Work Text:
“Hurry up, Lion, or I’m going to leave without you.”
“Just a moment,” Lion calls back, adjusting their jacket and tie in the mirror. If they’re going to go out, they’re going to look nice. Will may get away with throwing on the same old jacket and distractingly low-cut shirt every time he leaves the house and somehow looking perfect when he does it, but Lion prefers to put in a bit of effort.
After a minute, they’re satisfied with what they see—a nice violet suit and matching lavender tie, because why wear bland grays and browns when you could also not. It’ll do for today, although there’s a nice lavender dress they really must try next time. With that settled, Lion heads for the door where Will is already waiting, stopping on the way to pat Diana on the head.
“Watch the house while I’m gone,” they tell her. “I’ll take good care of him, don’t worry.”
Diana purrs in response.
“Why do you have to reassure my cat?” Will grumbles. “I can take care of myself.”
“It’s my duty to inform the head of the household when we’re leaving,” Lion tells him seriously.
“The head of the—?! Oh, forget it.” Will cuts himself off in the middle of his exclamation. “Are you ready?”
“Of course,” Lion says.
Will grins and extends a hand out to Lion, the perfect picture of a gentleman. “Well then, my dear assistant,” he says, “shall we head out on our date?”
Lion rolls their eyes.
——
The “date” is actually a case, as it usually is. Lion’s fairly sure most people wouldn’t consider solving mysteries together a proper date, but they’re not going to be the one to tell Will that. This may not be traditional the way a candlelight dinner would be, but it’s far more fun.
(They’ve never actually talked about these dates, is the thing. They’ve started calling them that without ever stopping to discuss what that means or what it makes their relationship. It’s not an uncomfortable state of things, but one of these days Lion is going to have to ask to spell things out, because for someone so incredibly smart, Will can be very dumb sometimes, and Lion’s not going to take any chances with something like romance, not after how that turned out for their poor, dear counterpart.)
The Western mansion they arrive at is not nearly as large as Lion’s family home, but it has a similar sense of elegance that makes it feel familiar. Inside, in the grand foyer near the staircase, a small group of SSVD members is gathered along with several people Lion doesn’t recognize, presumably the family members.
Will marches up to them. “Okay, explain all this to me,” he says without preamble.
One of them turns to Will, professionalism written on her face, pausing only to nod at Lion as they come over to stand next to their partner. “Of course. The head of the household, Madam Eleanor, has several relatives staying to visit, and her nephew, a young man named Darren, was killed last night. All evidence points to the madam’s daughter, the young mistress Jordan, as the primary culprit, but she refuses to admit her guilt and accept judgment.”
To her credit, if the SSVD member is at all starstruck in the presence of the famous detective, she doesn’t show it. Will doesn’t seem particularly impressed, though, and Lion can’t say they are either.
Lion glances over at one of the figures not in uniform. This has to be the daughter, Jordan; she’s not much older than Lion themself. She’s rather tomboyish in look, with close-cropped hair and the kind of washed-out, baggy casual clothes Mother would have scolded Lion and Jessica for if either of them had ever been inclined to wear such things in the first place. She doesn’t appear to be panicking over the situation, but her eyes are wide and she’s slowly shaking her head.
Next to the her is a put-together woman with vintage curls and a flowery dress. “As I have told you over and over again, this nonsense you’ve got in your heads is preposterous! My daughter would never do anything so horrible as that, and as the head of the household, I cannot permit you people taking her away on such flimsy evidence!” she exclaims. Ah, so this would be Madam Eleanor, would it?
Will folds his arms over his chest. “And what might be the evidence pointing to Jordan, hm?”
The SSVD member presses on, unwavering. “A servant witnessed Darren slip a note into the Jordan’s room the evening before the murder. The servant looked at the note and found it was a request to meet him in the courtyard, which is the scene of the crime, on the night the murder took place. Additionally, numerous members of the household report that Jordan had a poor relationship with Darren and was noticeably unhappy with him staying to visit.”
Will scoffs. “That’s it, huh? That all you got? That’s all circumstantial. Did you even bother looking into any other people in the household?”
When the SSVD member gapes instead of responding, Lion interjects. “Where might this note be now?” they ask. “That could be an important key in understanding what happened.”
The SSVD member falters. “…We have been unable to locate the note,” she admits.
“Of course you have,” Will grumbles. “I keep telling you people, you can’t ignore the heart of the mystery and go accusing a potentially innocent person. Never mind, I’ll go investigate myself. You can all just sit around here twiddling your thumbs. I can’t trust anyone’s judgment except my assistant here. Come on, Lion.”
With that, Will pushes past them and marches off down the hall, Lion rushing to catch up with him a moment after.
As they walk away, Lion leans over and murmurs, “I’m understanding now why you quit.”
——
The victim’s body is in the courtyard, so that’s where they go first. They step outside onto the thin layer of snow, being careful to avoid disturbing the scene itself. A household servant, who apparently felt it prudent to follow them, waits in the doorway expressionlessly.
The young man named Darren is lying face-up on the ground, head resting on the side of the fountain in the center of the courtyard. He’s covered in a thin layer of snow. His open eyes are glassy and his skin is unnaturally pale. Well, of course it is—he’s dead. Lion looks away; they’re still not used to seeing dead bodies.
“This seems straightforward enough,” Will says. He looks over at the servant in the doorway. “Hey, you. Has the body been moved at all since you found it?”
The servant gives a slight bow. “Not at all, Mr. Wright. The madam insisted on leaving it the way it was to avoid disrupting the investigation.”
“Good.” Will circles around to stand next to the body and crouches down. “Looks like trauma to the back of the head. He got in a fight with someone and they pushed him into the fountain. Maybe an accident, maybe not.”
“Why do you think he asked to meet out here on such a cold night?” Lion muses.
“Probably just for privacy, right?” Will says. “Didn’t want to risk someone overhearing, and didn’t think the cold weather through.”
“Mm, that seems like the most likely option,” Lion agrees. They glance at the thick wooden double doors; certainly, those look like they’d be difficult to eavesdrop through. Meaning the conversation was something he wanted to keep private that much?
“If I may interrupt,” the servant chimes in from the doorway, “the snow last night was quite unexpected and rather brief. He probably didn’t anticipate it while asking the young mistress here.”
“Freak coincidence, huh? Well, makes things easier for us,” Will says.
Since Lion’s not looking at the body, they can clearly see the multitude of footprints of all different shapes and sizes in the snow, likely from when the body was found. They sigh. “I suppose it would’ve been too much to ask for the culprit’s footprints to be here as well, wouldn’t it?”
“Yeah, that would’ve been too easy.” Will stands up and looks back over at the servant. “Do you know when it stopped snowing last night?”
She thinks for a moment. “I was the one on night duty last night… if I recall correctly, it should have stopped not long after ten p.m.”
“Thank you, you’ve been very helpful,” he tells her with a charming smile.
Oh, of course. “So that means he was killed around that time,” Lion says. “Since there’s not much snow piled up on the body.”
“Exactly. You catch on quickly.” Will directs that charming smile at Lion, and Lion has to ignore the way their heart skips a beat.
——
When they go back inside, Will tells Madam Eleanor to gather up all the members of the household for questioning; they’ll be talking to everyone one-by-one in the parlor. She quickly agrees, so Lion and Will head into the parlor and take seats next to each other on the overstuffed floral couch.
“I feel like I’m in an Agatha Christie novel,” Lion comments.
Will snorts. “Be glad you aren’t. Otherwise the snow would pile up after we arrived and we’d be stuck here for about three days.”
Suddenly feeling mischievous, Lion puts on their best innocent face. “Oh, are you saying you wouldn’t want to be stuck with me for an extended three-day date?”
“Wha—I didn’t say that!” Will sputters. Then he realizes he’s been baited and scowls at Lion, face going red.
Lion gives him a smug grin. Success. He’s cute when he’s flustered; pity it doesn’t happen more often.
They’re interrupted when the door opens and Jordan walks in. Will and Lion sit up straight, teasing forgotten for now.
Jordan sits down in the chair across from them, all drawn in on herself. “So I should… probably tell you guys my side of the story,” she says quietly.
Lion smiles at her. “It’s okay. Take your time,” they say in their best non-threatening voice.
“Okay…” She takes a deep breath. “Well. There’s really not much to tell, honestly. I did get a note, but it’s not the one everyone’s talking about. It said to meet them out on the back porch at ten p.m. I didn’t recognize the handwriting, but I went anyway because there are only a few people who could’ve written it. I went outside and waited, but whoever wrote it didn’t show up, so I went back inside after a few minutes because it was cold. And… that’s it.”
Well, ten p.m. would give her an alibi around the time of the incident if she could prove it, but…
“I see.” Will stares at her with a hard-to-read expression. “Would you happen to have that note still?”
Jordan shakes her head. “After I went back inside, I thought it was just a stupid prank, so I destroyed it. That’s why they’re suspecting me. I don’t have any proof.”
Will clicks his tongue, but he doesn’t reprimand her.
Lion decides to prod gently. “There’s no one who can prove you were outside then? No one who saw you?”
Jordan stares down at the floor for a long few moments, face unreadable. “…No,” she says eventually. “No, there’s not.”
Hmm. Curious. Lion glances over at Will; he’s frowning suddenly.
Certainly curious.
Will leans in. “Rumor has it you didn’t get along with the victim.”
“That’s true,” Jordan says, looking back up at them. “It probably sounds bad to admit that, but yeah. He was… pushy. He didn’t like to take no for an answer.”
Ah. Lion sees her meaning perfectly well. That explains the desire for privacy, at least.
——
“She has motive, means, and opportunity,” Lion says, “but I don’t think it was her.”
“Agreed,” Will says immediately. “If she was going to lie about an alibi, she’d make sure it was a good one.”
Lion nods. “…But,” they say after a moment, “I do think she’s hiding something.”
“Agreed again.”
——
Next is the servant woman who escorted them to the courtyard. She sits with perfectly straight posture, the picture of professionalism.
“You said you were on night duty the night of the incident,” Will starts. “You didn’t hear or see anything?”
The servant shakes her head. “Once I’m finished making my rounds for the evening, I rarely have reason to leave the servant room unless someone calls for me, which no one did, and the servant room isn’t particularly near the courtyard. Of course, I can’t prove my alibi, as I was merely reading and watching the snow through the window for most of the evening.”
Well, she’s certainly competent, isn’t she? She even answered their inevitable question about an alibi before they asked it.
“Well, that covers nearly everything,” Will says. “So while we have you here, let me ask you this. What did you think of our late victim?”
She pauses. “It would be imprudent to speak ill of the dead. Especially a relative of my employer.”
Lion almost laughs out loud. That reaction certainly is telling.
Will looks for a moment like he’s about to laugh as well. Of course, he doesn’t. Instead, he puts his serious face back on and says, “I promise you, whatever you have to say won’t leave this room.”
She thinks for a few moments. “Very well,” she says eventually. “To put it nicely, Mister Darren did not have the best personality. Every time he visited, he would treat us servants as though we’re robots or objects to be ordered around, so none of us are very fond of him.”
“So he was entitled,” Will says bluntly.
“If you wish to put it that way, yes,” the servant says.
——
Next is a woman they haven’t been introduced to yet—Darren’s mother. She leans back in the chair with her arms crossed, staring them down. Lion gets the feeling she’s trying to be intimidating, but they’ve seen worse looks from the likes of their mother and Aunt Eva.
Will is similarly unaffected. “First of all, I need to ask for your alibi for the night of the incident.”
She gapes at them. “Are you honestly suspecting me of murdering my own son?!”
Lion holds up their hands to placate her. “Of course not, ma’am. It’s standard procedure to ask everyone so we can get a picture of everything that happened.”
She stares Lion down. Lion stares back.
Eventually, she sighs. “Fine. I was in my guest room with my husband all evening. Of course, my husband can vouch for me.”
Will nods. “That’s fine. On a different note, let me ask you—what is the madam’s relationship with her daughter like?”
Lion glances over at Will in surprise. Will’s face is unreadable.
The woman seems taken aback for a moment, but she responds quickly. “Oh, my sister is always doting on Jordan. I swear, she’d do practically anything for her. It’s embarrassing, honestly. At some point you have to let the girl live her own life. I feel sorry for my niece, if you ask me.”
——
“Seems to me like the mother is just as much of a brat as the son sounds like. —Ow! What was that for?”
“Be polite.”
“Quit the pinching already, would you? How did you even reach my butt when I’m sitting down here?”
“A master never reveals their secrets.”
——
After that they have the victim’s father and several other servants, none of whom provide any new information.
The final interviewee is the madam herself. Eleanor sits prim and proper in the chair with her hands folded in her lap.
“First of all, can I ask for your alibi?” Will asks.
Eleanor doesn’t flinch. “I’m afraid I have none. I stayed in my room by myself all night.”
Will stares her down. “Did you.”
“Yes.” Eleanor returns his stare right back.
Silence. You could cut the tension in the room with a knife.
Lion looks back and forth between them, not liking where this is going but unsure what to do to stop it.
Will breaks the silence. “What did you think of your nephew?”
She scoffs. “Awful boy. I have to entertain him here because he’s family, of course, but he’s always treated us terribly.”
“By ‘us,’ do you mean your daughter?” Will retorts.
“Naturally,” the madam says.
When he speaks next, Will’s voice is soft. “If you love your daughter as much as you appear to, I think you know what you need to do next.”
The madam stares at him some more. Then, finally, she gets up and walks out the door.
By now, Lion knows exactly where this mystery is going, and it’s not going to be the most fun of solutions this time.
——
With the questioning done, Will gathers everyone in the foyer. It’s time for the summation; Will is better at the dramatics, so Lion lets him take this part.
“I’ve found out who the culprit is,” Will announces in a loud voice.
Murmurs go through the small crowd.
“I could tell you all right now, but I’d like to explain first and give the culprit a chance to step forward herself,” Will continues. “Because there are so few clues, the key point one has to look at is the motive. The heart of the story. Who has reason to want our victim dead? Better yet—who has reason to switch out one note for another and make sure our suspect is occupied at the time of the incident?”
Silence.
Will speaks up again. “If you really want to protect her, you need to step forward.”
More silence. Lion waits.
Finally, Eleanor sighs. “Very well. You’re correct. It was me.”
Gasps go up from the crowd. “Madam!” one servant exclaims. “Surely you’re joking!”
“I am not,” Eleanor says evenly. “I switched out the notes and met my nephew at the appointed time. I would like to tell you I didn't mean to kill him, but I'm afraid that would be a lie. He spoke about my daughter so despicably that a demon took hold of my heart all of the sudden. I pushed him, and he fell in exactly the wrong spot. Once I came back to my senses, I fled inside.”
Her story follows well enough, and it’s about what Lion expected. The trouble is, with no concrete proof, no one will accept it, unless…
Will nods with a very serious expression. “Is there anyone who can prove that you’re telling the truth and you were outside at that time?”
“Yes. There was a witness.” Eleanor takes a deep breath. “My daughter.”
Jordan starts and looks over at her mother with a betrayed expression. “Mother, no!”
Eleanor doesn’t waver. “I ran into her just as I was exiting the courtyard. We talked for a minute and then went to our bedrooms. She’s merely being stubborn right now and doesn’t want to admit it.” She looks at her daughter with a sad smile. “I know you’re only trying to protect me, darling, but it’s time to tell the truth, isn’t it? I don’t want you to get punished for something I did.”
The daughter looks like she’s on the verge of tears. She surges forward and suddenly pulls her mother into a tight hug. Watching the two of them, Lion feels a sudden, bittersweet pang of nostalgia for their own mother.
Will’s smile is equally bittersweet. “There was no malice in this mystery. This was a crime committed out of love. A mother killed to protect her daughter, and a daughter lied to protect her mother. You’re quite a pair. Although one of you did commit a crime and you do need to be punished for that, neither of you have anything to be ashamed of.”
Ah. Yes. There it is again. Gruff as Will can be, he’s always got that compassion in him, something he never forgets even in the face of terrible things. That’s exactly why Lion loves him, isn’t it?
——
The SSVD insists on handling the unpleasant aftermath themselves; Lion and Will are all too happy to leave them to it and head back home.
When they get back, Lion sits down on Will’s couch, and Diana promptly jumps up onto their lap, turns three circles, and flops down while purring. Lion will have cat hair all over their nice suit now, but that’s fine.
“Why does she like you better than me?” Will grumbles without any real heat to it. He sits down next to Lion. “So, you got kind of quiet near the end of that. Anything on your mind?”
“…I was just thinking about my own mother,” Lion confesses. “Of course, I wouldn’t want her to go so far as to kill anyone for me, but I’ve no doubt she would if she had to.”
Will nods. “I didn’t get to know her very well, but from what I’ve seen, she can be very protective, can’t she?”
“She can,” Lion says. “She’s also strict, and stubborn, and a bit overbearing, but… I know what she did to all those other versions of me in all those other worlds, but that doesn’t change the fact that the mother I grew up with was a good one.”
Will smiles that distractingly pretty smile. “I’m glad for you.”
Lion smiles back.
Then, feeling like they need to lighten the mood, Lion straightens up and clears their throat. “On a different note!” they say in a lighter tone of voice. “I think you owe me a bit of a happier date.”
“What? Come on, it’s not like I can choose what the mysteries are like,” Will grumbles.
“That is true,” Lion concedes.
“And it’s not like you’d actually enjoy something like a candlelight dinner, right?”
“…Also true,” Lion says. “I’m quite happy with our dates overall. However, you could do something a bit more than just taking me along as an assistant and calling it dates. A romantic gesture would be nice, for a start.”
Will narrows his eyes and stares at Lion for a long moment. Then he leans over and pulls Lion into a kiss.
It’s a very soft, chaste kiss, and Will is very gentle. It’s also brief; he pulls away after a few seconds. Nevertheless, the experience leaves Lion breathless.
“Is that a good start?” Will says quietly.
“Uh… yes. Yes, that’s good,” Lion manages.
Will puts an arm around Lion’s shoulders and they sit like that in companionable silence.
After a few minutes, Will speaks up again. “You know, they do those murder mystery dinner parties, don’t they?”
Lion snorts. “That sounds more entertaining than a candlelight dinner.”
It’s a rather unusual relationship, and the both of them are fine with that.