House Draculesti

Previously: Obsidian: Crystal Heart – Chapter 2

 Eh? Wha…? 

Me? For real? 

Did he just…? Uh?

John really wishes his thoughts were more eloquent but nobody’s ever done something like that for him. The molly just used the entirety of the sway he holds with Darcy and for what? To manoeuvre John into the brainspace with Darcy he always wanted to be in.

He just about manages not to blush (that’s a lie, he’s beet red), but he does manage not to tear up (much). He has something to do here because um, yes, Darcy is looking at him now. Looking at him all expectantly and… and, uh, what does he think?!

Fuck, he kind of needs his brain online for this and he’s feeling emotionally overwhelmed. Fuck, think!

He mentally scrolls over that contract, rights and responsibilities, and wait… wait! Now he remembers, Arthur changed it, and he liked that Arthur changed it. He took that clause about the wife always obeying the husband out! Hah! 

That being said, um, he likes that Darcy is looking to him and she can be a bit… well, she’s his girl, but his girl is a total drac, and he loves that about her, but it also means she puts about as much thought into her actions as a hungry puppy running face first into the cage wall when it smells something it wants.

And on top of that, uh, Quincy did him a massive solid there but also declared himself the affair, and John kind of feels in his debt and that molly, weirdly enough, is his bro, and in contrast to him doesn’t have a problem at all with showing off that he is socially observant. So um, right, what does he think?

“I think that you don’t need any punishment.” Seeing her near disappointment and knowing pretty fucking well from where that comes, he puts his hands on her shoulders and turns her. “But what you need is guidance. Just like we give our puppies. You wouldn’t ever punish one of them if they do something they don’t know better about. Culver, you need to promise me that if you think you did something wrong, you ask. Ask me… and ask Quincy.” Looking up and bumping their shoulders together, he smiles (but fuck, yes, they’re doing this, like last night.) “He and I are here for you, together. Your… um, real husband and your affair. Can you promise me that you’ll listen to us?” 

Oh fuck, that look, that happy look Darcy is giving him and the vigorous nod. The chirping promise and declaration of loving them both, in different ways, but loving them both.

Yes, they are doing this and John really, really has to fight not to cry, because he is so fucking happy right now. He’s the husband, the man of the house, and he’ll protect his girl and his bro from fucking everything Gregory tries to pull on them. He won’t ever again let Gregory hurt either of them, he’ll have to go through him first!

~

27 Dec 1899

“Lie about me and to me all you want, but leave sang du coeur out of it!”

Darcy’s voice is a low hiss, and she’s honestly surprised it’s not a yell across the entire estate, but no, her drac has its legs all straight and snout forward and teeth bared. There’s no posing and agitation, it’s coiled and ready to strike. There are the sparks of purple she’s seen before at the edge of her vision, too.

She knows she’s angry, so very, very angry and she doesn’t feel like telling herself to calm down and be obedient. Not after yesterday. Not after what Quincy and John told her. No, she’s only going to be an obedient wife to a husband who earns that right!

So yes, she lets her drac snarl, shows her own fangs, too. Snaps at the mask those deep eyes, that smell that isn’t a smell, is pushing towards her. Yes, she feels its cold against her skin, feels the tingling in her fingertips, but no, she doesn’t feel helpless.

She’s… blasted… no, fucking furious!

Gregory doesn’t get to lie to her about how much he and Quincy are in love, so much more than them. He’s teasing, or maybe he thinks he’s teasing, but it’s a lie!

Lie, lie, lie!

And she would have believed it and felt like a failure of a wife if not for Quincy telling her exactly what he feels about Gregory yesterday. No, enough, she… it’s a tearstained snap, but a snap with fangs anyway, she doesn’t care anymore if he sleeps around or if he doesn’t sleep with her, but he can’t lie about Quincy’s emotions!

No!

And he can’t play with them either! She would have told him he has to be good for Quincy. But now she knows Quincy doesn’t want it! Doesn’t want the theatre, either!

So she snaps at Gregory for that, too. Snaps and stomps her foot and then… then, no. No more.

Stomps her foot and whirls around and walks off, she doesn’t want to hear whatever he might try to answer, and she doesn’t want the tingling to get any worse. At least she’s not feeling numb, not as if she’s calcifying from the inside out, but she’s shaking and her body feels wrong and her limbs don’t fully obey, and she knows it’s Gregory’s fault, so she needs to get away from him!

John will protect her, Quincy will take care of her. She has her men, and she knows Gregory waited for the one moment she was alone. Ergo, she just won’t be alone anymore… and that thought makes her suddenly bounce.

~

It does not like this. It does not like this at all. 

Its core hums with delicious anger, but not enough, not nearly enough. 

Darcy is getting out of tune. And so is Quincy. They are tuning themselves to each other instead, and worse, to the dreamwalker. It is getting harder and harder to find them without him, and they are all synchronising to the entirely wrong emotions. 

It will have to do something about that. 

It turns into its body’s small, mobile form and lashes the body’s tail, just because it can. 

For now, it is hungry. If it cannot have a true meal from its dhampirs, maybe it can at least get a snack from Arthur. Keep him from becoming a problem, too, at the same time. 

Except, when it arrives it finds that the dhampirs have beaten it to him. And of course they will work to soothe all that quivering, tinkling emotion it can sense from the intruder’s attack. 

It is hungry! It goes to hunt in London. It will need many snacks to make up for the lack of dhampirs, but at least there are always plenty of those available in this mass of Midgardians.

~

Arthur isn’t sure how he feels. And because Hannibal is the best horse ever, and can tell his mood, he finds himself back in his stall, sitting in the straw and curled into Hannibal’s neck with Hannibal’s head in his lap instead of getting ready for a ride. 

It’s the same place he spent hours yesterday, after everything was over. He’s scratching Hannibal’s mane and stroking the soft velvet of his nose, and wondering how Quincy’s doing. The last he saw him, they were helping Mrs Harker together, and then later, Arthur went by the study and could hear Darcy, John and Quincy talking, so he decided to leave them to it. None of them showed up for dinner, or breakfast, so he’s not sure whether that’s a good sign or a bad sign. He hopes everyone’s okay. 

~

There he is! Quincy’s glad he doesn’t have to go out to find Arthur, but well, when you sleep in the same bed with Cycy and his darling, you wake up a bit later and then you miss Arthur at breakfast. Still, he wanted to find him as quickly as he could. The poor thing got stranded after everything yesterday. But Quincy had his cry and his two lovely people holding him and well, other ways of them all making each other feel better. Now he’s more than ready to take care of Arthur, too. He must be upset after that debacle. So when he spots him in the stall, he leans himself on the gate. “Hey, honey, want your space or do you want a hug after yesterday?”

~

Arthur looks up in surprise, because he didn’t hear anyone approach. Hannibal probably did, because he kind of flicks his ears and turns his nose a little to sniff in Quincy’s direction. 

“Oh, um…” A hug does sound… really appealing, so he says: “Sure?” He pets Hannibal’s nose one more time, then starts to get up, because he doesn’t think sitting in straw on the floor of a horsebox is really Quincy’s thing. “But, um, are you alright?”

~

“Well enough for now. My darling and Cycy hugged it all better, so how about I extend the favour to you?” Stepping back so that Arthur can get out of the stall but flicking the overgrown theatre prop one of those snack cubes he’s not thinking too hard about as thanks for having been sweet to Arthur, Quincy has his arms open and a smile on his face.

~

That makes Arthur smile a little. He can hear the rustle of Hannibal moving and the snap of his teeth behind him as he steps close to Quincy. “I’m glad. I, er, heard you talking in the study yesterday, and I didn’t want to interrupt.”

“That is very sweet and very you, but I hope you know that Cycy has a heart big enough to hug you, too.” Wrapping his arms tight around Arthur and starting to rub his back, Quincy hums under his words.

“Well, yes.” Arthur leans into the hug cautiously- but it does feel very nice. “But, well… it’s you who got hit worst this time…”

Chuckling, Quincy leans his head on top of Arthur’s. “And what have I done the last time I was stressed? Looked after people. Good distraction, you know. You can always ask me. But also, thank you for giving my two lovelies the space to deal with my drama.”

Arthur feels a little bit of warmth in his chest at Quincy saying that he can always ask him- because he doesn’t think Quincy is someone who would say that if he didn’t mean it. He’s, well… maybe too dramatic for that? “Thank you. And also, you’re welcome.” Arthur’s still not sure what’s going on with, well, apparently Darcy and John now being ‘his two lovelies’, but also, it’s not really any of his business. He likes that they’re getting along.

~

Although Quincy definitely can stand fine for a long time, doing this just out in the stables is a bit odd, so he wonders if Arthur would like to cuddle up for a bit somewhere more comfortable. “We can talk your feelings about the latest crisis out over some nice warm tea and cocoa, hm?”

~

“I’m not sure what my feelings are…” Arthur admits, and looks over his shoulder at Hannibal. Hannibal yawns wide, and stretches, and then puts his head back down on the straw, which Arthur interprets as Hannibal telling him to go ahead, he’s fine with taking another nap instead of going out for their usual ride right now. 

So Arthur turns back to Quincy, smiles up at him. “But, um, that sounds nice and maybe I’ll figure out what they are?”

~

“Sometimes you need to hear yourself talking about it to figure things out, that’s perfectly valid, honey.” Letting go of Arthur but keeping an arm around his shoulders, Quincy is just about to start moving when he has the weirdest feeling of… ugh, kind of like having your eyes closed and being touched with something, and it’s something furry. Must be his powers, and if it feels furry it’s probably Cycy, but he can’t pinpoint it, so now he’s curious. He’ll see what’s going on, he guesses.

~

Arthur decides he likes that Quincy still has an arm around his shoulders. It feels warm and… connecting. He knows for sure Gregory’s put his arm around his shoulders sometimes, but he can’t remember it feeling like this. But, well, maybe he wasn’t paying attention, or wondering how he was feeling about something at the time. 

He gives Quincy a questioning look when he feels him hesitate. “Everything okay?” Because here, you never know- what if it’s a warning sign of that fey coming back or something?

“Not sure, still figuring out my powers, expect something Cycy-related but no idea what.” With a shrug, Quincy starts walking again, pats Arthur’s shoulder gently.

Arthur nods to that, because figuring out powers is something he knows. “As long as it’s not a sign of another impending crisis or something…”

~

“Don’t you dare jinx us, honey!” Even as Quincy laughs and steps out of the stables, he spots the streak of red hair and stomping coming their way. “Uh oh…”

~

“What?” Arthur says, looks at Darcy approaching at speed in alarm. “I didn’t mean to!” But only a moment later, he finds himself barrelled into by Darcy, one of her arms clamping around him, and while he staggers, he realises that this is an exuberant hug and maybe nothing bad after all. (Though he might be healing some bruised ribs, and quickly shoves more magic into his defence bracelet, just to make sure she doesn’t accidentally break anything.)

~

“Cycy, you incorrigible puppy!” Despite the huff Quincy tries his best to hug back and keep them all from falling over. That woman ruins clothes like there aren’t other excuses to go shopping. “It’s not my fault you were half asleep when you got your morning cuddles from me earlier!”

~

She giggles at that and puts a kiss on his cheek, then Arthur’s, while declaring: “But Arthur hasn’t gotten any cuddles yet!” Then she realises how true that is. “Oh… oh, I’m sorry, I should have done this yesterday! Arthur-dear, how are you feeling now? Is the mean ouchie spell all gone?”

~

The mean ouchie spell? It takes Arthur a moment to realise what she means. “Oh! Yes, yes, that stopped right away! And you were helping Quincy yesterday, that’s okay, I understand.”

And of course he really does, but that she asks after him and came out to give him a hug and thought of him makes him feel a big, warm swell of emotion. 

Darcy smiles brightly at him and chirps that she’s glad, and he has no doubt that she means it. Then she goes up on her tiptoes to kiss Quincy. “Sang du coeur is important to me, of course, but so are you!”

Arthur knows that, or he thinks he does, but it’s still nice to hear, so he smiles back at her. “Thank you. Um… you’re important to me, too?” Then, of course, he blushes saying that.

~

Cooing at them, Quincy shoos them inside. “Honeys, you are being cute and I like it!” He can see that Darcy is blushing, too, but that’s a very pleased blush, that woman is just insatiable on being told when she’s doing good. Well, not that he doesn’t understand liking praise, she’s just being smart like that. He’s still wondering if she ran out to them for any specific reason but he can ask later, focus on Arthur first.

~

Arthur makes to automatically turn towards the library once they leave the kitchen, but Quincy instead steers them up the stairs, all the way up to his room. Which of course still has the naked-people art, and is very decadent, but also, in a way, yes, is cosier than the library.

~

Settling Arthur into his oversize sofa and throwing another pillow at him, just because there are never too many pillows, Quincy goes digging through his throw basket for the nicest blanket big enough for three, only to start laughing when Darcy, after one long and unsure look at Arthur, decides to wolf blanket on him. “Cycy, you’ll get hair on everything! Fine, the not-so-nice blanket it is, you animal!” Not that not all the blankets were made by the house anyway, but where is the fun in not huffing at his dearest forest goddess, who has about as much sense for nice, fancy luxuries as any other run-in-out-of-the-mud critter ever.

~

After a moment of hesitation, Arthur wraps his arms loosely around Darcy’s neck and ruffles her fur. “But you come pre-heated,” he tells her, because, well, actually, he thinks her playing blanket for him as a wolf is nicer than just a regular blanket. “A little, at least.”

~

Maybe because she’s still a bit miffed about what Gregory tried to do, or maybe because, well, even if her men were all offended about her thinking she needs punishment, she’s still so worried about getting it wrong with Arthur and he always seemed to like her better this way, and well, warm, she can do warm! Ergo, she fluffs herself up as big as she can make her fur.

~

Arthur laughs as she manages to turn herself kind of poufy. “I didn’t know you could do that!” And he realises how nice it is to be spending time with her and Quincy again, and he did miss them a bit, yesterday.

~

Putting the blanket over them and making sure to wrap it around Darcy’s head so she still sticks out from under it, Quincy lounges out next to Arthur, shoulder to shoulder, kicks his shoes off, then asks the house for a cup of cocoa. “There, comfy now. Feels time!”

~

Arthur is, indeed, very comfy like this, cuddled up with both Darcy and Quincy. So he supposes he can tackle those ‘feels’. “…I still don’t really know what they are,” he admits. “Kind of…” He listens inside himself, huffs. “Um… frustrated? Maybe? Like… we always try so hard, and learn more, but then always someone shows up who we just can’t stop from doing things…”

~

“The world is good at throwing stones like that,” Quincy acknowledges with a huff, but then leans his head against Arthur’s. “Trying one’s best is all we really can do. Giving up would be worse. I’m not going to, and Cycy is going to bite anybody who dares trying to make me. Same goes for you. She’s protective like that. She’ll try to stop things, I’m more about taking care of those who are still left standing afterwards.” Sighing, he stretches his legs and puts them up on the sofa. “I can’t help my sister now, but I can be there for mother. It’s where the larger need is.”

~

“Doesn’t it hurt to lose your sister?” Arthur asks hesitantly. “I mean… I didn’t grow up with one.” He thinks of that little gravestone in the cellar, that girl that only got to live a few weeks. He thinks if he’d known her and something had happened to her, he’d probably be very upset. “But, well, I hope she’s okay and that fey doesn’t treat her badly, it’s not… Well, she’s still out there?” He hopes that’s not tactless to talk about.

~

Great, now Quincy’s back to wondering what would be the right thing to admit to. He’s not going to admit to as much as he did with his lovelies, but he was the one who offered the feels time and Arthur so isn’t the one to be good at talking about these things, so it’s him or not at all. It still comes out as half a groan. “I’m freaked out by it, yes, but hurt, I think, is the wrong word. Pretty sure John’s more attached to my sister than I am.”

~

Arthur tilts his head, a little surprised. “Oh? I mean, I’m glad you’re not hurt,” he hurries to assure Quincy.

~

“I’m sounding like a right arse, don’t I?” Closing his eyes and allowing Darcy to wiggle her way half across his own lap, Quincy leans back and shudders. “I’m not going to repeat the whole whining session from yesterday, but remember how… with Harker, I just, well, no reaction. I’m more worried that I’ll be like my grandfather than about what he’s doing to my sister right now because frankly, she just might do better with it.”

~

“She didn’t seem terribly upset or scared of him,” Arthur agrees. “And she did say she wanted to go. Though, I mean, I don’t know how well she understands what she’s getting into, I certainly don’t. And, uh, well…” He shrugs. “…Children are weird? I dunno. I don’t want anything to happen to them on principle, but, um, yeah… I’d rather someone else deal with them?” he admits.

~

That gets a chuckle out of Quincy while Darcy scoffs with a whine, only for Quincy to ruffle her ears. “Oh hush you, let Arthur and me be bad men, you have the hunk to dad on anything childlike that comes your way no matter if you can produce it or not. You’ll get your gross, weird domestic bliss yet, and if I have to find him a bride myself.”

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