Chapter Text
The thumping starts after dark.
Thump. Thump.
It’s not a hurried sound, or loud, but it is steady.
Thump.
George and Lockwood glance at each other over the paper clippings, books, and codices scattered across the Thinking Cloth. The noise seems to be coming from the front door.
Thump.
A client would have rung the bell. Except it's too late for that. Lockwood and George glance at the clock. Since having gotten sucked into work after dinner, now it’s nearly midnight. Much too late for clients.
Thump.
“That doesn’t sound good,” George remarks dryly.
Thump.
Lockwood pushes his chair back from the kitchen table and moves carefully into the hall. His socked feet barely make a sound. His voice is quiet: “Expecting company?”
Thump.
“Just a ghost or two,” George replies, following Lockwood toward the front door.
Thump.
Lockwood retrieves his rapier from the umbrella stand. George pulls two mini salt bombs into his left hand, just in case, before reaching out with his right toward the front door. Lockwood waves him off, pointing to his ear. Listen.
The thumping has stopped.
Lockwood and George exchange another look. Lockwood nods, raises his rapier, and inhales to flood his body with calm. George unhooks the chain, grips the handle, and yanks the door open.
The doorway is empty.
“Lucy!” George cries.
Lockwood’s gaze falls to the figure crumpled on the ground, leaning against the doorframe. Her hair sags over her face. Her leggings are ripped. One side of her dark coat seems to shine somehow; perhaps it’s some new glossy, satin weave. The girl’s left hand, which grips her right arm above the elbow, shimmers with something wet in the dim light of the entryway. Her chin lifts wearily up. Her eyes track George’s movements as he discards the salt bombs and crosses to her.
Lockwood lowers his rapier. “Lucy?” His mind thuds dully, caught like a record player repeating one breath of a song over and over. Lucy. Lucy. Lucy.
George tucks both hands under Lucy’s left arm and hauls her to her feet. They shuffle uneasily across the threshold, Lucy swaying precariously.
“Shut the door!” George tells Lockwood.
The order jolts Lockwood into action. He slams the front door closed, locks it, and replaces the chain. He tosses his rapier in the umbrella stand as George and Lucy collapse in the middle of the entryway. George extracts himself from Lucy’s limp form before darting off toward the library.
“Bleeding!” George tosses over his shoulder.
Lockwood reaches up to loosen the black tie around his neck. He kneels on Lucy’s right side, where her bloody arm—it’s not satin, you idiot, it’s blood—is flung out away from her body. Lockwood finds the wound, a deep cut high on her arm, and tears his tie out from under his collar. He begins to wrap the strip of fabric over Lucy’s gash. It’s hard to tell how bad the damage is because her jumper and coat sleeve block most of the view. But the amount of blood she’s lost seems too much. Lockwood’s hands start to shake.
Her eyes are closed. Her clothes are soaked with blood. Her face is limp and pale, paler than anything, and cool and is she even breathing? Is she even breathing?
“Hospital?” Lockwood calls to George, panic rising in his voice.
“No hospital!” comes George’s answer. He returns to the entryway with pillows under his arms. He drops to his knees at Lucy’s feet, wedging the cushions under her ankles.
“Why bloody not?” Lockwood shoots back. His trembling fingers wrap the ends of his tie in a knot over Lucy’s gash, cinching it tight.
Lucy gasps awake, reaching vaguely for her injury with her left hand.
“Easy!”
She groans. “No hospital…”
“Alright—” Lockwood starts, softening his voice.
“Not safe,” Lucy whispers. Her eyelids begin to close.
George grips Lucy’s leg. “Keep her talking,” he tells Lockwood. “Slap her. Anything. Just keep her awake.”
“Lucy. Lucy?” Lockwood’s fingers land lightly on Lucy’s cheek.
Lucy blinks slowly.
“Up! Arm up!” George calls to Lockwood, retreating again. He heads for the lavatory.
Lockwood lifts Lucy’s gashed arm, his right hand squeezing against the knotted tie and his left fingers lightly encircling Lucy’s right wrist. He pulls gently until her right arm is straight up in the air, her hand dangling limply near his left ear.
“Do you hear me, Lucy?” Lockwood asks urgently. “Can you look at me?”
Lucy blinks again. Her eyes trace lines in the wallpaper near the ceiling.
“Where’s the bloody kit!” George’s voice echoes somewhere far away.
“Look at me,” Lockwood tells Lucy. “See me? You made it home.”
Her gaze slides down the wall until it reaches Lockwood.
“You’re safe now. It’s alright now.”
Then her fingers, the ones suspended in the air next to Lockwood’s face, tap faintly on the edge of his ear. Lockwood tenses at the touch. Her nails scrape lightly in the hair behind his ear, tugging at the short strands weakly.
“Who did this to you?” he murmurs.
Lucy’s pointer finger and thumb fall to Lockwood’s earlobe. Lockwood loosens his grip on her wrist so she can use it to give her answer. Her thumb finds the corner of his jaw and traces down toward his chin. Lockwood holds his breath. Her fingers flutter over his cheek, approaching his lips, before her eyes close again. Her hand collapses into a loose fist.
For Lockwood, that is answer enough. It’s his fault. He pushed her away. He did this to her.
He presses his mouth against her knuckles, willing them to move. They’re so cold. “Please.” His lips brush her nails, silently begging her to rake them across his skin and prove she’s still alive. To let him apologize. “Luce,” he whispers. “Please.”
“Got it!” George shouts, thudding down the stairs. “Found it!”
Lockwood snaps his head back.
George’s feet pound across the floor as he instructs, “No more touching!”
“What?” Lockwood tightens his grip on Lucy.
George drops to his knees to unload everything he’s carrying. Bits and bobs and towels, lots of towels, litter the floor near Lucy’s head. George selects a pair of scissors and a towel and approaches Lucy’s hovering arm. For a fleeting instant, Lockwood wonders if George is going to try to cut Lucy’s arm off. With scissors.
“This,” George amends, shooing Lockwood’s right hand away from his tie tourniquet. “Move this. Who knows what diseases you’ve got on your hands. At least I washed mine. Down on the towel. Put her down. To cut the sleeve out of the way.”
After George smooths a clean towel on the entryway tiles, Lockwood lowers Lucy’s arm onto it. Lockwood watches blankly as George carefully cuts through Lucy’s coat sleeve on either side of Lockwood’s tie. Then he cuts through her jumper sleeve the same way. George rolls the upper portion of her jumper sleeve further up her arm. He gestures at Lockwood to pull the portion of her sleeve below the tourniquet off her arm completely.
Lockwood’s fingers aren’t shaking anymore, but they feel unsure all the same. He grips Lucy’s soaked sleeve and pulls straight out. The coat sleeve comes away in his hand, so he tosses it aside. He pulls again on her jumper sleeve. George’s hands squeeze against Lockwood’s tie to keep Lucy’s arm as still as possible. Lockwood tosses the second bloody sleeve behind him before George nods at a nearby clean towel. Lockwood hesitantly plucks it off the floor and wipes his hands on it.
With the bulky fabric out of the way, George gingerly starts to unwrap Lockwood’s tie.
Lockwood protests immediately. “It hasn’t stopped bleed—”
“Stitches, then,” George counters.
Lockwood’s tone goes sharp. “Have you ever done stitches, George?”
“Have you ever shut up, Lockwood?” George fires back. He pauses unwrapping the tourniquet. “This is stressful enough without you being you about it. Hold her arm.”
“She’s passed out.”
“And I don’t want her bloody moving if she wakes up! Hold here and here, or so help me Lockwood—”
“I’ve got it!” Lockwood relents, setting down his hand towel. His fingers skate on Lucy’s newly bare arm. It’s smeared unevenly with drying blood. Lockwood settles himself on his knees before leaning forward to grip Lucy’s elbow and shoulder joints. “I’ve got it. Go on then.”
George sets Lockwood’s ruined tie onto the towel under Lucy’s arm. He reaches for two bottles of clear liquid—one of filtered water, one of saline—and begins to work. Lockwood bites his tongue as George flushes the cut for what feels like too long. The pressurized water comes out of the squeeze bottle slowly, but George moves the stream patiently back and forth across Lucy’s sliced arm. All the while, blood gushes out unevenly with the clear liquid. It soaks into the towel under her arm. Probably through to the tile underneath.
“She’s losing—”
“I’m making choices!” George snaps. “She can make new blood without a hospital. She might not be able to fight off an infection without one. Besides… it only looks worse than it is.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“Goes without saying.”
When the first bottle empties, George drains the second one the same way. Then George’s hands deftly move on to the next task. He reaches for a hooked needle and pliers and thread.
“You’ve done this before?”
“Once. Hiking trip.”
“When?”
“I would love to tell you,” George starts wistfully, “some other time. Now shut up.”
Lockwood closes his eyes, bracing for Lucy to jerk when George sews her skin closed. He inhales purposefully to avoid spiraling. He controls his exhale, waiting. But the harsh movements never come. By the time Lockwood opens his eyes, George is cutting off the excess thread close to Lucy’s skin. It’s over. But Lucy never stirred. That does not reassure Lockwood.
“Only seven,” George announces.
Lockwood blinks stupidly at Lucy’s smeared, red skin. “Seven what?”
“Seven stitches. Over the worst of it. I don’t think it— well, I don’t— I’m not a doctor.” George reaches for another towel to wipe his hands. “Go wash up.”
“I can help—”
“Yeah, with clean hands. Filthy man.”
Lockwood drags himself to standing. He looks down at Lucy’s pale face. “She looks bad.”
“I know, mate. Go wash. Bring a wet flannel. Or three.”
Lockwood puts one foot in front of the other. “Cold or hot?” he calls behind him.
“Cold.”
In the loo, Lockwood’s hands grip the sink. He doesn’t remember pushing open the door. He doesn’t remember flicking on the light switch. He doesn’t remember beginning to cry. Lockwood only remembers the accusation in Lucy’s fingers tracing his features. The blood leaking slowly into the towel. The cool skin fading paler with every passing second.
“Any day now!”
Lockwood shuts his eyes tightly, trying to refocus. She needs him. Right now. She needs him right now. How does that song go again, the one playing like a broken record?
“Lockwood!”
Lucy. Lucy. Lucy.
Lockwood snaps to attention. He runs his hands under freezing water until the drying red has disappeared down the drain. Then he washes two rounds of soap over his hands and rinses with hot water, as scalding as he can tolerate. He dries his hands with the closest towel, then uses it to scrub the blood his hands left behind on the sides of the sink. He rinses his hands again. Then he pulls a stack of flannels into the shallow basin, running cold water over them until they’re soaked. He wrings out the cloths and carries them back into the entryway.
George has already secured a bandage around Lucy’s arm. Only a thin strip of blood has leaked through it, which Lockwood tries to take as a good sign. George sits on Lucy’s uninjured side, using Lockwood’s towel to clean the blood off Lucy’s other hand.
“These?” Lockwood asks George, holding up the flannels. He kneels next to Lucy’s bandaged arm.
“Might help her wake up. One on— here, give it to me. One on her forehead.”
Lockwood hands over a flannel, which George wipes over Lucy’s left hand. He mops up the cracked blood dried there, then leaves it to sit on her forearm. Lockwood brushes Lucy’s hair out of her face, then puts a second cool flannel on her forehead.
“One more.” Lockwood offers George the third flannel.
But George sits back on his heels, ignoring the cloth. “If she doesn’t… I’ll see if I can make smelling salt.” He reaches for a bloodied towel next to him and wipes his hands on the cleanest section he can find. He swipes the back of his wrist against his cheek. “I’m phoning Holly,” he adds, pushing himself to his feet. He shudders a little, reaching out a hand to the closest wall.
“Alright?” Lockwood asks.
George nods and walks toward the kitchen.
Lockwood shifts next to Lucy. He crosses his legs, then pulls Lucy’s bare arm into his lap and gently sponges it clean with the third flannel. He starts with the skin closest to the bandage, then moves toward her elbow, unfolding and refolding the flannel as one side becomes tinged with a brownish pink. The smeared blood has dried almost like a crust on her skin. The crust stops above her wrist; it seems her jumper sleeve soaked up all the excess. Or her coat sleeve. On her hand, there’s only a faint smear of new blood, probably a result of Lockwood pulling off her bloodied sleeves. Lockwood refolds the flannel to a clean side and carefully cleans Lucy’s hand. He wipes her fingers too, to assure himself that he didn’t leave the job half done.
When he looks up, he finds that Lucy’s gaze is softly tracking him. Her eyebrows are scrunched like she’s trying to focus, but her eyes are dazed.
Lockwood freezes, dropping his right hand and the flannel to the carpet. He wonders if he ought to drop her hand too, but his left thumb presses into her palm, deciding for him. He can’t think of a single thing to say. The song, that breath, is echoing in his head. Lucy. Lucy. Lucy.
She blinks. Her gaze clears a little bit. Her eyebrows slowly unscrunch.
Lockwood swallows. “Hello.”