Chapter Text
In the land of Ingary, it was said that fortune favoured the youngest sibling, though John had never found that to be the case. Outliving his sister and parents could be considered lucky by some perhaps, but returning home to Ingary without a single living relative didn’t feel like any great fortune.
John settled in Market Chipping, by chance rather than choice, where he didn’t know a soul. Even if he had known anyone, the mirror was a constant reminder that they would not have recognized him, as his recent trials had left him aged beyond his years. At first, John wasn’t sure he would last long in the town. There was nowhere for him to live besides the temporary lodgings intended for travelers, and work for a wounded man invalided from war was scarce.
It was lucky, at least, that a limp and a tremor were assumed to be the consequences of the usual war wounds.
Luckier still that John had been a healer, and that not a week after his arrival he happened upon a local clinic advertising an open position in its window. John was put to work, though his hands shook too much for him to be of much use beyond treating acute ailments, and he imagined he’d only been given the job because the other healers had taken a liking to him.
Despite his terse nature and unsteady hands, his sutures always healed, and his medicines always worked. John would have lost the job within the first few days otherwise, as he performed his duties without any diligence, and was caught dozing in the backroom almost daily. More often than not, after slumping over at his desk, John was woken by the sound of the train trundling past his window.
John didn’t sleep most nights.
A healer at the clinic would have assumed he suffered from war-related nightmares. John almost wished that were the case. If anything, the memory of his time as a soldier was faded, and somehow even war was more appealing than his current state. Active service had at least meant being active.
The pain was always present, but night was when the wound just below his shoulder felt flayed open, the experience akin to prying fingers digging into a sore. Even if he did sleep, he was sure to wake in a cold sweat during the night. His chest would ache, and from there, the pain traveled down the left side of his body, till his hand and leg shook with it.
The ragged edges of skin were misleading, creating the appearance of a wound long healed. To John, it only confirmed that he would never find any lasting comfort through non-magical medicine. It wasn’t the physical body that needed treatment.
John had been cursed in the line of fire, and only breaking the spell would heal him.
+
Though, if not for his chronic condition, John might not have paid any attention at all to the town rumours about witches and wizards.
It was a blessing that the war in a land across the ocean was of less interest to the townspeople of Market Chipping. A topic deemed much more worthy of gossip was the Witch of Belgravia, who held the title of most powerful witch in all of Ingary, and who was known to change her loyalties to the crown as it suited her. If the tales were to be believed, her great power was drawn from a fire demon she had tamed, whose dark magic made her nigh unstoppable.
Rumour had it she had blackmailed a member of the royal family, and that even the Royal Wizard hadn’t been able to resolve the matter. Though there was much speculation on the nature of the blackmail, it remained unclear whether a satisfactory conclusion had ever been reached. Some said that the Royal Wizard’s Captain of the Guard, who was currently ‘missing in action’, had been devoured by the Witch.
Then there was the roaming castle out on the moors, which had at first been mistaken as belonging to the Witch. It had since been determined that the owner of the ghastly mobile home was none other than a wizard by the name of Holmes, who was viewed by many to be far worse than the Witch.
By the time John arrived in town this was all considered old news, but he was still given an earful on the subject during nearly every patient consultation. However, John didn’t learn why Holmes in particular was so disliked until a young girl who worked at the pastry shop Cesari’s caught him just before closing.
“Oh, I hate to be out in the evening these days, what with witches and wizards about,” she said, while John bound her twisted ankle. In a conspiratory whisper, she added, “No pretty girl is safe from Wizard Holmes if caught alone.”
“And why is that?” John asked, thinking that he would never be able to break his curse at this rate. Why did all wandering magic practitioners have to be morally ambiguous at best?
“Everyone knows that Wizard Holmes steals hearts!” his patient cried, almost toppling from the stool she was perched on in her enthusiasm.
John wasn’t sure that everyone knew that, as he certainly didn’t. “And what does he do with all those hearts, I wonder?”
His patient didn’t notice his wry smile, and answered in earnestness, “Oh, he eats them! Everybody knows that, Doctor Watson. He’s heartless.”
“Maybe that’s why he’s stealing them,” John suggested, as he finished wrapping her ankle.
She seemed to, at last, catch on to his sarcasm. “Joke all you want,” she said, walking gingerly towards the door with a pout. “You’re not the one at risk of having your heart stolen!”
“And thank heavens for that.”
John was dismissive, but after their conversation, he did take more notice of the discussion about the wizard. None of it was good, nor believable.
If this Wizard Holmes was such a menace, why had no one seen him or the soulless girls left behind in his wake? John hadn’t even caught a glimpse of Holmes’ fearsome moving castle, which was meant to haunt the hills above Market Chipping with its mechanic clanking and clouds of smoke huffing from its chimney, even though his backroom window overlooked the moorland.
John had no cause to doubt everyone else's word, but doubt he did, and he was proven right not long after.
+
With a choice between an evening at the pub with another healer from the clinic or alone in his barren lodgings, John had chosen the pub. However, there was a reason he rarely took Mike up on the offer; the streets were packed with people milling about in excitement at more soldiers being dispatched, making it difficult for John to walk. After having his cane almost jostled from his grip twice, John veered into a back alley to avoid the crowd.
He would have braved the main street had he known he’d find a group of newly appointed soldiers spilling out of the back of an establishment. Fresh to their uniforms, and soon to leave to serve their country, there was too much drink in them for the late afternoon. John could tell in a single glance that they were ready for a fight, if given half the chance.
Catching sight of his limp, one called out, “You served?” as he passed. John dipped his head, but continued on his way.
“Join us for a drink!” the same soldier called, while the others eyed his bad leg.
“Thank you, but I’m meeting someone,” John replied, not pausing.
There was a tension to the group, a repressed aggression. It was clear the lot of them were more interested in making an enemy than a friend. For a few seconds as he passed them, John was able to stand straight on his left leg.
“Oi! He’s not even leaning on that cane!” one of the other soldiers cried out. “I bet he’s faking it for the army pension. Where were you even stationed?”
John didn’t respond, walking faster. He wasn’t interested in a fight, or suffering fools.
“Coward! Get back here!”
A soldier nearest to him made a grab for his elbow, but he never made contact, as John swung out, hitting him squarely in the arm with his cane.
“I wouldn’t try that again if I were you,” John said.
The soldier hesitated, but spurred on by drink and the group supporting him, advanced on John regardless. The rest followed close behind. John’s grip on his cane tightened as he wished he’d brought a pistol.
“There you are,” said a deep voice from behind him.
John twisted his head, and was surprised to find that a man had snuck up on him. “I was wondering where you’d got to,” the man continued. “We were meant to meet on the street, not down an alley with a bunch of rabble.”
“Were we?” John asked, for want of a better reply.
The soldier at the lead of the pack took a definitive step back.
John couldn’t imagine why, as the newcomer pretending to be an acquaintance of his was in no way intimidating. With dark curls spilling across his forehead, blue gems dangling from his ears and his neck, and a pink and grey checkered coat with yellow piping hanging off his shoulders, John suspected the soldiers would have described him as a dandy.
“Who you calling ‘rabble’?” a younger member of the military entourage piped up, though he was shushed soon after.
“You idiot!” from one soldier currently in full retreat. “That’s the Wizard Holmes!”
“Oh, I do love when my reputation precedes me,” the man said, and with three twirls of his wrist and a single flick of his long fingers, the group of men assumed parade rest, turned on their heels, and began marching out of the alley in synchrony.
“That,” John said, watching as the soldiers disappeared around the corner, “was incredible.”
“Do you think so?” Wizard Holmes asked, folding his arms behind his back and underneath his draped coat. “It was nothing. Soldiers are so good at taking orders.”
“And giving them,” John said, as he turned to face the man once again.
That seemed to give Holmes pause, as his chin dipped down towards his chest. “Ah, yes.”
“So you’re him then?” John asked, thinking that he did not seem as soulless as described. “The one everyone’s so afraid of, ‘Wizard Holmes’?”
“Please,” Holmes said, extending his hand towards John. “Call me Sherlock.”
Though many would have considered it foolish, John didn’t hesitate to take his hand. “John Watson. And thank you for that. I don’t know if I would have left that encounter without a few bruises.”
Sherlock, as he had introduced himself, brushed away John’s gratitude, as if he had not just sent several men packing. “I dislike an uneven number in a fight, although I think you might have held your own without me,” Sherlock said, with a wide smile.
It might have been a trick of the light, but John imagined Sherlock’s eyes sparkled, not unlike his jeweled earrings.
The thought of inviting an infamous wizard to the pub for a drink with him and Mike seemed laughable, but John felt the urge do so all the same.
Before he could make the suggestion, a crack in the side of the cobblestone wall behind Sherlock’s shoulder began to extend.
John blinked, at first mistrusting his eyes, but the shadow continued to grow until a black bubble had formed. As the black form grew further, it became apparent that the bubble was in fact a bulbous nose in the center of an eyeless face. With increasing alarm, John watched as the entire dark outline of a person seeped out from the crack in the wall, complete with a straw boater hat atop its head.
“Um,” John said. “What the hell is that?”
Sherlock’s response was to grab John by his right elbow, and drag him down the alleyway at a breakneck pace.
When John turned his head to look back, three black mounds had joined the first, all dressed in human attire. Worse still, it seemed only more were on their way, detaching themselves from the stone surrounding them, and getting closer.
Sherlock stared forward as he walked, acting as if they were not being chased. John wondered if, like an ostrich sticking its head in the sand, the strange man thought pretending not to see them would assist their escape in some way.
“No cause for alarm,” Sherlock eventually said, his voice airy, like they were taking a leisurely stroll. “But we are being followed.”
“I’ve seen those things before,” John said, though this only became apparent to him once he had said it aloud. He had seen them. But where?
“That’s not surprising, the whole country is teeming with them,” Sherlock replied, now a touch breathless.
“What are they, and why are they following you?” John was still looking back; they were gaining on them, and gaining in numbers.
“Wizard’s henchmen. These ones in particular are meant to round up all the rogue, heartless wizards shirking their duties. They’re my constant companions these days.” Sherlock paused, though only to wink in John’s direction. “Can you run?”
“Not likely.” John had forgotten his bad leg in the adrenaline of the chase, but while the cane in his hand was not currently in use, he still doubted he was capable of more than speed walking.
For the first time, Sherlock spared a glance back over his shoulder. “Never mind that then. Up it is!”
A hard tug on his right arm, and a sudden weightlessness to his body, and John floated up from the ground. When the dark blobs launched up after them, the walls of the alleyway began to close inward on all sides.
In Sherlock’s clutches, John was catapulted up past the top of the highest building, nearly losing his cane and wits in the process. The henchmen chasing them were crushed by hard stone in the ensuing meeting of the walls, which John could only assume was Sherlock’s doing.
John and Sherlock drifted in the air, suspended for several seconds. John, having made the mistake of looking down, let loose a string expletives, and clung to Sherlock’s arm.
“Don’t mind that,” said the deep voice close to his ear. “Just walk.”
“Walk?” John shouted over the wind. “What, on air?”
But Sherlock was already extending his long legs forward, and John’s only choice was to follow suit.
Not unlike dance partners crossing a room side by side, they stepped across the sky, high above the busy street below.
All John could hear was the sound of the pastel-coloured sleeves of Sherlock’s jacket being buffeted by the wind, though the jacket never strayed from Sherlock’s shoulders. John focused on putting one foot in front of the other, despite no firm ground beneath them.
It was exhilarating and, for the first time since being cursed, the wound in John’s chest felt healed.
“Incredible,” John said, voice high, close to laughing. When he turned, Sherlock was looking back. Sherlock made no comment, beyond a small smile peeking out at the corner of his lips.
As they began to drop in altitude, the street where John had intended to meet Mike rose up to meet them, their feet almost scraping the shingles of a roof. The pub was on the corner, fast approaching.
Before John could point it out, Sherlock said, with a tinge of regret, “Those things are still after me. Till next time, John.”
At this, John was let loose from Sherlock’s grasp. With a yell, John was deposited onto the second floor landing of the pub, legs still moving through the air as he crashed into the side of the building. Even with the wind knocked from his lungs, John rushed back to lean over the rail, but couldn’t see anything in the sky besides soldiers flying in open-seated planes.
There was no sign of the dark figures that had chased them; John couldn’t believe he hadn’t recognized them at once. Perhaps he hadn’t expected to see them in Market Chipping—they were more common on the battlefield.
Once his breath was back, John went in to find Mike, but Mike found him first.
“John!” Mike clapped him on the back. “They said someone was dropped off by the Wizard Holmes, I can’t believe it was you! No wonder you’re late!”
“He helped me out,” John explained, still not sure what to make of it himself. “Not like how people described him at all. Charming, even.” A stealer of hearts, indeed.
“Good thing you’re not a pretty young thing or you might have been in trouble,” Mike said with a laugh, before thankfully dropping the subject.
They spent the rest of the evening together, though John imagined he was poor company. He only listened to Mike with half an ear, devilish eyes and a matching smile never far from his mind.
+
Perhaps because of this chance encounter, the next time a patient was keen to gossip about the wizard, John was defensive.
“I’m not sure if you’ll be able to help me Doctor,” his patient said as he felt her forehead, feeling a slight fever. “I think I’ve had a spell put on me by one of those wizards wandering our streets. Or, maybe my heart’s been eaten without my knowing it.”
“It’s just a cold,” John said, but still reached for the stethoscope in his leather bag to be thorough.
“How can you be sure?” she asked, pausing to cough. “They say that the Wizard Holmes wants the heart of every young girl in town.”
She wasn’t much younger than him, John might have pointed out, but did have some tact.
John pressed the scope to her chest and, as she covered her mouth for another coughing fit, her hand brushed against his shirt.
John took a step back.
“Has anyone actually seen Holmes do anything to a girl?” John asked. “I certainly haven’t seen or heard of any girls with their hearts removed.”
The woman’s coughing stopped as she leaned forward in her seat. “I haven’t myself, but you sound oddly familiar, Doctor. Have you seen him before?”
“No,” John lied, his hand twitching at his side. “No, only it seems unfair to accuse someone of crimes without any justification.”
“It’s surprising that you’re not more fearful of his kind, given your situation,” she murmured, her eyes resting on his shoulder.
John’s hand lifted to cover his chest, as if to conceal the scar beneath his clothes.
“My situation,” John repeated, annoyed that he had already given the truth of it away.
Her smile was all lips, none of it reaching her eyes. She didn’t elaborate.
“You’re a witch then,” John guessed.
“Oh, you’re quick.”
John took another step back; at the same time, the door to the room swung closed.
John, unmoving, leveled her with a hard stare. “Have you come to put a spell on me?”
“Oh, you poor man,” she said, affecting a look of exaggerated pity, which annoyed John more than if she had put a curse on him.
Crossing her legs, and leaning her chin on her hand, she said, “As you well know, you already have one. Though I doubt you know the extent of it.”
A muscle in John’s hand spasmed, his cane hitting the wood of the floor with a sharp rap.
“I’m well aware of the extent of it, thank you.” He bent down to retrieve his cane, putting all his weight on his good leg, as if to demonstrate. Not to mention he couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept for more than a handful of hours.
“Now that we’ve established that,” John continued, his smile grim. “Either tell me you know how to break the spell that’s on me, or kindly leave.”
The witch watched his display of dominance with little interest. “Oh, I can’t break a curse like this one. Hardly anyone can.” Here, she paused. “However…”
“However?” John prompted. “As I said before, either spit it out or leave.”
The witch stood from the patient’s stool. Even though John remembered her as shorter than him when he’d led her in, she now matched John’s height easily.
“Well, it’s a good thing you don’t take much stock in rumours, as I think I might know someone who can,” she said, turning to face the window overlooking the train tracks. The moors loomed in the distance.
John heard the train coming before the black smoke rose past his window. When nothing could be seen out of the window but exhaust, the woman lifted herself onto the window ledge, and fell backward out of it, through the glass.
Though John forced it open after, and stuck his head out to look in every direction, there was nothing outside but the train moving past.
The witch had not given John her name, or the name of the person she thought could help. She hadn’t needed to, considering she’d done an excellent impression of him in her exit.
+
John thought it over for all of thirty minutes, before leaving the clinic to return to his lodgings, wrapping cheese and bread in a handkerchief, and catching a ride out of town on the back of a shepherd’s wagon. It wasn’t that John trusted a witch’s word, especially not one who was visiting him under false—and still unclear—pretenses.
John was out on this limb because the only break from the pain he’d had since his return had been the brief time spent in Wizard Holmes’ presence, and he wasn’t about to pass up the chance for a night of sleep.
When the shepherd left John only part of the way up the winding hills leading to the moors, he attempted to dissuade him. “I don’t know what you’re after, but if you’re trying to reach Market Folding, it’s a long way,” the shepherd said. “There’s nothing out there for quite a ways but a bit of hillside, and past that the wastes of Belgravia.”
John knew what the shepherd saw—his cane and diminished frame—but he could not be persuaded.
After an hour of laboured walking, his hand stiff where it gripped the handle and pain shooting up his leg, John came to almost regret that decision. At a particularly annoying twinge, John cursed his leg, and threw his cane onto the ground. The cracking sound that followed was the cherry on top of John’s charming afternoon.
“Perfect,” John said, picking up one of the now broken off pieces. “Guess I’ll just have to improvise.”
Spying a stick in a bush, John shifted his weight to his right leg, and pottered off the path. First, he pulled, and then pushed down as if applying force to a lever. It required most of his remaining energy, but at last there was give, and John almost smacked himself in the face with the other end of the stick, which was startlingly dressed as a person and had some kind of root vegetable for a head.
“A scarecrow? That’s not much of a walking stick.” After observing the scarecrow’s friendly expression, he said, “Not much of a scarecrow either.”
John didn’t quite know what to do with it. Now that he had unearthed it, it was apparent the stick was far too tall for him to lean on. He let it drop back into its bush, and continued on his way back to the path.
He’d have to find another stick, and soon. His good leg couldn’t support all his weight for long, and especially not uphill. It was growing dark, the mist was thicker the higher he climbed, and there was still no sign of Wizard Holmes’ moving castle.
Only, when John paused to rest, and looked back down over the way he had come, the scarecrow was no longer lying in the bush.
It was standing upright along the path.
John waited. When nothing happened, he looked back uphill into the mist, but turned back quick enough to catch sight of the scarecrow hopping forward.
Once caught, the scarecrow apparently felt no need to conceal that it was capable of movement, and continued hopping towards John.
“A living scarecrow,” John said. “Yeah. Of course it is. Why not.”
On closer inspection, the scarecrow had a weathered expression, and straw that had seen better days as hair. When it reached John, it bounced on the spot to stay upright, but did not pass him.
“Don’t suppose you can talk?” After a pause, “No, ‘course not. You’re a scarecrow. Silly of me.”
Still, the scarecrow bounced in front of him, as if it was trying to convey something.
John noticed that near its base, there were two sturdy branches. Sturdy enough to act as foot holds.
“You want to give me a lift?” John asked, and the bouncing seemed to increase in pace and enthusiasm. With his leg causing him a great deal of discomfort, John wasn’t in a position to refuse.
Feeling as though he might be taking his life in his hands, John held onto the scarecrow and placed his feet on the lower branches. The scarecrow was off like a shot, and John was jostled with each lurch forward. Though they did not move remarkably fast, it was much better than John’s earlier pace, and for that John was grateful.
“I’m looking for a castle,” John informed the scarecrow. “A moving one.”
Except that, as it turned out, it was not a moving one at all.
When the scarecrow crested the top of the hill and bounded towards a hulking pile of scrap metal in the distance, John didn’t quite know what to expect. It certainly wasn’t what he would call a castle.
John’s eyes couldn’t decide where to settle on the strange collection of objects. There was wood, brick, stone, pulleys, and who knew what else, all amassed together. Two metal legs with three-pronged feet, which the amalgamation had perhaps once stood on, were splayed out, one sticking up in the air.
The light drizzle of rain on the moors created the illusion of an unseen boundary around the structure, as if there was a layer between the odd construction and the air.
It might have been a magical protection spell for all John knew, but when he slid off the scarecrow and went to touch one side, his hand only met with cold metal.
“Either this is too easy,” John said. “Or I and my aching leg have come all this way only to find a very inept wizard.”
The vegetable-headed scarecrow didn’t offer him any reply.
There was a large black door facing them, close to double John’s height. “Do you suppose that’s the way in?”
However, when John attempted to get closer to it, there was an invisible force preventing him from approaching.
“At least there’s some protection on this thing,” John said, struggling for several more minutes. No matter how hard he tried, he could not even reach out to touch the door, let alone try to open it.
“That’s fine,” John told the castle. “I’ll just take the back door.”
Between the rock and mortar a few paces away, John spied a set of protruding steps. Above the steps, there was another smaller door positioned at a severe angle, nearly sideways.
“Think I’ll have better luck here?” John asked the scarecrow.
A sequence of hops seemed to suggest the scarecrow agreed.
Holding onto the railing, John climbed the tilted steps, and pushed and pulled at the handle.
The door was locked.
John breathed in, resting his weight on the railing, and aimed a kick directly over the key-hole with his good leg. The wooden door swung open after the first try, revealing more stone steps within.
“Not much security for a wizard,” John commented, looking back at the living scarecrow. Rain was soaking its long coat, but it was too tall to come inside with him. “Thanks? I suppose,” John said over his shoulder. “Hop off if I don’t ever come back out.”
When John put his foot on the first step, a realignment occurred that made his head spin. At once, the steps were not on a slant at all. The steps in fact were more like a stoop, and led into what appeared to be a ransacked living room.
John had the presence of mind to put the broken door back into place behind him, before turning to stare. It made no sense that a living area of any kind could exist within the heap he had seen from the outside, but then, it was magic after all.
The room was littered with books and strewn papers, with the sofa and wing-back chairs piled high with scrolls and tomes. The mess seemed to spill out from the shelves across the room, stocked with books and jars of powders. Underneath was a work table, covered in mixing bowls, glass bottles of varying sizes, chemist burners, and ashtrays filled with pieces of chalk.
Bound herbs hung by string from the ceiling, and there were window frames with no windows, covered with maroon paisley patterned drapes. The mantle above the fireplace was well-decorated, including bat wings pinned to corkboard and a human skull, but the grate beneath it was empty, explaining the chill of the place. By John’s head, to the right of the door, there was a staircase, which John assumed would lead him up to the wizard.
But when John stepped past the stoop, a door at the other side of the room swung open to reveal an older woman with a broom held aloft.
“Oh!” she cried, lowering her broom from overhead. They eyed each other for an extended period before she released a small laugh, and waved towards the only uncovered chair in the place. “Well, you’d better come in then.”
John walked forward, still unsure of his welcome, though the woman had released her broom entirely and was throwing a pile of couch cushions onto the ground from the table. Beneath them, there was a kettle. “If you want a cuppa,” she said, watching him out of the corner of her eye, “you’ll have to start a fire to boil the water over.”
John, still gobsmacked, found his voice at last. “I suppose you’re not the Wizard Holmes.”
“Goodness, no,” she said. “I prefer Mrs Hudson. And while I do sell spells and enchantments, it’s nothing like what Sherlock gets up to. I owned an old shop in Kingsbury, and Sherlock wanted it for one of his fronts. So, now I’m his landlady.”
John blinked. Kingsbury was nowhere near Market Chipping. “Why are you living here if you have a shop way over there?”
“It’s all one and the same,” she said, pointing to the door behind him. John turned to see there was a diamond-shaped knob by it, with four different coloured segments. An arrow was currently pointed to the green coloured part of the knob. “Facades and bolt holes, but this is the real place.”
John eyed the mechanism by the door, not sure he understood. “I suppose you can’t break my curse then?”
Shaking her head, “I’m afraid I’m not in that business. Besides, that spell is far too strong for the likes of me.”
“Do you think he can?” John asked, tipping his head towards the stairs, though he didn’t even know if the wizard was in.
“Oh, I don’t know! But this is just the sort of thing he likes. The clever ones always are.”
John was still standing, awkward, in the middle of the living room. “I’m John, by the way. John Watson.”
“Oh, yes!” she cried. “Silly me, never even asked you for your name. And Sherlock isn’t in at the moment. He’s always doing who knows what at all hours, but you can wait for him here if you like.”
“Right.” John was surprised, but glad, to find someone so welcoming in the strange place. He was glad as well that the wizard really was the same man he had met that day in the alley. “Shall I start a fire then?”
John coaxed a fire to life while Mrs Hudson filled the kettle. On closer inspection of the table, and in keeping with the rumours, in one bowl there appeared to be a human heart, stinking of preservatives. John chose to ignore that, for the time being.
John had to move a violin from the only other spare chair to sit down, but to his shock, his bad leg had yet to protest being stood on for so long.
“I’m to bed, I think,” Mrs Hudson said, returning to the door she had appeared from, “but feel free to stay, John.”
John did, though he ended up falling asleep sitting up in the chair. The fire had burned down to embers by the time the knob above the door changed with a click and a chime, and the door creaked open. John woke at the sound, startled.
A dark figure entered. At first, it was not anything John would have identified as a human; he could just make out an elongated face, the white of a claw, and the shape of two black wings.
John knew the second he was spotted, as the creature reared back, as if slapped. John stayed still in the chair, hand reaching out for his cane, forgetting he had lost it on the moor.
Piece by piece, the blackness seeped away from the figure standing in the shadow, till only dark, curled hair was left atop a very human head.
To John’s great relief, it was the same man he had met in town, Sherlock.
Despite returning to his human form, Sherlock’s visible shock at finding a man in his living room did not recede. He remained at the top of the stoop, mouth agape, staring at John sitting in front of his fire.
“Hello,” John said. It seemed a good start.
“Hello?” Sherlock had still not moved past the steps.
John half-turned in his seat. “You might remember me."
Sherlock exhaled a breath somewhat close to laugh. “Might I?”
“Yes, we met briefly in town.” John wondered if Sherlock truly did not recall. “Soldiers, dark blob men, walking on air—any of that ringing a bell for you?”
“We did meet in town,” Sherlock agreed, his mouth tipping up on one side. “Not sure that explains you breaking down my door and helping yourself to a pot of tea though.”
John supposed it didn’t. Motioning towards the kettle, John said, “Well, you weren’t using it.”
Sherlock barked a laugh, and for the first time in days, John’s shoulder felt relief.
“And what do you have in your pocket?” Sherlock asked, hand outstretched. “Give it here.”
John, puzzled, looked down at his coat. “You mean, the bit of bread and cheese?”
“No." Sherlock slid forward, and John sputtered as one ringed hand reached into the front pocket of his shirt. He pulled out a folded piece of paper.
Sherlock swept past John and the fireplace, heading for the table. With his arms stretched out over the wood, Sherlock unfolded the slip of paper. At once, it turned to smoke in his fingers, and the sound of a woman moaning echoed through the room.
When John leaned over the back of his chair, he could see the scorch marks left on the table where the remnants of the paper had fallen.
“The Witch of Belgravia sent you, I take it." His voice was devoid of inflection.
“No? At least, I didn’t know it was her.” After a beat, “What did the note say?”
“'You who swallowed a falling star, o' heartless man, blah blah blah.' Mrs Hudson will have a fit when she sees the table.”
Sherlock ran the palm of his hand over the scorched table, his dark hair rising up away from his face and purple smoke crackling beneath his fingers, till nothing was left of the witch’s mark in the wood.
“It’s gone,” John said, amazed.
“And yet, her spell lingers on." Sherlock grinned, though it was more like a grimace. It was spoken with such intense bitterness that John could only assume there was quite the story behind it.
Sherlock stayed at the table, where he began fiddling with the instruments on the worktop. No further questions of John were asked.
John turned in his chair. “The Witch did suggest I come, but I wasn’t sent. I’ve come here—that is, to you—because I have a curse, and I want to know if it can be broken.” When there was no pause in the fiddling, “Your landlady mentioned you might find my case interesting.”
With his back still turned, Sherlock snorted. “Interesting. Yes, I have been known to take on such magical problems.”
“And,” John prompted, “can you take on mine?”
Sherlock swiveled on his heel, facing John once more. “What is your curse, if you don’t mind me asking? What are the effects?”
“You can’t tell me?” John asked, wondering if he really had found himself a useless wizard.
“I’d rather hear it from the source,” Sherlock said, bristling. “Rather than biasing you with my interpretation of the spell.”
“Pain,” John answered simply. “In the place where it hit me.”
Sherlock’s gaze on him was intent, as if the bleak description of his symptoms were truly fascinating. “And where did it hit you?”
John pointed to his chest. “Here, where it left a mark. That’s healed now, but the pain is deeper in.” John didn’t mention the insomnia, or that when he did manage to sleep, he woke near tears.
“And how did you come to be cursed?” Sherlock advanced on John, circling his chair.
John twisted his head to follow his movements. “While in action.”
“Ah yes, we’re at war." Sherlock seemed to have just recalled it. “And you were a soldier, put on the same battlefield as witches and wizards. Did you see who cast the spell on you?”
“All I saw were those things, like the ones that were following us the day we met. A wizard’s henchmen, as you said.”
Sherlock hummed, and then, with a wave of his hand, “Well, that’s not much help.”
“Sorry,” John said, though he wasn't sorry in the least. “Can you take it off me, or not?”
“There are as many ways to break a curse as there are curses." Sherlock's gaze darted to the left. John supposed he was dismissed. John waited for him to continue, but Sherlock appeared to be lost in thought, staring into the fireplace.
“Is that a no?”
“While I do enjoy a tricky curse,” Sherlock evaded, “I can’t make bricks without clay. I don’t have enough information at present.”
John sighed. He should have known better. “Where does that leave us, then?”
“It leaves us here." He motioned to the disarray of the living room around them. “Where are you from? Where do you currently live?”
“I live in town, and you could say I’m from there as well.”
Sherlock appeared to mull this over, hands steepling together beneath his chin. Speaking to the fireplace, Sherlock said, “I have a spare bedroom upstairs.”
John felt his face scrunch up in surprise, and confusion. “Are you suggesting I live here?”
“You’re the one that broke into my castle and made yourself comfortable,” Sherlock said, oddly defensive, with his lower lip jutting out. “And I need time to study a curse! A month, at the very least. And as it happens, this home does have expenses outside the realm of magic. I need assistance with my spells, and Mrs Hudson needs help with her herbs and potions. Unless, of course, you prefer your job and lodgings in town, in which case we need never discuss this again.”
“I prefer,” John said, “to sleep at night.”
Sherlock clapped his hands together in front of him. “That settles it then!”
He spun away to the wooden table, and came back with a pair of scissors. “Now, quick, give me some of your hair. The more of it, the better.”
“What? Why?” John reached up to touch the back of his head on instinct.
“To seal the deal!” Said as if it were obvious. “Payment for me agreeing to help lift your curse. That is, if you’re staying?”
His expression was manic, shadows cast in strange places over his angular face by the low flickering light of the fire. The discomfort of John’s wound was, for the moment, diminished to a dull ache, and his leg hadn’t bothered him since stepping in through the castle’s door. Perhaps the magic of the place was already working, loosening the grip that the curse had like a vice around his life.
John took the scissors from Sherlock’s hand outstretched hand, and used them to snip at the back of his head. His once blond hair was now mostly grey, which was made more evident when he handed over the silver strands.
“I’ll stay, and I’ll take the room upstairs.”
Sherlock rocked back on his heels with delight. Then, while cupping John’s hair in one palm, he squatted down in front of the fireplace, and using a poker, began tapping at a loose brick towards the back. Once the brick was wiggled out of its slot, John could see a small hiding place, and a jar within it. Curiously, Sherlock leaned into the fireplace over the hot coals, unscrewed the lid, and stowed John’s hair in what appeared to be a jar of dust.
“Careful,” John said, as Sherlock pulled back, though he needn’t have worried. Sherlock extended from his crouch without ever coming into contact with the ash or hot grate.
“There!” Sherlock clapped his hands together again. “Now about that room.”
Without further comment, Sherlock twirled away and dashed up the stairs by the entrance. Which he then, slowly, returned back down. “Are you coming?”
John wanted to laugh. “Yes, only—” John needed something to act as a cane, if he was going to climb the stairs. His leg didn’t hurt him now, but he knew better than to trust it on stairs.
Sherlock returned to his side in an instant, and offered his arm.
While John appreciated the gesture, his pride did not. “I’m fine." Out of habit, he leaned on his right leg as he stood.
Except—as John shifted his weight to his left, it didn’t buckle under his weight, or even twinge. He really was fine.
“Right then,” John said, clearing his throat, “lead the way.”
Sherlock for the second time bounded up the stairs, taking John to a small landing, with one door at the end, and one door to the left. Sherlock opened the door at the end, and ushered John into the dark room within.
His exhaustion, and the absence of pain, caught up with him. Without a thought for his host, John found the bed in the dark, and feeling its softness, sat down.
John fell asleep almost as soon as he had laid down his side, only dimly aware of Sherlock closing the door behind him as he left.