Chapter 92
Previously: The Rose of Whitby – Chapter 91
Arthur jumps at her squeak, first thinks maybe the puppy bit her- but, wait, no, Darcy generally doesn’t notice if the puppies bite her, and if she does, she just giggles and taps them on the nose. He (gently) drops the puppy he was inspecting for parasites into the pen at her words. “His father? Mr Harker? Attacked? How? Where?” he asks, while hurrying to close up the pens and cages.
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Distracted by trying to get any useful information out of Gregory, Darcy bumps into things as she hurries along to help Arthur. “Ugh, best I can figure out at the firm, there’s a big crowd of people.” Mixing up what she said out loud and what she says in her head, she shouts. “Gregory, blasted do something rather than just mingle! We’re on our way!”
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The firm? London, then. So Harker never was on his way here? “Damn, John,” he remembers as he closes the last cage, shushes the rat inside that’s agitated either with their rushing around or Darcy’s mood. “Come on.” He holds the hospital’s door open for Darcy, joins her in dashing for the kitchen door.
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“I can’t run into town and be back fast enough,” Darcy whines and is really annoyed that her drac can tell her which direction Gregory is but she has no idea where Quincy might be. Can’t be helped, she inhales and shouts for him at the top of her lungs.
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“Neither can I… unless I’d show off Hannibal for what he is to the whole town.” No, Arthur decides, they don’t know enough about how bad a crisis this is to risk that. “I’ll write John a note,” he tells Darcy, waves her to go ahead out of the kitchen while he stops by the table to do that. “The house can show you where Quincy is,” he remembers. “Meet you in the library.” With that, he asks the house for some pen and paper and starts scribbling a short explanation to John.
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Oh, right, of course the house can. Sheepishly, Darcy stops shouting and instead asks nicely, runs after the wave in the carpets, the drafts in the curtains and ends up on the battlements. She could have shouted inside all she wanted, she guesses, and finds herself terribly reluctant to disturb Quincy. He looks so very content up here, even though she has no idea what he’s doing.
It’s not quite dancing, not quite silent reciting, but he seems to be gesticulating up at the sky and that grin on him is so very confident and triumphant… He’s so beautiful… No, he isn’t, drac, down, or wait, it’s not the, um, family attraction, it’s that hot feeling in her chest. In either case, she shakes it off and runs up to him to tell him what happened, best she can.
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His father, no, hell no, Harker got attacked? Should he care? Does he care? Quincy’s not sure. But it sounds urgent and, shit, his mother might be in danger. Yes, they need to go check. Quincy didn’t quite mean that to end up with him racing after Darcy, not because he wants to but because she has his hand in a death grip. But where the hell are they even going? This doesn’t seem like the way outside? Is this a library? He knew that Cycy is a bit of a nerd, but this?
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Arthur checks that his shield bracelet is in place and set to guard him from both physical and mental attack for the second time- and of course it is, he can feel it against his wrist and palm. What else, what else? Right, a coat, he thanks the house for materialising one over his shoulders, stuffs his arms into the sleeves. Then Darcy comes running into the library with Quincy in tow, and he nods to them and runs up the spiral staircase to the mezzanine.
“Uh, what are you two up to? The exit is the other way last I checked.” Quincy demands, understandably confused.
Arthur throws him a sheepish grin over his shoulder while he comes to a stop next to the London door. “Magic castle- secret magic door to London,” he explains as he yanks it open to the sight of the narrow hallway and, right, the huge horse painting.
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“What the hell?!” And no, that’s not just for the weird design choices on the other side of that door, that’s very much for the fact that this place just doesn’t give him a break on things he’s supposed to just accept, no questions asked. He’d laugh if he wasn’t preoccupied with worrying for his mother. Fine, through the magic door he goes!
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Arthur clatters down the stairs ahead of them, calls back: “I’ll find us a cab!” as he ducks out the front door, takes a quick look around for any trouble, and then jogs over to the main street to find one.
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Following after more slowly, Quincy takes a look at his surroundings and okay, maybe the distastefully oversized horse painting isn’t the worst part of the area. This is not a part of town he wants to be in. He can deal with the social derision and questioning looks if he is what people suspect he is, but here he worries that just the fancy vest and even the makeup that’s made to look like not being makeup is going to get him beaten up. And Cycy might be a knightly dhampir but she’s sticking out as too rich for these parts like a sore thumb. Shit, maybe he should worry more about himself than his mother. This could get ugly fast.
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Thankfully, it doesn’t take more than a minute to find an unoccupied cab, and Arthur directs the driver over to Severn Street to pick up the others before they attract too much local attention. He doesn’t even want to know what the gossip is like these days, because he assumes he’s being recognized. Still, he expects his father’s reputation, and how it’s always been extended to him, is going to keep the opportunists away from anyone coming out of his house and go look for safer prey.
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The cab seems like some much-needed safety in this area. Quincy wants to get away, he’s not one for potential violence. Running away is the more sensible course of action. But of course, now he’s in a cab driving towards whatever happened with his father. He knows the address of the firm by heart, so he can at least make himself feel useful. Not that it holds long, so he tries for conversation instead, not that he can ask all the questions he’d like to ask, cab drivers have better ears than people think and he’s not about to share info with somebody else.
Alright, memo to himself: these two couldn’t do small talk to save their life. On the upside, that means that he won’t have to teach Darcy to not give things away during it, because he’s met half-mute people who are more talkative.
Rolling out of the worst parts of town and getting closer to his father’s, argh, Harker’s firm gives him a sense of being more on home turf again, although he wouldn’t admit to that since he wants nothing to do with that firm. Harker has tried to chain him to those books for far too long, he’s frowned over Quincy’s lack of drive for the dreadfully boring material one too many times for Quincy to want to so much as acknowledge that yes, he’s been here often.
But normally the street isn’t that full. Quincy doesn’t think he’s ever seen it that full before, that’s a real crowd, right in front of the building. What’s going on?
He can kind of make out something between the crowd and the building. Is that some kind of pole? A scarecrow? In the middle of town? Did somebody try to burn an effigy or something? Guy Fawkes Night was last month but maybe somebody took inspiration and declared Harker traitor to the common people, or something.
Then they get closer and his eyes go wide, his hands start to tremble, he’s not good with violence… and that crowd is there for the gruesome spectacle.
Not an effigy.
That is Harker up there.
Not tied to the pole. Not even hanged.
Oh Divine have mercy on his ability to keep his stomach settled.
The pole… Harker isn’t attached to the pole, he’s impaled on it. Quincy can see the top part of it jut out from Harker’s chest, forcing his head back. He doesn’t even want to know where the pole enters… and he wants to think even less about the implication of the whimpering he feels like he can hear above all the clamouring of the crowd.
Harker isn’t dead yet.
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Seeing the way Quincy is gripping the edge of the window, Darcy tilts her head. He’s upset, very upset. She doesn’t want him to be upset! The heat in her chest flares up again and she knows she just has to do something, has to protect him.
She looks at the scene outside. The crowd is inconvenient, she would be terribly obvious if she just runs up the building and tries to pull her lawyer off that big stick. That must have been difficult to do, the getting him on there and the making the stick stay upright with the weight, she means. That took strength and coordination, maybe a gang of people?
Oh, Quincy’s gasping that he’s alive. Well, that means she has to get Arthur up there to heal him… She’s not sure if she should pull Harker off the thing first or let Arthur heal him first. She’ll let Arthur decide that, he’s better with understanding medical stuff.
So, putting her plan of action together and automatically assuming command, as she normally does on excursions and really, this is just like that, she reluctantly uses the link she has to Gregory and asks him to make a scene, cause a distraction. Then she sticks her hand into her pocket to grab whatever bill she has in her purse and opens the cab door, pays the driver off, then waves at Arthur. “Back alley, now, I’ll get you upstairs for healing. Mon sang du coeur, stop looking. Find a safe spot. We don’t know if whoever did it is still nearby. I’ll protect you. Go.”
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Arthur feels clammy, his knees shaky, his stomach roiling. It doesn’t matter that he doesn’t know Mr Harker all that well, or doesn’t even particularly like him, found him dry and intimidating, not in this moment.
In this moment, all he can see is a person, suffering, suffering badly from something so cruel someone did to them. All he can do is imagine the trauma, the pain, the fear… He wants to help. He has to help.
But… “I can’t heal that,” he croaks while he staggers after Darcy. Definitely not with that stake… that stake… all through the man. The internal injuries, how… how is he even still alive? Maybe he can stabilise him? But… but that stake would have to be removed, and how… there’s no way his healing could keep up with the trauma of that. The bleeding.
“I… maybe I can keep him alive, but… This needs a better healer than me, a professional, someone… someone from the university or something…”
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“I can’t get somebody from the university here quickly. Arthur-dear, you are stronger than you always give yourself credit for. Let’s try. If Gregory can get the crowd dispersed maybe… hm, maybe I can shove a little at the time to get Harker off the big stick and you can heal meanwhile.” Turning for a moment she takes his hands to squeeze them, then blinks as Quincy runs off… right into the crowd. She said safe… maybe that’s what he thinks of as safe?
And where is that distraction she asked for? Gregory earlier was all talking about that crowd, shouldn’t he still be there? For a moment she feels anger rising but then she shoves it away, she has things to do. And Arthur seems unsteady on his feet so she holds his hand but drags him after her.
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Arthur swallows hard at the idea of “shoving” Harker off of the stake slowly- why the shock and pain hasn’t killed him already, he really doesn’t know, but that could just do it. He clutches tight to Darcy’s hand, shudders with the visceral echo of the agony that would have to cause. “I’ll try,” he promises. “I’ll try as hard as I can.” First, he runs along as fast as he can, because surely, every second counts.
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At the back of the building, Darcy thinks for a moment about just carrying Arthur right up to the roof, but there’s still nothing happening in front of the building. Why did she even think she could rely on Gregory? No time for that anger now. “Are any of those windows open? Can you see?” Not waiting for him to check first, she changes to her rat form and runs up the wall, tries the first window she comes past, it’s locked, so keeps running but also glances back at Arthur if he has spotted anything.
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Right, open windows, he can look for open windows, that’s within his power. It’s the small ones people often leave open, thinking that nobody dangerous could get in through those anyway… And yes, there, on the first floor, maybe a hallway one or something, that latch doesn’t look properly in place. He points it out to Darcy.
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Scuttling over immediately, she wiggles through, and only moments later unlocks the backdoor for him, doesn’t even wait before turning wolf and trying to find the closest window to Harker, maybe they can reach from there? But what will that do with the crowd still looking on? Not that she can change that… unless she jumps down as a wolf and scares them away, that might do it. First they have to find Harker, though.
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No one seems to be at the firm, which takes up the entire house, and Arthur’s glad for it. It means he and Darcy can rush up the stairs unopposed, until they reach the third floor and its front-facing windows. Arthur really, really doesn’t want to get close, to face Mr Harker and his suffering, but he shoves that away. That’s not important right now, this isn’t about him, this is about him maybe being able to help someone- help like he wasn’t able to when it was Gregory, and what did he learn healing for, what is his magic good for if not exactly this, if not to give him a chance in situations like this to do something?
So he crosses that room (someone’s office), and he throws open the window panes, and he faces the ruin that is Mr Harker, and the horror of what was done to him, and he reaches out a hand to rest it against one of Mr Harker’s dangling arms.
Downstairs, he can see the crowd swirl in eddies as the police arrives, with whistles and stern voices, with demands for people to tell them what they saw, and to disperse, and other such things. He’s pretty sure he also hears at least one person throwing up down there.
But all that isn’t important, important is his magic, and his spell, and his concentration. He has practise with this, by now, and the spell pours from his mind, pours into Mr Harker… pours like a trickle into a deep, dark abyss. Arthur knows it’s too little, too late, (if he ever even would’ve stood a chance at all,) even while he pushes with all his power, throws all the magic he can at the man in an attempt to keep life in a body that is far past its capacity to cope.
“Not… him,” a strained voice says, and it takes Arthur a moment to notice that it’s Mr Harker, that he’s trying to speak. It’s weak and thready and… and how can he even talk with a great big stake through where his lungs are supposed to be?? It’s hard to split his attention, to listen and keep his spell going, useless as it is. He wants to shush Mr Harker, to tell him to save his strength… but there isn’t much strength left, and if these are the man’s last words, Arthur wants to at least honour him, his suffering, by hearing them, by not taking them away from him, by maybe, maybe at least giving him the time and resources to say them.
“Brother,” Mr Harker slurs. Arthur thinks that’s the word- brother? And: “Quincy. Still… my…”
Arthur’s spell wavers, flickers- he pushes, no, Mr Harker isn’t finished, he wants to say something else! But the spell winks out as Mr Harker’s life does, his chest stills, the agonized wheeze of air stops.
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Darcy is split, she wants to hug Arthur, tell him he tried his best, thank him, but she also can hear that somebody followed them into the building, she’s not sure if it would be very bad to be found here. So she does a bit of both, she puts her back close to Arthur, hopes that comforts him, but also guards him.
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Arthur lets his hand drop- it hurts to have failed, again, to still not be able to do anything, to be there and to have to watch, helplessly, as life slips away, like so much water running through his fingers. At least, he tells himself, Mr Harker isn’t in pain anymore, now. But still- he couldn’t safe him. Couldn’t safe him for Mrs Harker, or for Quincy- what’s Quincy going to feel about it?
Clearly, he didn’t get along with his father, but was it the ‘not getting along but still caring about him’ kind? And what about Quincy’s little sister? Arthur just so hates the idea of anyone having to feel like he did when Gregory died. To feel like they’d lost someone important.
He feels Darcy at his back, and that’s reassuring. She’s alive, and she’s going to be there for Quincy, if he knows her at all, and… and someone did this to Mr Harker. Why? It’s so blatant, so cruel, so public, it can only be a statement of some kind. And, as he looks down, Arthur sees how the stake is rammed through the cobbles into the street below. Whoever did this… either they were a bunch of people, or they were a very strong person.
A much-more-than-humanly-strong person. Like a vampire, maybe?
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It was bad from below. And it feels strange to be in the building without walking behind his father, Harker, he means, huffing at whatever boring legal stuff he was talking about. He’s been in here when it was empty before, but not like this, not when he ran to get away from the police. Sure, Harker paid them off more than once, but he wouldn’t put it past them to arrest him even in here. Or maybe especially in here?
The police isn’t exactly on good terms with him. What if they think this is related to him? Maybe it is related to him? That stake… maybe the one who killed Harker thought it was fitting for somebody who would bail out a molly?
Quincy doesn’t know, and he doesn’t know what to feel at the thought of feeling Harker’s eyes on him… Just, when he gets into the room, yes, he can’t help it, he looks, but those eyes aren’t seeing him. And if he thought it was bad from below, it’s so much worse from closer up, from where he can see the face.
That’s the worst… and he… he doesn’t even have tears or grief or anything people write about that you have when you see a dead parent. All he has is a massive wave of nausea. A sense of being grossed out and not being able to deal with this. This isn’t even Harker’s office. After one gasp and whimper, Quincy turns on the spot and runs over to his father’s, no, Harker’s (and does it even matter now?,) office to curl up on the sofa.
He should feel terrible, he thinks he should feel sad and worried, but all he can think of is: ‘Don’t throw up, don’t throw up,’ and that lack of emotion freaks him out even more. Freaks him out to the point where he hides his head under a pillow and whimpers just to hear himself react, make himself aware that he’s still alive. He’s not that dead and grey.