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“Edwin! Edwin, come on, we have to go!”
Charles reached down to gently jiggle Edwin’s shoulder and Edwin opened glassy eyes, taking a moment to focus on Charles.
“I’m afraid,” Edwin answered, voice breathy but level, “I’m afraid I can’t.”
He lifted his hands from where he was curled around them and Charles stumbled back in horror. Edwin looked back down, at his own wrists. If he could bleed, they would be dripping. As it was, they were shot through with black, the burns snaking up his arms following the veins. His wrists and ankles were wrapped around several times with barbed wire, the barbs fully puncturing the blackened skin. The wire was connected between the wrists and ankles, far too short to walk.
“Modern barbed wire is made of galvanized steel,” Edwin said, distantly gazing down at his wrists, “but in the eighteenth century, it was made of gold or iron.”
Charles nodded. “Right,” he said numbly. “I see that.” He almost reached down to tear off the wire with his bare hands before realizing the stupidity of the action. It wouldn’t help him or Edwin to have them both iron-burnt, and Edwin would cuss him out for it later, besides. He dropped the bag from his shoulder and reached into it, pulling out a pair of wire-cutters. “Can you keep your hands there, for just a minute?”
Charles knelt by Edwin and set the blades around the wire between Edwin’s wrists and ankles. “I’ll be quick.” He pressed down on the blades and as they tugged on the wire Edwin let out a ragged gasp. “Sorry, mate, sorry, sorry,” Charles chanted as he put his full muscle into cutting through the wire. It finally came loose with a snap and the jolt tore a yelp from Edwin’s throat.
“Just one more snip and you’ll be able to walk, okay?”
Edwin’s wide, glazed over eyes skittered over him, then Edwin nodded.
Charles went for the tangle of wires at Edwin’s ankles and resumed chanting desperate apologies as Edwin whined wetly. When the last wire snapped through, it brushed against Charles and he choked back a yell.
“Okay, time to get up,” Charles said, looking behind him then back at Edwin. He reached a hand for Edwin’s upper arm, carefully avoiding the wire around his wrists. “Crystal’s got a car outside, and she can get this off you, yeah? But now we have to go.”
Edwin closed his eyes for a moment, then leaned against Charles’s hand, struggling to stand. His naked feet were almost entirely burnt-black, as functional as the feet of a corpse. Edwin let out a sob as he pulled himself up on Charles’s arm, the barbs of the wire digging under his skin with each movement.
“Good, mate, you’re doing great,” Charles said, looking over his shoulder again. “Actually - ” He held Edwin against the wall as he reached back into his bag, pulling out two lengths of cloth. He wrapped them around Edwin’s wrists as Edwin pressed back into the wall as though trying to get away from his own hands. “You’re okay,” Charles said, and slung Edwin’s arm over his shoulders.
They limped out the door and through the hall, Edwin biting hard enough on his lip that it, too, would bleed if it could. As they came out the door, Crystal jumped out of the driver’s seat of the car and threw open the rear door. Charles lifted Edwin in and hastily laid him out on the seat, then wriggled in to sit under Edwin’s head.
“Go, Crystal,” Charles said, and Crystal floored it just as the warlock ran out of the door they had left.
Crystal looked at them in the rear-view mirror. “What the fuck happened?”
“Fucking - ” Charles clenched his fists. “Fucking iron barbed wire. Wrapped around him. In him. We’re going to need you to get it off.”
“Jesus,” Crystal said, and then was silent. Charles stroked the hair back from Edwin’s face and tried to ignore the tears soaking through his pants.
They were back at their motel in only a few minutes, and Charles, with difficulty, got Edwin up and onto the greying motel bed. Edwin gazed up at the ceiling, nearly unresponsive, as Charles positioned himself under his head again.
Crystal’s eyes widened in shock as she looked at the swollen, burnt feet and the scorched hands, the barbs torn right through soft ghostly flesh. “Fuck, Edwin,” she breathed, as she lifted a hand and began to unwrap the fabric around the wrist. Edwin twitched as she did so, but his gaze remained fixed on the ceiling above.
She got hold of the end of the wire and began to unwrap it, one hand holding Edwin’s steady, the other tugging on the wire. As the first barb pulled free from Edwin’s skin, he bucked slightly on the bed. “It’s okay, Edwin, you’re doing amazing, you’re out and now we just gotta get this wire off and you’ll be fine in a jiff,” Charles murmured, stroking Edwin’s hair.
The second barb tugged loose and Edwin’s legs pulled up, as though he was trying to curl into himself. A tear dropped from Charles’s eye and disappeared before it could reach the mattress.
They got through the wire on the wrists with barely a sound from Edwin, just Charles’s quiet reassurances and Crystal’s muttered sorries when Edwin twisted in pain. The wire on the ankles was tangled further than that around the wrists, and Crystal worked at it for what seemed like forever. As one of the last barbs slid out of Edwin’s soft skin, he jerked against Crystal’s hold. The rest of the wire tore away from him with a horrible ripping sound and Edwin arched against the bed with his mouth open in a silent yell.
Crystal threw the wire across the room, away from the ghost boys. Charles gently directed Edwin onto his side, where he curled up around himself, his head still on Charles’s lap. Crystal brought over the blanket from the other bed and carefully arranged it over Edwin so it didn’t touch his still-charred wrists or ankles. Edwin burrowed his nose into Charles’s leg, and Charles ran his fingers through Edwin’s hair, and Crystal delicately climbed up on the bed beside them.
“Scooby-Doo?” Crystal asked, pulling her laptop off the nightstand.
A pause of several moments, then Edwin nodded into Charles’s thigh. Crystal leaned over the two of them to put the laptop where Edwin could see it, pressed play, and settled in, her head at an awkward angle on Charles’s shoulder, craning to see the screen across Edwin.
Scooby-dooby doo, where are you? We need some help from you now…