SORRY
By Chornyi
Not mine.. Not even Ian, unfortunately. You know whose they are.
ANOTHER sad short story.. Sara rejects Ian one time too many.
The credit for this story goes to SPIN11 who's wonderful story A SHADOW NO MORE gave me the idea and the emotional state to write this.
If you haven't read her story yet- READ IT!!! It is the best Ian/Sara story in this vein out there.
Without A Shadow No More, there would be no 'Sorry'.
Also, thanks to Days Of The New for constant inspiration.
...................................................................................
'Sara.'
Some instinct warns her of his presence before he speaks. Even so, the soft voice, too close behind her, makes her shoulders jerk in reaction.
Sara's jaw clenches and she turns slowly to face her stalker.
He's closer then she'd thought- turning puts her nose to nose with Nottingham.
The assassin is wearing black of course- a long-sleeved black shirt that fits tightly to his broad chest and muscular arms, and loose black Army pants tucked into the tops of polished combat boots.
In deference to the hot weather, the coat and hat are absent, but he is still wearing gloves as if it were sub-zero cold.
That, out of all of it, annoys Sara the most.
Why can't he be normal for once?
She flashes on a maybe-memory or vision:
... Jake looking at her as Ian sits at the table in a precinct interrogation room. 'What's wrong with him?' the rookie asks.
'You got a week?' she responds. ...
The vision ends, leaving Sara even more shaken then Nottingham's mere presence.
'What do you want?' she asks sharply. Although she refuses to lose her temper with him again, the warning signs are there in the fierce blaze of her hazel eyes and the dangerously lowered brows.
He doesn't fail to read them.
His golden-brown eyes gaze tentatively at her. Despite the fact that Nottingham is tall enough to look down on Sara, and that he is well inside her personal space, he is not in the least threatening. She wonders how he does that.
'To see you, Sara,' he answers her question.
She raises her arms at shoulder level and lifts her brows. 'Well, here I am. What's on your mind, Nottingham?'
'Why don't you trust me, Sara?' he asks softly, with that hurt flavor to his words, the one she can't stand because it makes what is between them personal- and she tries so hard to be sure it's not.
'What?' Her voice raises slightly in reponse. 'Trust you? Nottingham..'
'I have tried to help you.' he interrupts her trailing words. 'I told you what you needed to do to defeat the pretender, Lucrezia. I saved your life, Sara. And yet you still look on me with disfavor.'
'Nottingham, I don't think trust is going to happen between us.' Sara says finally, in a surpisingly gentle voice.
He shakes his head at her words.
'You have your own agenda,' Sara continues, ignoring the motion. 'Even if you won't admit it. Now that Irons is gone, someone has to take up where he left off, and it seems like you're doing a pretty good job.'
'I have not tried to take the Witchblade from you. I have not tried to control you.' There is a slight edge to his voice now. He looks up at her, a dark look in his eyes- it's one Irons knew but Sara does not.
'Yet,' she replies. Just one word, but it is enough to make him drop his head again.
Suddenly he moves.
Sara jumps, raising her right arm, but he isn't attacking her. Instead, he drops to his knees at her feet- the motion is eerily reminiscent of another time he did this- Sara flashes on him begging her understanding after he contracted Mobius to kill her.
The tortured expression was the same then as it is now.
'Sara,' he says. He holds out his gloved right hand, but this time she doesn't take it. 'Nottingham, enough of this.' she says.
He stares up at her, mutely pleading.
Reluctantly, Sara places her right hand in his.
He bends over it, a curtain of heavily waved dark hair hiding his face. She feels his breath, then the warmth of his lips touching her skin. Against her will, she shivers.
'Goodbye, Sara,' he says softly, letting go of her hand, head still bent.
Sara takes her hand back and puts it safely behind her.
'Where are you going?' she asks him, keeping her voice level although it wants to shake. He has that effect on her sometimes, though she denies it with all she has.
'Home,' he answers. His head raises again, those eyes meeting hers. The anguish in them is visible. 'I am sorry, Sara.'
'For what?'
'That I wasn't a better protector. That I could not gain your trust.'
'Protector? I told you before, I don't need your protection.'
'Yes. You did.' He rises gracefully to his feet. Now is when he needs the coat, Sara thinks, so he can swirl it around his body and make a dramatic exit.
Instead, he simply turns and walks away, head down.
---
Inside, Ian plays Sara's final words to him over and over again-
...'I told you before, I don't need your protection.'...
Does she have any idea how those words hurt him? They slice like knives, each one cutting another small piece of his heart away, leaving only aching emptiness behind.
...'Nottingham, I don't think trust is going to happen between us.'...
After all this, those words.
He has done his best to protect her. He has told her everything he could, helped her against direct orders, suffered punishments to keep the Witchblade on her wrist and her alive, forgiven her for taking away the one person he loved before her. And in the end, it still means nothing.
He remembers the dream he had, the one where he died for her, taking the bullets of Bruno Dante and his men. He remembers what came before that.
...'It is written no man can serve two masters. I thought I could prove the exception. I was mistaken.'
He kneels before Irons, the katana laid across his hands. 'You gave me life. It's yours to take back. I would consider it a mercy.'
When Irons doesn't move, just looks at him, Ian turns the blade so it is directed at his heart.
'If you don't, I shall.'
Finally, Irons moves. He wrenches the sword from Ian's grasp and roughly grasps him by the hair, forcing Ian's head down and pressing it against his leg. Ian lifts his hand and clasp the leg, holding his cheek against it. ...
Although it never happened, Ian remembers the agony of waiting. The moment of hope when Irons' touch on his hair lightened. The tickle as the tear ran down his nose.
Then Irons' words, deceptively gentle.
...'I am not a merciful man, Ian. And it is also written, "As for this worthless slave, cast him out into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."'
That gentle hand suddenly turns rough, flinging his head away. ...
Casting him out, as Irons' words promised.
Into the dark.
In that dream or memory, Ian didn't have the courage to go to Sara and ask her to take him in. Instead he merely said goodbye to her, then willingly gave up his life.
For him, it was better to be dead then to be alone. Without Irons, without Sara, he had nothing.
But in this lifetime, he had a chance.
He had more courage- enough to go to her this last time and try to resolve things. If he had her trust, he would have everything.
If she would only once treat him as she treats her partner, Detective Woo, or her friend, Gabriel, or even her rookie, Jake McCartey, he would be content.
But in this, as in all things, he has failed. She will not have him.
His dream has become a reality- The dark is waiting for him.
...'Begone, Ian. Your darkness awaits.'...
He can face guns, knives, death. But he cannot face being alone.
For a long time, he has hung on the outskirts of Sara's life, living for the moments she gives him, hoping but never daring to ask for more.
Now she has destroyed that hope- she has said it, finally- She will never trust him.
There is nothing left for him.
Ian feels the emptiness inside spreading. He ignores the curious stares, walking slowly, his head down, seeking the sanctuary of the mansion.
No one stops him.
This is New York, after all. No one really even sees him.
He told Sara he was going home, but he didn't mean here.
Entering his bedroom, he goes to the black pallet and lifts its edge. His hand slips underneath, finding what lies there with the ease of long practice. Carefully, he pulls it out, lifting it into the light.
Lamplight winks off the steel, shiny and new. It has only been used once. That old stain along the blade is Sara's blood.
Slowly Ian raises the scalpel to his lips. With the tip of his tongue, he touches the edge. Their blood mingles.
...'Sara.. You wouldn't lift the Blade against your own flesh and blood, would you?'...
He lifts the blade to eye-level, tilting it, examining the razor sharp edge.
Then he turns and slowly walks out of the bedroom and into the bathroom, carrying the scalpel with him.
---
After Ian leaves, Sara continues on her way home, walking slowly, taking in the sights of her city.
But her calm is shattered.
She is shaken by Nottingham's words, by the pain in his eyes, in his voice.
Why does she have to mean so much to him?
She has seen the way he watches her. It is like the way he watched Irons but more so.
He wants her. Or wants to belong to her, which is maybe worse.
Because Sara doesn't want him.
Nottingham is an assassin, a weapon, something created for one purpose, like a gun or that damn Japanese sword he carries. Beautiful, yes, but deadly.
Worse, he isn't a whole man, and he never will be.
At first she only saw him as a freak, Irons' lapdog, his hired killer. She would have been happy to put him behind bars and forget him.
Later she saw him for what he really is- a sad creation of someone who didn't care what he left out to get what he wanted.
That need Nottingham has to belong to someone else, his submissiveness- she's a cop, she recognizes the products of abuse and neglect. For that, she can pity him.
But he doesn't want her pity.
That look in his eyes is deeper then that, darker then that.
It's a look she wants no part of, and yet a look that it is hard not to give in to.
If she admits it to herself, and who else can she admit it to?, she has considered it.
He has a dark attraction.
But there is no future in Nottingham.
He isn't someone you can laugh with, live with, love with.
What Sara wants is what she had with Conchobar, until he was taken from her. What she thought she'd found again with Daniel.
What she wants is what Nottingham could never give her.
And the things he can give her aren't worth it.
Sara lets herself into her apartment and sighs, sitting down on her couch and closing her eyes.
She's exhausted, and the run-in with Nottingham didn't help.
Maybe this time he finally got the point.
---
Ian sits on the bathroom floor, fully clothed. Grasping his left glove in his right hand, he slips it off, then repeats the process with his right glove and left hand.
His hands look strangely naked, and he gazes at them for a minute, then slips the heavy silver ring back on his finger, cold against his bare skin.
Closing his right hand about his left wrist, he slowly pushes the fabric of his sleeve up until it is above the elbow.
After doing the same with his right arm, he lowers his head until it rests on his knees. For a moment he stays still, head bowed. Then he lifts his head and picks up the scalpel from the tile floor next to him.
Taking his left wrist, he lays it across his knees. Almost gently, he places the tip of the scalpel against his skin. As he applies pressure, the tip of the scalpel sinks into his arm and blood forms a welling track behind it.
His expression never changes.
When he reaches the end of the cut, he lifts the blade away from his skin.
The slice is long and deep, running from the base of his hand to his elbow. Blood spills out of the flesh, pouring over his arm.
Ian closes his eyes for a second, making a fist so the blood runs faster. He hardly feels the pain of the wound compared to the pain in his heart.
'Sara..' he whispers softly. He conjures up her image against the backdrop of his closed eyelids.
A tender look on her face. Long, thick chestnut hair, beautiful smoky hazel eyes, those fierce brows. Sara.
That softening in her eyes, that small smile trying to be born. Others have received it, why not him?
She wouldn't begrudge him that, not now.
For a few seconds more, he lets himself gaze at her.
Then he opens his eyes and switches the scalpel to his left hand.
The hand doesn't want to work, and he has to force his fingers to close around the handle.
The metal is slick with blood, and it slips from his grasp when he tries to tighten his grip.
He tries to pick it up, but it skitters further away across the floor.
It's too much of an effort to get up and go after it.
One cut will be slower, but the result will be the same in the end. Ian closes his eyes again and leans his head back against the wall.
He feels the blood running out of him, and with it his life.
Soon he will be free.
---
Sara is pouring a glass of orange juice when the vision hits.
... She sees Ian in a room that must be his bedroom, holding a scalpel up to the light. He touches the blade to his tongue and closes his eyes. ...
The vision ends.
'What?'
Sara looks down and sees she has dropped her drink. Orange juice spreads across the floor, sparkling with shards of broken glass. When she bends to pick one up, it slices her fingertip.
'Ouch!'
Dropping the fragment, Sara rubs the Witchblade and feels the bracelet's warmth.
Without warning, it flings her into another vision.
... Now Ian is in the bathroom. He sits on the floor, rolling up his sleeves. He is wearing the shirt and pants from when she saw him today, but his hands are bare.
As she watches, he lays his head on his knees and stays that way for a minute.
Then he lifts his head, and the emptiness she sees in those golden-brown eyes shocks her.
He picks something up from the floor next to him, and as he brings it in front of his body, she sees that it is the scalpel. ...
The vision ends.
Sara is shaking.
'Jesus!'
She rubs the Blade frantically. Did she really just see Ian Nottingham preparing to kill himself?
'Show me! Show me, damn you! Is this happening?'
The stone flares.
... Ian lifts the scalpel from a long cut on his arm. Blood washes slickly over his flesh, pouring down on his knees, soaking into his pants, spreading to the white tile floor. His arm muscles cord and his fingers form a fist, the blood flows faster. His eyes are closed, head tilted back slightly. 'Sara..' he whispers. ...
The vision ends.
Sara stands frozen in the center of her apartment, numb from what she has just witnessed.
Then she is out the door and running down the stairs, making for her bike.
Before she hits bottom, she is struck by another vision.
... Ian, as she saw him before, leaning back against the wall. His head has fallen forward so she can't see his face, but his cut arm lies wrist up on the tile floor.
The blood flow has stopped. The skin is paper white.
The bathroom floor is a sea of blood around him. ...
Sara comes out of the vision.
Her eyes are squeezed shut as if trying to deny what she has seen. Tears seep from under her lids, but she doesn't feel them.
'No, God damn you...' she whispers. 'I won't let this be.'
But they are hollow words.
She has seen Ian Nottingham die for her before- when he took the crossbow bolt to save her life, to redeem himself for trying to have her killed. She healed him then.
But this time it is her fault.
She might as well have cut his arm herself.
So why should she be allowed to save him now?
---
Sara enters the mansion without knocking. If the vision wasn't true, she'll apologize later. If it was true, she has no time.
She has no idea where Ian's room is, or where to find the bathroom the Witchblade showed her- she has not been here since Irons died.
But somehow, she knows where to go.
Nottingham's room is spare, sparsely furnished. There is nothing but a black pallet on the floor, a framed photograph on the window sill, a doorless closet hung with black clothes. The left wall is a display for his swords.
The right wall holds another door, shut.
Sara recognizes the door to the bathroom in her vision.
Half-running to the door, she flings it open and doesn't even hear it bang against the wall and rebound behind her.
What she sees inside stops her in her tracks for a long frozen moment.
Ian sits on the bathroom floor amid a pool of blood, blood that is seeping slowly across the white tile. His head is bowed forward, face hidden behind wavy hair, his legs stretched out in front of him.
The bloody scalpel lies a foot from his left hand.
'Jesus, Nottingham!'
Finally able to move, Sara kneels beside him, unmindful of the blood soaking through her jeans. She grasps his chin and raises his face. His eyes are closed.
'Ian!' She gives his chin a little shake and his eyes open, glazed and groggy. He doesn't seem to see her, and after a few seconds his eyes drift shut again.
'Oh my God.' Sara lets go of his chin and his head falls back down.
911. She fumbles for her cellphone, then drops the plastic object. By the time paramedics arrive, he'll be gone. He's lost too much blood. He is dying.
Gently, she lifts his injured arm. The wound gapes, blood seeping out of it slowly and thickly like molasses. Sheets of blood. It is a wonder he is still alive. If he'd cut the other wrist, he'd be dead right now.
As it is, he's almost there.
Sara squeezes his wrist with her Witchblade hand. 'Please,' she whispers.
But the stone remains dark and cold.
Ian's arm feels faintly cool to her touch, no warmth to spare.
She's losing him.
And now that it's too late, she can finally admit that she doesn't want to.
Kneeling over the motionless assassin, Sara raises his arm until the uninjured part of his wrist is pressed against her face.
She can taste the salt of his blood, or is it her own tears?
His blood continues to flow, thick and steady, dripping off his curled fingers, running over her arms.
'God damn you, Nottingham...' Sara is finally crying. Hot tears pour from her eyes, blinding her. She can't save him. He's going to die for her again.
And this time it's permanent.
Cradling his wounded arm against her breasts, letting his blood soak her shirt, she pulls him up against her until her face is in his hair.
Cool and silky against her face, smelling of him, that elemental scent that always made her knees weak when he got too close.
How can he die? How can she let him go?
She never even really knew him.
The dark assassin. The stalker. Her shadow.
Those haunted, beautiful eyes, the lost, longing look he gives her when he thinks she's not looking.
Six feet, two inches of tall, muscular killer, but one word from her can make him bow his head like a scolded dog.
... 'Relax, Sara. I would do anything to please you.' ...
... 'I love you... In unguarded moments.' ...
... Her voice, sarcastic and disbelieving. 'Are you trying to tell me that you got a crush on me?' His response. 'I'm trying to tell you I'M being crushed..' ...
... 'Alone at last.' ...
... 'If you want to stay close to me, just ask. Sara, we can be inseparable.'...
... 'For the promise of another tryst like this one, you can keep me here forever.' ...
God, how could she have been so blind?
He loves her.
For him, that means he belongs to her, utterly, body and soul. Maybe she didn't want him, but she had him, whether she wanted him or not.
And she rejected him. Threw him away.
Consigned him to the darkness Irons left him in when he died.
What did she think he was going to do?
What else COULD he do?
Sara presses her face deeper into Nottingham's hair, holding him tighter, as if she can keep him alive by force of will alone.
But even as she does it, she knows that it won't be enough
---
'You want me to say it?' Sara asks, lifting her head from Ian's curls and letting go of his arm with one hand to hold the Blade up to her face. 'Is that it?'
She clenches her jaw for a second, her brows drawing down. 'Fine. Okay. I don't ... I don't want to lose him.'
Not enough.
'I.. care about him. He doesn't deserve to die for me.'
The stone mocks her with its stillness, its flat red color.
Finally Sara looks back down at her assassin's bent head, the shades of black and chocolate and gold in his mass of tangled hair.
'I need him, God damn you.' she whispers. 'I need him. Don't you fucking let him die.'
On her wrist, the Witchblade stone flares, silver lightning flashes coruscating across the blood-red surface.
A vision hits Sara.
... Ian watching her walk away after Irons refused her the money to save Conchobar.
His eyes follow her, filled with that familiar dark look.
Suddenly Irons grabs him by the chin, forcing Ian to meet his gaze. 'Don't come back without the Blade.' he says coldly ...
The vision changes.
... Ian kneeling beside her as she lies across Conchobar's body, comatose from the pain of watching her lover die.
Gently, he places the bracelet on her wrist. Reaching up, he puts back his hood, strips off his gloves and touches a drop of blood at her shoulder with two fingers.
He raises the blood to his lips and sucks it off his finger tips.
With a sharp point on his ring, he cuts his own finger and tastes that blood too.
He has a pained expression on his face.
Replacing his gloves, he kisses the same two fingertips, then gently touches her shoulder.
After a second of more of kneeling with his head bent over her, he stands and walks quickly away. ...
And again.
... Irons, speaking fiercely to a submissive Ian. 'You should have had it. That little Irish whore was an utter pretender.'
Ian, head still bowed. 'I agree. So, evidently, did the Witchblade. It was back on Lady Sara's wrist by the time I got there.' He raises his head, meeting Irons' eyes at last as he lies. 'Even when she was unconscious, it would not come off.'
Irons glares at Ian, then draws his hand back and strikes him hard across the face- the blow is forceful enough to make some of Ian's hair fall loose from its knot.
'You should have cut off her hand.' The words are bitten off, harsh with anger.
Ian looks forward, refusing to meet his master's eyes. 'Next time I will.' he says, his voice devoid of emotion. ...
The vision ends.
In her arms, Ian stirs.
His head lifts from Sara's breast, the curtain of hair falling back to reveal his haunted golden-brown eyes. He stares up at her wordlessly, then looks down at his wrist.
The wound is gone.
'What did you do?' he asks finally.
'I don't know.. The Witchblade, it healed you.' she answers him. Inside, she is overjoyed that he is alive. But obviously, he's not.
'Why?' There is no emotion in his voice.
'I couldn't let you die!' Guilt makes her own voice sharp.
'Why not?' His is eerily empty. 'I have failed you, Sara. There is no place for me in your life.'
'Nottingham...' Her words trail off. She doesn't know what to say.
---
Ian knows he should pull away from Sara, distance himself.
This shouldn't be happening. He should be dead now, not living, not in the Wielder's arms.
Why did the Witchblade send her to save him?
The last thing he remembers is lying back, feeling his blood trickle hotly over his arm, waiting to die.
Now his body is cradled against Sara's, her arms holding one of his captive.
Being this close to her is torture.
He can't help but feel her pressed against him, warm female, infinitely desirable.
He should pull away, but his traitorous body won't let him. Instead it sinks closer.
Her unique scent surrounds him.
He wants to rub on her like a cat.
'I.. thought you were going to die,' she is saying. Her voice shakes, and he wonders at that. Why does she care?
'Sorry to disappoint you,' he answers, his voice flat.
'Damnit, Nottingham, this isn't a joke!' she gives him a little shake and he goes limp in her grasp, an automatic submissive response. The mild violence of her grasp sends a frisson of guilty pleasure through him.
He shouldn't be feeling this. Shouldn't want her. Shouldn't need her. Can't have her.
Soon this moment will end.
She will put him away from her, fling the daggers of her words at him.
The darkness will wash back over him, and this time he will have to face it.
But he can't resist her either. Not this close, not touching him willingly for the first time he can remember.
He will enjoy this while he can.
Laying his head back on her breast, he rolls his eyes up to meet hers, and doesn't try to hide what is in his gaze.
'Death is never a joke, Sara. But in my case, it would have been a mercy.'
---
Sara looks down at Ian, shaken by his words.
She knows what she has done is not enough. If she wants him to live, she has to go all the way.
'I'm sorry I said I didn't trust you,' she says finally.
It is the first apology he has ever received from her.
'I do trust you, Nottingham.. Ian. And you have done a good job of protecting me, despite everything. I was wrong about you.'
His expression doesn't change.
'I understand how it was with you and Irons,' she continues. 'I understand that you need that. I can give you that, Ian.'
He looks away from her at that. 'No.'
'Yes. You can be mine, Ian. I want you.'
His eyes turn back up to hers.
'Do you?'
The look there is not one she really wants, but she knows she has to take it.
'Yes. You're mine, Ian. You belong to me. And I want you to live.'
He is way too close like this. And the words she hears herself saying are not making the situation any more bearable.
She can feel his warmth through the thin, silky material of his shirt, hard muscles beneath it. His hair looks Autumnal and glorious against the fabric of her gray tank top.
His eyes are still rolled up to hers, and in them she sees the darkness is still there, aching and empty.
He needs more.
'Ian.'
She lets go of his arm, and puts her hand in his hair instead. Holding him there, grasping a handful of thick waves. He shudders at her touch, and she can see that it is an effort for him to maintain eye contact.
'You said if I ask, we can be inseparable. I'm asking now, Ian.'
He doesn't respond, but he is watching her. Waiting.
She finally does the only thing that's left- she lowers her mouth to his and kisses him.
He tastes of salt, like blood or tears. He doesn't kiss her back, but he opens his mouth, letting her in.
And she takes him. For the moment, there is nothing but this. His taste, his feel, the small whimper of aquiescence he makes when she pulls him closer, the way his body arches into hers when her hand tightens in his hair.
When she pulls back from him, it is do that or drown.
Looking into his eyes, she sees the answer there.
---
By Chornyi
Not mine.. Not even Ian, unfortunately. You know whose they are.
ANOTHER sad short story.. Sara rejects Ian one time too many.
The credit for this story goes to SPIN11 who's wonderful story A SHADOW NO MORE gave me the idea and the emotional state to write this.
If you haven't read her story yet- READ IT!!! It is the best Ian/Sara story in this vein out there.
Without A Shadow No More, there would be no 'Sorry'.
Also, thanks to Days Of The New for constant inspiration.
...................................................................................
'Sara.'
Some instinct warns her of his presence before he speaks. Even so, the soft voice, too close behind her, makes her shoulders jerk in reaction.
Sara's jaw clenches and she turns slowly to face her stalker.
He's closer then she'd thought- turning puts her nose to nose with Nottingham.
The assassin is wearing black of course- a long-sleeved black shirt that fits tightly to his broad chest and muscular arms, and loose black Army pants tucked into the tops of polished combat boots.
In deference to the hot weather, the coat and hat are absent, but he is still wearing gloves as if it were sub-zero cold.
That, out of all of it, annoys Sara the most.
Why can't he be normal for once?
She flashes on a maybe-memory or vision:
... Jake looking at her as Ian sits at the table in a precinct interrogation room. 'What's wrong with him?' the rookie asks.
'You got a week?' she responds. ...
The vision ends, leaving Sara even more shaken then Nottingham's mere presence.
'What do you want?' she asks sharply. Although she refuses to lose her temper with him again, the warning signs are there in the fierce blaze of her hazel eyes and the dangerously lowered brows.
He doesn't fail to read them.
His golden-brown eyes gaze tentatively at her. Despite the fact that Nottingham is tall enough to look down on Sara, and that he is well inside her personal space, he is not in the least threatening. She wonders how he does that.
'To see you, Sara,' he answers her question.
She raises her arms at shoulder level and lifts her brows. 'Well, here I am. What's on your mind, Nottingham?'
'Why don't you trust me, Sara?' he asks softly, with that hurt flavor to his words, the one she can't stand because it makes what is between them personal- and she tries so hard to be sure it's not.
'What?' Her voice raises slightly in reponse. 'Trust you? Nottingham..'
'I have tried to help you.' he interrupts her trailing words. 'I told you what you needed to do to defeat the pretender, Lucrezia. I saved your life, Sara. And yet you still look on me with disfavor.'
'Nottingham, I don't think trust is going to happen between us.' Sara says finally, in a surpisingly gentle voice.
He shakes his head at her words.
'You have your own agenda,' Sara continues, ignoring the motion. 'Even if you won't admit it. Now that Irons is gone, someone has to take up where he left off, and it seems like you're doing a pretty good job.'
'I have not tried to take the Witchblade from you. I have not tried to control you.' There is a slight edge to his voice now. He looks up at her, a dark look in his eyes- it's one Irons knew but Sara does not.
'Yet,' she replies. Just one word, but it is enough to make him drop his head again.
Suddenly he moves.
Sara jumps, raising her right arm, but he isn't attacking her. Instead, he drops to his knees at her feet- the motion is eerily reminiscent of another time he did this- Sara flashes on him begging her understanding after he contracted Mobius to kill her.
The tortured expression was the same then as it is now.
'Sara,' he says. He holds out his gloved right hand, but this time she doesn't take it. 'Nottingham, enough of this.' she says.
He stares up at her, mutely pleading.
Reluctantly, Sara places her right hand in his.
He bends over it, a curtain of heavily waved dark hair hiding his face. She feels his breath, then the warmth of his lips touching her skin. Against her will, she shivers.
'Goodbye, Sara,' he says softly, letting go of her hand, head still bent.
Sara takes her hand back and puts it safely behind her.
'Where are you going?' she asks him, keeping her voice level although it wants to shake. He has that effect on her sometimes, though she denies it with all she has.
'Home,' he answers. His head raises again, those eyes meeting hers. The anguish in them is visible. 'I am sorry, Sara.'
'For what?'
'That I wasn't a better protector. That I could not gain your trust.'
'Protector? I told you before, I don't need your protection.'
'Yes. You did.' He rises gracefully to his feet. Now is when he needs the coat, Sara thinks, so he can swirl it around his body and make a dramatic exit.
Instead, he simply turns and walks away, head down.
---
Inside, Ian plays Sara's final words to him over and over again-
...'I told you before, I don't need your protection.'...
Does she have any idea how those words hurt him? They slice like knives, each one cutting another small piece of his heart away, leaving only aching emptiness behind.
...'Nottingham, I don't think trust is going to happen between us.'...
After all this, those words.
He has done his best to protect her. He has told her everything he could, helped her against direct orders, suffered punishments to keep the Witchblade on her wrist and her alive, forgiven her for taking away the one person he loved before her. And in the end, it still means nothing.
He remembers the dream he had, the one where he died for her, taking the bullets of Bruno Dante and his men. He remembers what came before that.
...'It is written no man can serve two masters. I thought I could prove the exception. I was mistaken.'
He kneels before Irons, the katana laid across his hands. 'You gave me life. It's yours to take back. I would consider it a mercy.'
When Irons doesn't move, just looks at him, Ian turns the blade so it is directed at his heart.
'If you don't, I shall.'
Finally, Irons moves. He wrenches the sword from Ian's grasp and roughly grasps him by the hair, forcing Ian's head down and pressing it against his leg. Ian lifts his hand and clasp the leg, holding his cheek against it. ...
Although it never happened, Ian remembers the agony of waiting. The moment of hope when Irons' touch on his hair lightened. The tickle as the tear ran down his nose.
Then Irons' words, deceptively gentle.
...'I am not a merciful man, Ian. And it is also written, "As for this worthless slave, cast him out into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."'
That gentle hand suddenly turns rough, flinging his head away. ...
Casting him out, as Irons' words promised.
Into the dark.
In that dream or memory, Ian didn't have the courage to go to Sara and ask her to take him in. Instead he merely said goodbye to her, then willingly gave up his life.
For him, it was better to be dead then to be alone. Without Irons, without Sara, he had nothing.
But in this lifetime, he had a chance.
He had more courage- enough to go to her this last time and try to resolve things. If he had her trust, he would have everything.
If she would only once treat him as she treats her partner, Detective Woo, or her friend, Gabriel, or even her rookie, Jake McCartey, he would be content.
But in this, as in all things, he has failed. She will not have him.
His dream has become a reality- The dark is waiting for him.
...'Begone, Ian. Your darkness awaits.'...
He can face guns, knives, death. But he cannot face being alone.
For a long time, he has hung on the outskirts of Sara's life, living for the moments she gives him, hoping but never daring to ask for more.
Now she has destroyed that hope- she has said it, finally- She will never trust him.
There is nothing left for him.
Ian feels the emptiness inside spreading. He ignores the curious stares, walking slowly, his head down, seeking the sanctuary of the mansion.
No one stops him.
This is New York, after all. No one really even sees him.
He told Sara he was going home, but he didn't mean here.
Entering his bedroom, he goes to the black pallet and lifts its edge. His hand slips underneath, finding what lies there with the ease of long practice. Carefully, he pulls it out, lifting it into the light.
Lamplight winks off the steel, shiny and new. It has only been used once. That old stain along the blade is Sara's blood.
Slowly Ian raises the scalpel to his lips. With the tip of his tongue, he touches the edge. Their blood mingles.
...'Sara.. You wouldn't lift the Blade against your own flesh and blood, would you?'...
He lifts the blade to eye-level, tilting it, examining the razor sharp edge.
Then he turns and slowly walks out of the bedroom and into the bathroom, carrying the scalpel with him.
---
After Ian leaves, Sara continues on her way home, walking slowly, taking in the sights of her city.
But her calm is shattered.
She is shaken by Nottingham's words, by the pain in his eyes, in his voice.
Why does she have to mean so much to him?
She has seen the way he watches her. It is like the way he watched Irons but more so.
He wants her. Or wants to belong to her, which is maybe worse.
Because Sara doesn't want him.
Nottingham is an assassin, a weapon, something created for one purpose, like a gun or that damn Japanese sword he carries. Beautiful, yes, but deadly.
Worse, he isn't a whole man, and he never will be.
At first she only saw him as a freak, Irons' lapdog, his hired killer. She would have been happy to put him behind bars and forget him.
Later she saw him for what he really is- a sad creation of someone who didn't care what he left out to get what he wanted.
That need Nottingham has to belong to someone else, his submissiveness- she's a cop, she recognizes the products of abuse and neglect. For that, she can pity him.
But he doesn't want her pity.
That look in his eyes is deeper then that, darker then that.
It's a look she wants no part of, and yet a look that it is hard not to give in to.
If she admits it to herself, and who else can she admit it to?, she has considered it.
He has a dark attraction.
But there is no future in Nottingham.
He isn't someone you can laugh with, live with, love with.
What Sara wants is what she had with Conchobar, until he was taken from her. What she thought she'd found again with Daniel.
What she wants is what Nottingham could never give her.
And the things he can give her aren't worth it.
Sara lets herself into her apartment and sighs, sitting down on her couch and closing her eyes.
She's exhausted, and the run-in with Nottingham didn't help.
Maybe this time he finally got the point.
---
Ian sits on the bathroom floor, fully clothed. Grasping his left glove in his right hand, he slips it off, then repeats the process with his right glove and left hand.
His hands look strangely naked, and he gazes at them for a minute, then slips the heavy silver ring back on his finger, cold against his bare skin.
Closing his right hand about his left wrist, he slowly pushes the fabric of his sleeve up until it is above the elbow.
After doing the same with his right arm, he lowers his head until it rests on his knees. For a moment he stays still, head bowed. Then he lifts his head and picks up the scalpel from the tile floor next to him.
Taking his left wrist, he lays it across his knees. Almost gently, he places the tip of the scalpel against his skin. As he applies pressure, the tip of the scalpel sinks into his arm and blood forms a welling track behind it.
His expression never changes.
When he reaches the end of the cut, he lifts the blade away from his skin.
The slice is long and deep, running from the base of his hand to his elbow. Blood spills out of the flesh, pouring over his arm.
Ian closes his eyes for a second, making a fist so the blood runs faster. He hardly feels the pain of the wound compared to the pain in his heart.
'Sara..' he whispers softly. He conjures up her image against the backdrop of his closed eyelids.
A tender look on her face. Long, thick chestnut hair, beautiful smoky hazel eyes, those fierce brows. Sara.
That softening in her eyes, that small smile trying to be born. Others have received it, why not him?
She wouldn't begrudge him that, not now.
For a few seconds more, he lets himself gaze at her.
Then he opens his eyes and switches the scalpel to his left hand.
The hand doesn't want to work, and he has to force his fingers to close around the handle.
The metal is slick with blood, and it slips from his grasp when he tries to tighten his grip.
He tries to pick it up, but it skitters further away across the floor.
It's too much of an effort to get up and go after it.
One cut will be slower, but the result will be the same in the end. Ian closes his eyes again and leans his head back against the wall.
He feels the blood running out of him, and with it his life.
Soon he will be free.
---
Sara is pouring a glass of orange juice when the vision hits.
... She sees Ian in a room that must be his bedroom, holding a scalpel up to the light. He touches the blade to his tongue and closes his eyes. ...
The vision ends.
'What?'
Sara looks down and sees she has dropped her drink. Orange juice spreads across the floor, sparkling with shards of broken glass. When she bends to pick one up, it slices her fingertip.
'Ouch!'
Dropping the fragment, Sara rubs the Witchblade and feels the bracelet's warmth.
Without warning, it flings her into another vision.
... Now Ian is in the bathroom. He sits on the floor, rolling up his sleeves. He is wearing the shirt and pants from when she saw him today, but his hands are bare.
As she watches, he lays his head on his knees and stays that way for a minute.
Then he lifts his head, and the emptiness she sees in those golden-brown eyes shocks her.
He picks something up from the floor next to him, and as he brings it in front of his body, she sees that it is the scalpel. ...
The vision ends.
Sara is shaking.
'Jesus!'
She rubs the Blade frantically. Did she really just see Ian Nottingham preparing to kill himself?
'Show me! Show me, damn you! Is this happening?'
The stone flares.
... Ian lifts the scalpel from a long cut on his arm. Blood washes slickly over his flesh, pouring down on his knees, soaking into his pants, spreading to the white tile floor. His arm muscles cord and his fingers form a fist, the blood flows faster. His eyes are closed, head tilted back slightly. 'Sara..' he whispers. ...
The vision ends.
Sara stands frozen in the center of her apartment, numb from what she has just witnessed.
Then she is out the door and running down the stairs, making for her bike.
Before she hits bottom, she is struck by another vision.
... Ian, as she saw him before, leaning back against the wall. His head has fallen forward so she can't see his face, but his cut arm lies wrist up on the tile floor.
The blood flow has stopped. The skin is paper white.
The bathroom floor is a sea of blood around him. ...
Sara comes out of the vision.
Her eyes are squeezed shut as if trying to deny what she has seen. Tears seep from under her lids, but she doesn't feel them.
'No, God damn you...' she whispers. 'I won't let this be.'
But they are hollow words.
She has seen Ian Nottingham die for her before- when he took the crossbow bolt to save her life, to redeem himself for trying to have her killed. She healed him then.
But this time it is her fault.
She might as well have cut his arm herself.
So why should she be allowed to save him now?
---
Sara enters the mansion without knocking. If the vision wasn't true, she'll apologize later. If it was true, she has no time.
She has no idea where Ian's room is, or where to find the bathroom the Witchblade showed her- she has not been here since Irons died.
But somehow, she knows where to go.
Nottingham's room is spare, sparsely furnished. There is nothing but a black pallet on the floor, a framed photograph on the window sill, a doorless closet hung with black clothes. The left wall is a display for his swords.
The right wall holds another door, shut.
Sara recognizes the door to the bathroom in her vision.
Half-running to the door, she flings it open and doesn't even hear it bang against the wall and rebound behind her.
What she sees inside stops her in her tracks for a long frozen moment.
Ian sits on the bathroom floor amid a pool of blood, blood that is seeping slowly across the white tile. His head is bowed forward, face hidden behind wavy hair, his legs stretched out in front of him.
The bloody scalpel lies a foot from his left hand.
'Jesus, Nottingham!'
Finally able to move, Sara kneels beside him, unmindful of the blood soaking through her jeans. She grasps his chin and raises his face. His eyes are closed.
'Ian!' She gives his chin a little shake and his eyes open, glazed and groggy. He doesn't seem to see her, and after a few seconds his eyes drift shut again.
'Oh my God.' Sara lets go of his chin and his head falls back down.
911. She fumbles for her cellphone, then drops the plastic object. By the time paramedics arrive, he'll be gone. He's lost too much blood. He is dying.
Gently, she lifts his injured arm. The wound gapes, blood seeping out of it slowly and thickly like molasses. Sheets of blood. It is a wonder he is still alive. If he'd cut the other wrist, he'd be dead right now.
As it is, he's almost there.
Sara squeezes his wrist with her Witchblade hand. 'Please,' she whispers.
But the stone remains dark and cold.
Ian's arm feels faintly cool to her touch, no warmth to spare.
She's losing him.
And now that it's too late, she can finally admit that she doesn't want to.
Kneeling over the motionless assassin, Sara raises his arm until the uninjured part of his wrist is pressed against her face.
She can taste the salt of his blood, or is it her own tears?
His blood continues to flow, thick and steady, dripping off his curled fingers, running over her arms.
'God damn you, Nottingham...' Sara is finally crying. Hot tears pour from her eyes, blinding her. She can't save him. He's going to die for her again.
And this time it's permanent.
Cradling his wounded arm against her breasts, letting his blood soak her shirt, she pulls him up against her until her face is in his hair.
Cool and silky against her face, smelling of him, that elemental scent that always made her knees weak when he got too close.
How can he die? How can she let him go?
She never even really knew him.
The dark assassin. The stalker. Her shadow.
Those haunted, beautiful eyes, the lost, longing look he gives her when he thinks she's not looking.
Six feet, two inches of tall, muscular killer, but one word from her can make him bow his head like a scolded dog.
... 'Relax, Sara. I would do anything to please you.' ...
... 'I love you... In unguarded moments.' ...
... Her voice, sarcastic and disbelieving. 'Are you trying to tell me that you got a crush on me?' His response. 'I'm trying to tell you I'M being crushed..' ...
... 'Alone at last.' ...
... 'If you want to stay close to me, just ask. Sara, we can be inseparable.'...
... 'For the promise of another tryst like this one, you can keep me here forever.' ...
God, how could she have been so blind?
He loves her.
For him, that means he belongs to her, utterly, body and soul. Maybe she didn't want him, but she had him, whether she wanted him or not.
And she rejected him. Threw him away.
Consigned him to the darkness Irons left him in when he died.
What did she think he was going to do?
What else COULD he do?
Sara presses her face deeper into Nottingham's hair, holding him tighter, as if she can keep him alive by force of will alone.
But even as she does it, she knows that it won't be enough
---
'You want me to say it?' Sara asks, lifting her head from Ian's curls and letting go of his arm with one hand to hold the Blade up to her face. 'Is that it?'
She clenches her jaw for a second, her brows drawing down. 'Fine. Okay. I don't ... I don't want to lose him.'
Not enough.
'I.. care about him. He doesn't deserve to die for me.'
The stone mocks her with its stillness, its flat red color.
Finally Sara looks back down at her assassin's bent head, the shades of black and chocolate and gold in his mass of tangled hair.
'I need him, God damn you.' she whispers. 'I need him. Don't you fucking let him die.'
On her wrist, the Witchblade stone flares, silver lightning flashes coruscating across the blood-red surface.
A vision hits Sara.
... Ian watching her walk away after Irons refused her the money to save Conchobar.
His eyes follow her, filled with that familiar dark look.
Suddenly Irons grabs him by the chin, forcing Ian to meet his gaze. 'Don't come back without the Blade.' he says coldly ...
The vision changes.
... Ian kneeling beside her as she lies across Conchobar's body, comatose from the pain of watching her lover die.
Gently, he places the bracelet on her wrist. Reaching up, he puts back his hood, strips off his gloves and touches a drop of blood at her shoulder with two fingers.
He raises the blood to his lips and sucks it off his finger tips.
With a sharp point on his ring, he cuts his own finger and tastes that blood too.
He has a pained expression on his face.
Replacing his gloves, he kisses the same two fingertips, then gently touches her shoulder.
After a second of more of kneeling with his head bent over her, he stands and walks quickly away. ...
And again.
... Irons, speaking fiercely to a submissive Ian. 'You should have had it. That little Irish whore was an utter pretender.'
Ian, head still bowed. 'I agree. So, evidently, did the Witchblade. It was back on Lady Sara's wrist by the time I got there.' He raises his head, meeting Irons' eyes at last as he lies. 'Even when she was unconscious, it would not come off.'
Irons glares at Ian, then draws his hand back and strikes him hard across the face- the blow is forceful enough to make some of Ian's hair fall loose from its knot.
'You should have cut off her hand.' The words are bitten off, harsh with anger.
Ian looks forward, refusing to meet his master's eyes. 'Next time I will.' he says, his voice devoid of emotion. ...
The vision ends.
In her arms, Ian stirs.
His head lifts from Sara's breast, the curtain of hair falling back to reveal his haunted golden-brown eyes. He stares up at her wordlessly, then looks down at his wrist.
The wound is gone.
'What did you do?' he asks finally.
'I don't know.. The Witchblade, it healed you.' she answers him. Inside, she is overjoyed that he is alive. But obviously, he's not.
'Why?' There is no emotion in his voice.
'I couldn't let you die!' Guilt makes her own voice sharp.
'Why not?' His is eerily empty. 'I have failed you, Sara. There is no place for me in your life.'
'Nottingham...' Her words trail off. She doesn't know what to say.
---
Ian knows he should pull away from Sara, distance himself.
This shouldn't be happening. He should be dead now, not living, not in the Wielder's arms.
Why did the Witchblade send her to save him?
The last thing he remembers is lying back, feeling his blood trickle hotly over his arm, waiting to die.
Now his body is cradled against Sara's, her arms holding one of his captive.
Being this close to her is torture.
He can't help but feel her pressed against him, warm female, infinitely desirable.
He should pull away, but his traitorous body won't let him. Instead it sinks closer.
Her unique scent surrounds him.
He wants to rub on her like a cat.
'I.. thought you were going to die,' she is saying. Her voice shakes, and he wonders at that. Why does she care?
'Sorry to disappoint you,' he answers, his voice flat.
'Damnit, Nottingham, this isn't a joke!' she gives him a little shake and he goes limp in her grasp, an automatic submissive response. The mild violence of her grasp sends a frisson of guilty pleasure through him.
He shouldn't be feeling this. Shouldn't want her. Shouldn't need her. Can't have her.
Soon this moment will end.
She will put him away from her, fling the daggers of her words at him.
The darkness will wash back over him, and this time he will have to face it.
But he can't resist her either. Not this close, not touching him willingly for the first time he can remember.
He will enjoy this while he can.
Laying his head back on her breast, he rolls his eyes up to meet hers, and doesn't try to hide what is in his gaze.
'Death is never a joke, Sara. But in my case, it would have been a mercy.'
---
Sara looks down at Ian, shaken by his words.
She knows what she has done is not enough. If she wants him to live, she has to go all the way.
'I'm sorry I said I didn't trust you,' she says finally.
It is the first apology he has ever received from her.
'I do trust you, Nottingham.. Ian. And you have done a good job of protecting me, despite everything. I was wrong about you.'
His expression doesn't change.
'I understand how it was with you and Irons,' she continues. 'I understand that you need that. I can give you that, Ian.'
He looks away from her at that. 'No.'
'Yes. You can be mine, Ian. I want you.'
His eyes turn back up to hers.
'Do you?'
The look there is not one she really wants, but she knows she has to take it.
'Yes. You're mine, Ian. You belong to me. And I want you to live.'
He is way too close like this. And the words she hears herself saying are not making the situation any more bearable.
She can feel his warmth through the thin, silky material of his shirt, hard muscles beneath it. His hair looks Autumnal and glorious against the fabric of her gray tank top.
His eyes are still rolled up to hers, and in them she sees the darkness is still there, aching and empty.
He needs more.
'Ian.'
She lets go of his arm, and puts her hand in his hair instead. Holding him there, grasping a handful of thick waves. He shudders at her touch, and she can see that it is an effort for him to maintain eye contact.
'You said if I ask, we can be inseparable. I'm asking now, Ian.'
He doesn't respond, but he is watching her. Waiting.
She finally does the only thing that's left- she lowers her mouth to his and kisses him.
He tastes of salt, like blood or tears. He doesn't kiss her back, but he opens his mouth, letting her in.
And she takes him. For the moment, there is nothing but this. His taste, his feel, the small whimper of aquiescence he makes when she pulls him closer, the way his body arches into hers when her hand tightens in his hair.
When she pulls back from him, it is do that or drown.
Looking into his eyes, she sees the answer there.
---