sounded comical when paired with how uncertain he sounded.
“Yes, yes, what is it? I’m not hurting you, am I?”
“No, not at all, that feels… Nice. It’s like before, just more intense,” Duckworth replied. “Also I seem to have transformed into my… other form.”
“Yes, I’d noticed.”
“...and that doesn’t...bother you?”
“Why should it bother me?” Scrooge asked absently, “I mean obviously I’d prefer to be looking at your handsome old face, but considering you’ve come back from the dead, I dinnae think I get to be so fussy aboot it, now do I? I’ll take what I can get.”
“I suppose you have a point,” Duckworth sighed. The ghost tentatively reached out with his black clawed hands and cupped Scrooge’s face, touching the old duck as if he were afraid he might break. For once, Scrooge did not complain, patiently enduring Duckworth’s awkward fumbling, letting the ghost run his claws through his feathers and stroke his cheek whiskers.
After a few minutes of allowing himself to be petted, Scrooge put an end to it. “While this is an improvement, I think we can still do better. You still cannae feel me and when I try to grab you I just go through you.”
“I think you may be hoping for too much,” Duckworth insisted. “Perhaps it would be best to simply settle for what we have right now.”
“Scrooge McDuck doesn’t settle! And besides,” he reached up and tapped a finger against the snout end of the skull that was currently Duckworth’s face. “I donnae think I can snog you like this.”
Duckworth burst into laughter and stretched his arms out. They coiled around Scrooge like a pair of shadowy snakes.
“Oh, but we should test that just to be sure, don’t you think?”
The House Rules, Scrooge thought, were simple to understand and should not have been difficult to obey. Do not trespass on Scrooge's personal space, and for everything else, see Mrs. Beakley.
Simple! They had worked when Donald and Della had been younger, so they should work now for this current crop of children! So why in blazes did he find himself staring down a quartet of (uninvited, currently unwanted) ducklings in his study, all looking as if they'd just seen a ghost?
To be fair, they had just seen a ghost, for approximately ten seconds anyway. Duckworth had most unhelpfully vanished when the children had come bursting into the study yammering on about something or another. Coward, Scrooge thought, grimacing. Leave me to handle this alone, will you?
"Well go on, spit it oot!" Scrooge barked at the kids, crossing his arms defensively. "Not that I owe you little beasts any explanation when you cannae be arsed to knock on a door before you come stampeding in!" Normally he made a half hearted attempt to avoid swearing around the children, but his mood was too foul at the moment to curb his tongue.
"Were...were you just kissing Mr. Duckworth?!" Webby asked. Scrooge really didn't want to answer, but he could already tell that he would be better off in the long run if he said something rather than let the children's imaginations run away with them.
"As much as one can kiss a semi-corporeal spirit, yes. Or, well, we were giving it a try." And then the four of you interrupted, Scrooge thought sourly.
"You can kiss ghosts?!" Was apparently what Webby took away from his response, "When you figure it out can you teach me, in case I ever need to?!"
"Wait, you're gay? With Duckworth?" Huey asked, and Scrooge wasn't sure if this was a better line of questioning.
"This explains so much," Louie chimed in, and Scrooge could feel new wrinkles etching their way into his forehead as his face scrunched up. What did that mean?
"Uh, what exactly does this explain?" Dewey asked. That’s what I'd like to know, Scrooge thought.
"Duh! Why he's not married even though he's eight hundred years old and has like, a gazillion dollars. That’s what they normally call an extremely eligible bachelor, right? So how come he’s never been married?”
“I thought he was single because his life of adventure left no room for romance,” Webby said.
“Yes! I never--” Scrooge tried to interrupt the runaway train the conversation had become, but Louie kept on going as if he hadn’t spoken at all.
“And I thought it was because of his winning personality, but obviously I was wrong,” Louie said, “You couldn’t get married if you were gay like them in Olden Times. So you had to like, be gay in secret.”
“What about our first grade teacher, Mrs. Flycatcher?” Dewey asked, “Wasn’t she married to another lady?”
“They were both Ducks,” Louie said with a roll of his eyes. “Duckworth’s a Dog. It’s different.”
"I'm not gay!" Scrooge protested, his outburst finally loud enough to put a halt to the children’s wild speculation. "Duckworth’s the only man I’ve ever been involved with!”
“So then you are involved with Duckworth, right? That’s you confirming that?” Louie asked, and Scrooge wondered how such a small boy could already be such a big sadist. The lad was going to end up a politician or a lawyer when he grew up.
"It's none of your bloody business!" Scrooge bellowed, bouncing to his feet. "I'm an old man, leave me in peace!"
"But—but this is great! We should celebrate!" Huey said.
"Celebrate what?! That you're sticking your beaks into my private life?"
"That um, we've learned something important about you? That we're growing closer as a family?"
"Ten feet apart with a dining room table between us is close enough, thanks!"
"I think it's kinda cool, Scrooge having some kind of forbidden love affair," Louie admitted, from his position sprawled across the sofa in living room #3, which he claimed was the most comfortable one in the mansion. Therefore Living Room #3 had become the kids' default gathering place.
(Living Room #3 had once been a part of their Grandmother Hortense’s quarters, not that it had mattered in decades.)
"Why exactly is it 'cool'?" Dewey asked, doing air quotes. "It just seems sad to me. I mean-- sure he's here now but Duckworth is kinda...you know, dead. He’s not really back."
"Which is sadder: Old man who had a secret gay love affair with his butler who died, or old man who never fell in love, lived his entire life alone and just sits around all day and night counting his money--- did I mention the alone part?"
"Okay, when you put it that way..." Dewey admitted "Why do you think it's a love affair though? I mean we saw them… kissing but so what?"
"Dude," Louie rolled his eyes as he sat up from his spot on the sofa. He began counting off his points on his fingers as he explained. "One, Duckworth came back from wherever ghosts go to protect Scrooge at the party. Two, now he's just hanging around the mansion and follows Scrooge all the time. Three, if you wanted to kiss a dude don't you think there might be some easier options out there than trying to kiss a ghost? Especially if you're rich. No way. They're totally a thing--- or they were a thing and now they're a thing again. We've got a ghost great-uncle-in-law that's haunting the house we live in."
"I… Yeah, okay. I guess I didn't really think it out," Dewey said, scratching his head. "Ghost great-uncle-in-law…"
"God, we are going to have the most amazing Halloween party this year," Huey said as he wandered back into the conversation with cans of soda for his brothers. "You heard that stuff Glomgold and Ma Beagle were saying. Duckworth threw great parties-- I wonder if he can invite other ghosts? I'm finally going to get my Junior Woodchuck Paranormal Investigation badge!"
"He threw great parties and Scrooge let him. Scrooge let him spend money," Louie said, "Honestly I don't think I need more proof than that. Case closed. Obviously in love."
"What are we talking about?" Webby asked, joining the conversation now that she'd been freed from her daily home-schooling sessions with her grandmother.
"Uncle Scrooge and Duckworth," Dewey said, "Hey--- You knew Duckworth when he was alive right?"
"Yeah," Webby laughed, curling a strand of hair around one finger absently, "But I was four when he died. I don't remember that much... Oh! He used to have tea parties with me and my dolls," she paused, apparently realizing that this wasn't the kind of hot information the triplets were hoping to get out of her, "Uh. He was kinda old by then. He didn't really do a lot of--- typical butler-y stuff. Honestly I remember Mr. McDuck taking care of him more than the other way around," she admitted, frowning like she found fault in her own recollection. "He went everywhere with Mr. McDuck though. And he and Granny were always arguing about the cleaning."
"The cleaning? Mrs. Beakley keeps the house spotless," Louie protested.
"Not Duckworth-clean," Webby laughed. "She'd clean something and then he'd get up and clean it again and then they'd fight about it--- I think he wasn't supposed to be cleaning stuff anymore."
"So… What happened?" Louie asked. "Did he just...get old and sick and die?"
"Well...yeah."
"You know that it's okay, right?" Huey said to him the next day, head poking over the edge of his desk. Scrooge leveled a glare at him.
"Rule number one--"
"I knocked! You didn't answer!" Huey replied.
"That usually means I'm busy," Scrooge muttered, turning the page in his book on Oneiromancy. Huey walked around to the front of his desk to force himself into Scrooge's line of sight.
"Yeah, but what if you were unconscious, or dying in here because nobody ever checks on you?"
"Someone is going to be one of those two things very shortly if you don't leave me with my reading, lad," Scrooge groused, but the threat sounded hollow to his own ears – apparently not to Huey though, as the boy laughed nervously.
"Right, yeah, ok," Huey said, "Sure. But um, I just wanted to make sure that you know it's okay, and that we still love and respect you and stuff right?"
"What's okay? What are you going on and on aboot?" Scrooge asked with a sigh, taking his spectacles off to rub the space between his eyes.
"Um, that you're gay! Or-- bi, you know. It's okay! You don't need to be ashamed of it or hide it."
"Bye?" Scrooge repeated, looking up from his book for the first time to squint at Huey in bewilderment.
"Uh—yeah, bisexual? You know-- you like ladies and guys?"
"I don't like anyone," Scrooge replied sourly, "I like money."
"I don't… I don't think there's a pride celebration for that one."
"It's called Wall Street."
"Was… Was that a joke?" Huey asked, trying to figure out if he was being scolded, made fun of, or having some kind of weird family bonding moment.
"Yes," Scrooge said with a sigh.
"It was sort of funny?" Huey offered helpfully.
"Are we done?" Scrooge asked, though he had a feeling the answer was 'no'.
"Well, I mean, are you super busy? I can go if you're super busy," Huey said, his hands crumpling the front hem of his shirt together nervously as he fidgeted.
Honestly! These children had no idea how to stand still and speak to someone directly. They were going to get eaten alive by the world if Scrooge didn't do something about it and fix these appalling habits of theirs.
"I mean, I know you're reading, and you didn't answer my knocking, but you're always busy and this seemed less busy than when you're at the office or on the phone or in a meeting or--"
"Fine, fine, you've made your point," Scrooge grumbled, closing his book. "And stop saying 'well', 'I mean' and 'you know'! You're just adding a bunch of words to what you're saying for no reason--"
Huey abruptly stood up straighter and put his hands at his sides, tensing up noticeably. While that wasn't exactly what Scrooge wanted from him, he could remember when he was a lad he'd always addressed his father and mother with respect, and while he couldn't remember being afraid of them there had always been a sense of distance that he didn't see with young people and their children these days.
The boys loved Donald, but to them he was a person, their friend. Scrooge had loved his father, but to him the man had been a pillar of strength. An authority figure. He wasn’t someone Scrooge would have shared his personal life with, unless it somehow affected the family. In retrospect he knew his father had been a man, too, with weaknesses and strengths, who had lived and died in poverty, but he was certain that feeling of reverence towards him was something he would take with him to his grave.
"No need to look so nervous," Scrooge said, tapping one finger against his desk in time with the grandfather clock nearby that was marking the passage of seconds with every tik-tok. "I'm not going to bite your head aff. I just want you to stop and think before you speak, and when you're ready, say what's on your mind. Got it?"
"Yessir," Huey replied, taking a deep breath and slowly letting it out. The boy didn't relax entirely but he looked less like a store window mannequin.
"Why does all of this matter to you so much?" Scrooge asked, trying not to feel suspicious, but a lifetime of paranoia made it hard not to see ulterior motives behind everything.
"I—" Huey stopped himself immediately and studied the desk between them intently for several moments, and Scrooge waited patiently for the boy to marshal his thoughts. "Because it's the right thing to do," Huey said at last. "You've lived most of your life hiding this--"
"Hiding this—what, exactly?" Scrooge asked, leaning back in his chair and crossing his legs.
"I—um. Well--" Huey stammered, until Scrooge cleared his throat, reminding him to think before he spoke. "I've never read anything about you being—with someone like Duckworth, and you're---" Huey paused to grope for the best word. "---historic! If people knew, they would have said something about it."
"Aye. And they didn't know because I kept my private business private," Scrooge said decisively. "That's the way we did things back then, and I think it was better. Nowadays everyone is like that Mark Beaks, looking to get rich by getting famous for nothing. Showing your bum aff on the internet shouldn't be enough to make you a millionaire, no matter how nice a bum you've got!"
"Bum is like...your butt, right?" Huey asked.
"Yes," Scrooge groaned, "Anyway, I'm famous enough! I don't need people gossiping aboot me even more--” and then his cell phone rang and he fished it from his pocket, snapping it open. "McDuck. No. Don't sell. Have Launchpad bring a car around, I'll be at the office in ten minutes." Scrooge hung up and got to his feet, set his hat on his head and hooked his cane into the crook of his arm.
"Are you seriously going to work right now?" Huey asked, "It's like 11 o'clock at night."
"It's only 10:53." Scrooge replied as he headed for the door, "Anyway, the financial world never sleeps! But-- you should be, shouldn't you? Don't you have school tomorrow? Go on!" he ushered Huey out of his study with a wave of his cane.
Driving back and forth between Duckburg and Los Angeles wasn’t too bad, Donald had done it so many times at this point he barely noticed the 6 hours go by. It was nearly one in the morning when he arrived back at McDuck Manor though, so he parked his station wagon outside of the garage and went inside through the back door, not wanting to wake anyone.
He felt a little bit guilty for not taking the kids with him when he ran for it, wanting to avoid his uncle’s foul mood on his birthday. Donald was pretty sure Scrooge liked the boys better than he liked him, though, so he thought they would be fine… Besides, Louie got carsick on rides longer than an hour, Huey had band practice and Donald knew he didn’t want to miss it, and Dewey… Well, if he took one of them he had to take all three, those were just the rules. So it was probably best to leave the kids at home.
Anyway, The Enchanted Tiki Room, a cabaret that Jose and Panchito ran in Anaheim wasn’t exactly the kind of place that Donald wanted to take his boys. Maybe when they were older? Nah, Donald had already decided that they weren’t allowed to date until after he was dead.
Easing the mud room door closed silently, Donald used the flashlight on his phone to navigate. His room now was in the same part of the house he’d lived in decades ago and he knew where the creaky floorboards were by heart, but the kids tended to leave toys everywhere and he didn’t want to step on something in the dark. Knowing his luck, he’d trip and fall down the stairs and wake everyone up, not to mention wind up in a full body cast again.
He navigated around a mine field of toy cars just outside of his bedroom door, already thinking about the earful he was going to give his boys for the mess, when he accidentally set his left foot down on one of the squeakiest parts of the hallway-- and there was no noise.
“That’s strange,” he said to no one, turning in a circle while scowling at the floor. With each step Donald braced himself for the boards to squeak but there was nothing. “The floor always squeaks here.”
“Not anymore,” a deep growling voice said, “I fixed it.”
“Oh,” Donald said, “That’s nice of you, thanks--” Maybe it was the reasonable and polite tone of voice the mysterious speaker had used, but it took Donald a full five seconds to realize he had no idea who had answered him, and also he’d just done a full 360 degree circle and hadn’t seen anyone else in the hallway--
There’s no ghosts in Uncle Scrooge’s house, Donald thought as he slowly raised the flashlight’s beam, heart pounding wildly and feathers standing on end as he peered into the darkness around him. Uncle Scrooge’s house is totally ghost and curse-proof-- He found himself looking into a pair of glowing red eyes, set into a white skull, hovering about six feet off the ground.
“I’ve missed you terribly.” the demon said.
Donald screaming in the middle of the night loud enough to rouse the legions of the underworld was unfortunately not a new occurrence in McDuck manor. Scrooge considered just rolling over and going back to sleep, but the sudden way the scream cut off worried him. Climbing out of bed, he pulled on his dressing gown and grabbed his cane before jogging towards where he felt the sound had come from.
The hall lights were on and Donald was laid out flat on the floor, seemingly unconscious, surrounded by an array of toy cars. A guilty-looking Duckworth loomed over him.
“What’s all this then?” Scrooge asked, hands on his hips.
“I was so eager to see Donald again, I forgot...how I look at night,” Duckworth said, sounding and looking like a scolded puppy, rather than a towering demonic spirit made of shadow and bone. “I greeted him and he tripped on the children’s toys.”
“I cannae believe I got oot of bed for this,” Scrooge sighed. The children hadn’t woken up of course, they’d long ago become immune to the sounds of Donald’s night terrors. “He’ll be fine,” Scrooge said, “He’s got a head harder than a diamond… I’m going back to bed. I have meetings in the morning.”
“Of course,” Duckworth replied, watching Donald’s unconscious form uneasily.
“You’ll be fine,” Scrooge said, yawning as he shuffled away.
Donald’s head hurt. He was laying on the ground. Things were… Bright. Had he fallen asleep? Was it morning?
He sat up and looked around, and immediately wished he hadn’t. The thing he’d seen before - he remembered now, it had come looming out of the dark, with eyes on fire and bleached white bone for a face-- was still there, huddled on the ground a few feet away from him.
Donald opened his mouth to inhale, ready to scream again as he backpedaled away from the thing, when it suddenly moved towards him and in a blink of an eye, something had clamped his beak shut and all he could produce was a muffled shout.
Let me go, you monster! He tried to scream, but all that came out was wehhmegohuoomuonr! which was pretty unintelligible even by Donald’s usual standard.
“Please calm down,” the thing growled at him, which was weird because that wasn’t the sort of thing monsters and spookums usually said when they attacked. “I’m not going to hurt you,” it continued. “You know me.”
“Dukwooth?” Donald tried to say, no longer screaming or struggling.
“Yes,” the thing replied, releasing his beak and helping Donald to his feet. “I am a ghost, but… Well, it’s a long story. I died but I never really left. I couldn’t just abandon Mr. McDuck.”
Donald didn’t know what to say, but that sure sounded like the sort of thing Duckworth would have said, always putting that selfish old coot’s needs before his own.
“He doesn’t deserve you,” Donald said, smoothing down his tunic. “He never did.”
“That might be true,” the ghost said, “But regardless it makes me happy to stay by his side. It’s not a question of merit.”
“So what happened?” Donald asked.
“It’s a long story, come, let’s get out of the hallway.”
A long story wasn’t exactly right, the tale of how Black Arts Beagle had tried to summon a demon and gotten Duckworth caught in his magic web instead wasn’t really long, it was just convoluted and confusing. After explaining, Duckworth had left Donald to get a few hours of rest, but he hadn’t been able to sleep a wink of course. How could he knowing there was some kind of ghost roaming around the house? He hadn’t been entirely convinced that the ghost was Duckworth until sunrise came and he saw the monster transform with his own eyes, going from a shadowy horned beast to that familiar face he knew.
Seeing Duckworth for the first time in nine years hit him like a gut punch, he couldn’t stop staring at him, mouth hanging open. “Duckworth? Is that really you?”
“Yes, it really is. Did you not believe me before?”
“No, it’s not that I didn’t believe you--- I mean, I did not believe you, but not because of you, it’s because of me,” Donald tripped over his own words, his throat closing up as feelings all tried to fight their way out of his chest at the same time, making it hard to breathe. “You’re… dead. You died years ago. And good things like-- A friendly ghost--- Never happen to me--”
“Hush now, that’s enough of that,” Duckworth said, sitting down beside Donald. The ghost felt cold as ice but Donald was so grateful for his presence that he didn’t care that he felt like he was sitting inside an icebox. “I know you think that fate is always out to get you, that you have worse luck than anyone else--”
“I do!”
“And maybe it’s true,” Duckworth said, “But it isn’t as if nothing good has ever happened to you either.”
“Sometimes it sure feels like it, though!”
“You’re being melodramatic,” Duckworth said, trying not to laugh at Donald.
“One of my best friends has come back from the dead! I think I’m allowed to be a little emotional,” Donald huffed. “So, what do you do now?”
“Well, I was planning on making breakfast for everyone.”
“You don’t have to do that! You’re dead, Duckworth! You’re not Scrooge’s slave anymore! You can do whatever you want!”
“Well, what I want is to make breakfast,” Duckworth said with an arch of his eyebrows that told Donald this wasn’t a fight he could win.
“Okay… Well, can I help you then? I can catch you up on what’s been going on.”
It's the right thing to do, Huey had said. Bollocks. What was so right about spreading his personal life out for the whole world to see? Scrooge found himself returning to the thought time and again long after the conversation had ended.
It's the right thing to do. Well. Maybe he should let the boy speak his mind and see what he had to say about it, rather than cut him off. That was the only way he could resolve the subject in his mind and understand what the Devil Huey was talking about.
"Beakley, the next time you see Huey, send him to my study."
"He is literally in the next room," Beakley replied through gritted teeth, vacuum in one hand and duster in the other. She'd gotten militant with her daily cleaning ever since Duckworth's return, and had resumed petitioning Scrooge hourly to hire more staff for the mansion. "Ask him yourself!"
Scrooge continued on his way to his study without stopping.
"Huey! Study! Now!" he shouted, expecting to be heard and obeyed. The rapid slapslapslap of duckling feet on the hardwood told him Huey was on his way.
Scrooge took a seat in his favorite armchair and laced his hands together in his lap. When Huey stood there nervously, like he didn't know what to do with himself, Scrooge sighed and gestured towards the other armchair across from his own.
"Sit down, Lad. You're no in trouble."
"Oh! Okay," Huey didn't look like he entirely believed him, but he did climb into the chair and waited to see what Scrooge wanted from him. "So..."
"The other day you said the reason you were so… fired up aboot my relationship with Duckworth was because… Letting the world know aboot us was...The right thing to do. You never did explain what you meant by that to my satisfaction."
"Yeah! Okay, so, I've been thinking about how to explain this. Things are a lot different now than they were when you were our age right?" Huey began, and Scrooge resisted the urge to roll his eyes, instead just nodded his head for Huey to continue.
"Right. So...I know that you say you're not ashamed, but why is it so important for you to keep your private life, uh, private?" Huey asked.
Scrooge felt a cold chill tickle across the back of his neck and realized that Duckworth was present in the room, invisible but listening. He’d hoped to understand the boy’s motivation without having to talk about himself any further, and being questioned made him want to put an immediate end to the conversation. However, Duckworth’s presence reminded Scrooge that this conversation wasn’t only about himself. Even though he was dead, this was very much Duckworth’s story as much as Scrooge’s.
Duckworth’s presence made Scrooge think twice about what he was going to say. He didn’t want to hurt the man’s feelings.
Why was it so important to keep his private life private? Scrooge had never given it any thought. He frowned and eyed a nearby corner of the Persian carpet. It was a bit ragged-- Duckworth had been after him to get it mended professionally for years.
"I'm not usually one for long bouts of introspective navel-gazing," Scrooge muttered.
"I have no idea what that means, but okay," Huey replied, cheerfully unphased, "Take your time."
Scrooge heaved an enormous sigh.
"I suppose… because if you're… Different, people knowing aboot it can be dangerous," Scrooge began slowly.
"Okay, that's true, but counterpoint: when has something being dangerous ever stopped Scrooge McDuck from doing it?"
Scrooge closed his own mouth with a sharp clak, scowling at his grand-nephew. "Fine. Danger isn't the real reason then, because as you've so astutely pointed out, danger has never stopped me from doing what I want. However, there used to be laws against this kind of miscegenation--”
"Because we all know that you always obey the law and super rich people never get away with breaking the rules," Louie said, sauntering into the study and making himself at home on one of the sofas without looking up from his cell phone.
"What the--" Scrooge almost let loose with some choice expletives, because he was certain he had closed the door solidly behind Huey, but no, it was waving back and forth in the breeze. A breeze that sent a cold chill up along Scrooge's fully clothed arm and down along his spine. Duckworth...did you let them in?
"Louie!" Scrooge snapped, turning to glare at the boy, who was playing some kind of game on his phone.
"And Dewey!" Dewey chimed in, from the spot he'd camped out at Scrooge's desk. He spun around in a circle with Scrooge's office chair. When the blazes had he gotten there?!
"I don't recall inviting the two of you to join this conversation!" Scrooge growled at them, back teeth grinding together.
"You didn't, Duckworth told us it was a family conversation and we should come help out," Louie said, not looking up from his phone. "So what are we talking about?"
How to banish unhelpful ghosts on the cheap, Scrooge thought acidly, glaring around the study but aside from the occasional cold chills he felt, Duckworth was nowhere to be seen. You set me up for this torture and you don't even have the decency to make yourself present and help out.
"Um, I'm trying to explain to Uncle Scrooge why we feel like he might be happier if he was like-- Out," Huey said.
"I would be delighted to be oot," Scrooge groaned, hiding his face in his hands.
"What, seriously?!" Louie said, sitting bolt upright and dropping his phone.
"Oot of this room, oot of this conversation, oot of this planet!" Scrooge clarified. "But fine, let's just get on with it, since you three seem so keen on talking me into an early grave aboot this." At least if we're both dead I can try to strangle Duckworth for his meddling. Can a ghost strangle another ghost?
"So, right, okay," Huey said, "I was asking Uncle Scrooge why he feels like it's so important to keep his personal life secret."
Scrooge massaged his temples and tried to recover his lost train of thought.
"Listen, lads, it just wasn’t done! You kept these things to yourself. It would damage my image if people knew the truth," Scrooge said at last, "They would think that I was… Weak, a sissy. And that would damage the companies that belong to me. Stocks would drop, investors would sell--"
"And that's why the right thing to do is to tell people," Huey explained.
"You've lost me," Scrooge said. “When is losing money the right thing to do?”
"No, no, not the losing money part. The part about telling people the truth. You're not weak, you're not a--- sissy, the fact that you love a Dog doesn't mean any of that! You're a great example that proves that gay people in mixed relationships can be just as strong as anybody else," Huey said. "And there are people out there who aren't like you, Uncle Scrooge, who are scared and ashamed, but if people everywhere knew about you then--- Then that proves those hateful people wrong. It gives somebody who's scared a hero to look up to that's like them, even when everybody is telling them that they're wrong and different."
Unbidden, Scrooge found himself thinking of Duckworth's family. Duckworth had tried to tell them about the two of them back in the 80’s. They never spoke to the man again after that. They hadn't even turned up to bicker over his will when he'd died.
Duckworth had never complained about it, of course. Duckworth rarely complained about anything.
Do you want acknowledgment, Duckworth? Is that what this is about?
"Alright, fine, I get it," Scrooge sighed heavily. "So what exactly do you want me to do, take oot an ad in the bloody paper and announce our relationship to the whole world?"
"Don’t be ridiculous, nobody reads newspapers anymore," Louie said, back on his phone, having lost most interest in the conversation.
"I read the paper!" Scrooge protested.
"And then you burn the paper for warmth in your office because you never installed central heating at the Money Bin, we know," Louie said. “I’m sure the Duckburg Dailies is glad they’ve got one last subscriber.”
"Watch it lad, you're fixing to get yourself a thumping," Scrooge growled.
"I'm just saying, print newspapers are a dead media form," Louie said with a shrug.
"Maybe we can go to an event during Pride Month. Show your face, let people know you’re an ally."
What the devil is pride month? Scrooge wondered.