A.N. Here is the new story! It has nothing to do with the other one I am working on. Mr. Tiny will be in this but he won't be as prominent a character right away and he certainly will not be nice.
I hope you all enjoy it ; )
I do not own Cirque Du Freak or the characters in this story. The print at the beginning is taken directly from the book so everyone knows where it starts. That will be the only copied thing.
He howled then and finally lifted his mouth. It was red, a dark awful red, full of guts and blood and pieces of flesh and bone.
He rolled on top of me, forcing me down and pinned me with one long hairy arm. His head shot back and he howled up at the night sky. Then with a demonic snarl he drove his teeth toward my throat, meaning to finish me off with one quick bite.
At the last possible second I wriggled an arm free and whipped it up to cover my neck, turning my face to the side so I did not have to watch the Wolfmans teeth sink into my flesh. His jaw snapped around my upper right arm and shoulder, ripping and tearing until my screams died into faint whimpers. Apparently satisfied the Wolfman leaned back and at the same instant Mr. Crepsley blurred into view, slamming into the monster with blinding force; the Wolfmans head snapped back and I doubted the thing could have survived.
Mr. Crepsley scrambled off the monster and hurried over to me, his scarred face a mask of worry as he crouched down next to me and examined the wound on my shoulder. He gently turned my head away when I tried to look down and blocked my view of Sam. "Hush," he said and picked me up in his arms, looking pained when I whimpered again; the faintest jostling of my arm sent spikes of agony into my skull. Blood was staining his shirt at a faster rate then should be healthy. He set off at a run, holding me close and the lights of the Cirque Du Freak glittered in the distance, drawing closer with every step Mr. Crepsley took.
I could feel Mr. Crepsley's pounding heart underneath my face and took comfort in it, trying to keep myself from loosing consciousness. I knew without Mr. Crepsley saying that if I blacked out now there would be little hope in me waking up. I wrapped bloody fingers around his sleeve and focused on his scar, taking deep measured breaths through the pain as my blood pumped out with each beat of my heart. When the lights covered us I was almost gone; there was so much blood that all I could see was red and little black dots slowly covering my vision. Mr. Crepsley was shouting something and more hands grabbed onto me, lifting me away from my mentor and into the air. Someone's breath was on my face, gently blowing the bangs off my chin. I was set down on a bed and my pale hand flopped to the side, trickles of blood dripping onto the floor.
Mr. Crepsley's face loomed above me, equally pale. His mouth was moving but I couldn't understand what he was saying and I stared blankly at him as he uncapped a bottle and placed it at my mouth, pinching my jaw between his fingers to make my mouth open. Warm blood gushed into my mouth and my mentor rubbed my throat to make me swallow unwillingly. He fed me three bottles, but I could almost feel the blood going down my throat and straight out the wound.
A pain even beyond what the Wolfman had inflicted shot down my arm and into my neck when someone else prodded the bites and I arched off the bed, screaming. When the pain stopped I flopped back down, sweating and shaking. The blood ceased to flow out of me at such an alarming rate. I hadn't even noticed my shirt had been cut away and now rags were sopping up the blood off my chest and around the wound. White bandages looped around and around my body, Mr. Crepsley helping to lift me up so they could go under my back; I would have howled in pain again but my voice was too hoarse to do anything but squeak in protest.
"Darren," Mr. Crepsley said and snapped his fingers in front of my face to get my wandering eyes fixed on him. When they did he sponged his face clean of blood while talking to me soothingly. "The drugs will start working soon. Do not fight them. Go to sleep." He squeezed out the sponge into a bucket by the edge of the bed and red water splashed into it. He turned back to me and forced out a smile that looked more like a grimace. "You will be fine." His face was starting to blur, the scar stretching eerily across my face.
I tried to nod but my neck was stiff and I blinked once, staring puzzled at the other person who had finally moved into my eyesight. He was so tall he was bent over to keep his hat from being crushed on the roof of the trailer and my lips quirked up into an amused smile. But he too blurred and my eyes drifted shut while my hands sought out the hem of Mr. Crepsley's soiled cloak. I fell asleep with the material clenched in my good fist, fingers stained with the redness of my own blood.
"Evra," I croaked, making the snake boy jump from where he had fallen half asleep in a chair next to my bed. He leapt up and handed me a glass of water from the bedside table, holding it up so I could sip slowly from it.
The cool water felt wonderful on my chapped lips and sore throat and I drank greedily, only lowering my head when the glass was drained. "How long?" I asked in a slightly less gravelly voice.
"Almost a week," the snake boy said and set the empty glass on the table, scooting the chair closer to study me critically.
I looked down at myself too and frowned. The bandages covered almost my entire arm, shoulder and neck, halting movement as they were supposed too. Blankets covered me up to my waist but I could feel I was wearing a loose pair of sweatpants and socks. My arm throbbed in time with my heart beat but the pain wasn't that bad. There was no blood staining my skin anymore so someone would have given me a bath.
"You are on the strongest painkillers we could get," Evra explained.
"Is the Wolfman dead?" I asked, fingers clenching on the bed sheets.
Evra nodded and brought out a bottle of water to refill the cup. "Mr. Crepsley broke his neck when he got it off you."
"Where is Mr. Crepsley?" I murmured.
"Sleeping. Truska manhandled him into his coffin after he almost burned himself. He stayed awake for days with you." Evra helped me into a sitting position. "I could wake him for you?"
"No," I said quickly. The aching in my bladder reminded me of a much more pressing matter. "I need the bathroom," I said awkwardly. When Evra held out a bed pan I stubbornly shook my head as far as it would go.
Evra was reluctant, but he sighed and helped me sit up slowly; it took nearly ten minutes to get me upright and my legs over the side of the bed because I kept getting dizzy.
By the time I was standing upright I was shaking badly and the distance to the bathroom looked like a hundred miles. But I was determined not to use the bedpan and I shuffled forward slowly, leaning on Evra heavily with my good side. We made it to the bathroom and Evra held me upright, turning around to give me a bit of privacy then he helped me back to the bed and aided me in changing my sweatpants. It was a relief to be back leaning against the pillows when we were done. I kept touching the bandages, running my fingers lightly over the place where the Wolfman had sunk his teeth in. The image of glistening fangs lunging for my throat flashed across my mind and I shuddered. "Sam?" I asked.
"He…he's gone Darren," Evra said softly. "We buried him."
I looked down at the blanket and bit my lip. I had known; that brief flash behind Mr. Crepsley but hearing the truth made it unavoidable. Tears snaked their way down my face and then I was sobbing, my hitching shoulders sending small spikes of pain down my arm. Evra wrapped his arms around me, avoiding the bite and we huddled together for awhile, lost to grief that made our hearts ache. If the Wolfman had been alive still I would have wobbled outside and stabbed him through the heart.
"Will I be able to move my arm properly?" I asked when we separated.
"I think so, but it could take awhile. Mr. Tall stitched you up and he said the healing would go smoothly. The bandages are supposed to come off this evening and be replaced so he could check on it."
"Mr. Tall?" I said startled.
"Yeah. He said what happened should not have. It was really odd…I haven't seen him like that before," Evra said. "He also kept staring at the bite and muttering to himself. It didn't even sound like English!"
Our conversation was interrupted by Mr. Crepsley bursting through the trailer door with a blanket held over his head. His hair was sticking up crazily and it ruined his normal image of calm and collected. His eyes settled on me and his expression went slack with relief. "You are awake," he said.
"Yes," I said matter of factly, feeling my spirits lift right away. I hid a smirk when Mr. Crepsley caught sight of himself in the bathroom mirror; he flattened his hair right away and patted it just so.
"I have brought you more medication," Mr. Crepsley said and withdrew a plastic bag from his vest pocket. He opened it awkwardly and poured three pills into my palm, batting Evra's hand away from the water so he could help me swallow the pills instead.
"Thanks," I said and watched my mentor settle himself at the end of the bed. He still looked exhausted. "You should get some more rest. You look awful and I'm not going to drop dead," I pointed out.
"Two nights ago your soul was hovering on the doorstep of Paradise. There is still risk of infection and complications," Mr. Crepsley informed me seriously.
"Who knows what the Wolfman had going on in that mouth," Evra said shuddering.
I paled. "Yeah. Who knows." Had bits of Sam been embedded into my shoulder? Before I could finish mulling that over in my head Mr. Crepsley interrupted my dark thoughts.
"Mr. Tall is arriving shortly. He intends to remove your bandages and see to the stitching," Mr. Crepsley said. "We are very lucky he decided to aid in healing you. The speed of recovery has been greatly increased and perhaps in a couple days you will be able to go outside."
A couple days? I was ready to die from boredom already. I picked at the blanket, noticing that my nails had been trimmed too. I didn't want to remember what had happened that night; everything was blank except flashes of bloody cloth and the Wolfmans teeth. "Why do you think he helped?" I asked curiously. Mr. Tall usually stayed out of our way when someone was injured.
"He said he had free reign to interfere in your health because the injuries you suffered were not supposed to happen," Evra said. "Without his help you would be dead right now, let alone talking like you suffered just a scratch or two."
I frowned thoughtfully. "That makes it seem like he knows when everyone else is going to get hurt?"
Mr. Crepsley shrugged, quite an unusual movement for the vampire to make. It seemed in his exhaustion his usual standards had been lowered quite a bit. "I have long assumed Mr. Tall has the gift of foresight and cannot meddle with the things he sees. During the time you were unconscious he confirmed my suspicion. In this case he did not see you getting bit. He was quite adamant that the Wolfmans attack and your resulting injuries did not go as he saw."
"But why is that strange? Certainly things get mixed up all the time and don't go the way he sees it?" I said.
Mr. Crepsley shook his head, a movement I was jealous that he could make. "No. He said that was the first time."
"Did he say how that night was supposed to go?" I asked. My brain was beginning to hurt.
"Not exactly. He only said that the bite was not the events he saw. Apparently the only wounds were going to be minor," Mr. Crepsley explained.
"What about Sam?"
"That would have been unchanged no matter the outcome of your injuries," Mr. Crepsley said kindly and pretended not to notice when I wiped my eyes on the corner of the blanket.
I sank back into the pillows, staring into space. All the talking had made me weary and thoughts kept bouncing around my head like I was a pinball machine. Imagining that I had not gotten bit would do no good. Evra left after announcing he had to go feed the Little People which made me think of something else. Had Mr. Tiny changed my fate? The meaning of his name could not be mere chance. Maybe his fury at me for asking so many questions had led to a more painful ending at the Wolfmans hands. I sighed and closed my eyes almost all the way, watching my mentor fuss with the blankets and straighten up the room before settling in the chair Evra had left. His head snapped up several times but it kept sagging down and eventually his soft snoring was the only sound in the room. Outside the window the Cirque Du Freak was lit up; the moon hanging half full above the tents and the bright lights sent a brief memory to me, one of Mr. Crepsley screaming and running, my limp body flopping around in his arms as the lights swallowed us whole. I snapped back to reality with a gasp, shivering. I felt sweaty and ill, and a headache pounded between my eyes. I rolled onto my side away from the window and pressed my cheek into the pillow which was suddenly so hot I couldn't stand it. I pushed the covers back with my feet and fought the urge to yank off my sweatpants too. Was this one of the complications Mr. Crepsley had mentioned? I felt weak but restless at the same time. My current injured state was not handling the twitchy feeling well. I wanted to run out into the night and roam until the itch was satisfied.
There was a knock on the door and it startled Mr. Crepsley into awakening. He got up and yawned, the long scar moving with the muscles in his face before he slumped to the door and opened it, letting Mr. Tall in.
Mr. Tall was dressed in his customary outfit and top hat, but he carried a black bag I had never seen before. He gradually stretched up to his full height and the ceiling stretched with him, bending around his hat. "Good evening," he said to me and nudged the chair over to him with one foot so he could sit on it. He looked ridiculous on the chair with his legs folded up awkwardly.
"Hi," I said uncertainly. My dealings with Mr. Tall were slim and I could never get a good read on him. He was mysterious like Mr. Tiny, but not nearly as unstable and downright murderous.
Mr. Tall chuckled and opened the black bag, taking out a roll of bandages and scissors. "Help him sit up," he ordered Mr. Crepsley.
Mr. Crepsley maunevered behind me and held me up with one hand on my good shoulder. The tension in his fingers set me on edge too and I almost jumped clear off the bed when Mr. Tall started to snip the bandages away.
I turned my head away from what Mr. Tall was doing right away. I didn't want to see the wounds the Wolfman had inflicted and remember more horrible things. I felt the bandages fall away and Mr. Tall carefully pulled them out from behind me. His fingers brushed over the stitches in a large half circle at the front of my shoulder and I frowned. I had thought there was more then one bite, but apparently the Wolfman had made do with one massive rip. When he brushed over the back of the wound I couldn't stop the flinch of pain.
"The stitches are still intact. There is tenderness but that is to be expected," Mr. Tall said. "I do not see any infection." He rubbed medicine onto the wound and I bit down on my lip so hard it bled to keep from crying out. "The healing is further along then I thought. Mild exercise is alright but movement of that arm is to be avoided." He wrapped fresh bandages around the wound and tightened them before smoothing down the edges. "That should do it," he said satisfied.
Only then did I turn back and stare down at his work. The bandages were laid out in the exact same way, hiding the damage underneath.
"Use a sling whenever you get up to keep your shoulder muscles from taking the weight," Mr. Tall said and pulled one out of the black bag. He gave it to Mr. Crepsley who stared at the contraption of many straps with confusion. The idea of trying to explain how the straps all fit around my shoulder and arm was almost enough to send me into a laughing fit.
"Ok," I said with a straight face.
Mr. Tall then pulled out a miniature feast out of the bag. A meal big enough for five people appeared and he split between Mr. Crepsley and I; sandwiches, water, chips, a giant bowl of salad and blood. With each item he got out my eyebrows went higher.
"What else is in that bag?" I asked.
Mr. Tall sent me a sly look. "That would be telling." He got up, knees popping and once again the ceiling stretched up for him. He put his hand on the doorknob and then turned back to me. "I am aware that young Evra Von told you that what happened should not have. Do not go spreading that around Master Shan. It would be unwise for certain…individuals to hear of it."
"You mean Mr. Tiny?" I questioned anxiously.
Mr. Tall did not reply and tipped his hat to Mr. Crepsley and I before bending over to leave the trailer. The door shut behind him with a click and the ceiling shrank back down.
"Let us eat," Mr. Crepsley said and handed me a sandwich after sitting back on the chair. He did not comment on my mention of Mr. Tiny but I could see him thinking over what I had said.
I bit into the sandwich and was surprised to find it was my favorite. Bacon and cheese. The food vaporized quickly and I took a drink of water with help before falling back into the pillows. Mr. Crepsley and I sat in silence for awhile, but it was neither awkward nor stiff. I eventually picked a book off the side table that Evra must have been reading and opened it to the first page. I was reading for a bit before I noticed Mr. Crepsley watching me with a touch of longing on his face. "Do you want me to read out loud?" I asked.
Mr. Crepsley shook his head. "No." But his expression shouted otherwise.
"Someone could teach you how to read," I told him.
"I am a poor student. Besides I have no wish to occupy someone else's valuable time on a problem I should already have solved." Mr. Crepsley sniffed.
I closed the book with a snap and stared down my mentor. "If I am going to be laid up doing little to nothing for awhile then I don't see why I can't teach you. It won't be getting in the way of my training. It isn't your fault you grew up not knowing how to read and write."
Mr. Crepsley looked startled and it took him a minute to work up a response. "You wish to teach me?"
I grinned. "Yes." I scooted over with some difficulty and patted the bed beside me. "Give me my notebook and get over here. No excuses for not sitting here either because this isn't my bad arm."
After hesitating greatly Mr. Crepsley did so and leaned back awkwardly against the bit of pillow I gave him.
I opened the notebook and flipped to a section of empty pages. On a few lines I wrote out the entire alphabet in large print and showed it to Mr. Crepsley, naming each letter one by one. Below that I wrote out Larten Crepsley and Darren Shan. "That is your name and mine" I said to my mentor who looked impressed. Then on the next page I wrote the letter A at the top and handed the pencil and notebook to Mr. Crepsley. "Practice copying that and try to remember which letter you are working on."
"Can I not work on my name?" Mr. Crepsley asked with a glimmer of stubbornness. There was a wicked gleam in his eyes that told me he was not going to be a compliant student.
I sighed and took the notebook back, split the one page in half and wrote his name again. "Do the letter A on the top half and your name on the bottom," I said and handed the notebook back without a hint of annoyance. I loved this. Being able to teach Mr. Crepsley something that he did not know for once was incredible and once I finished teaching him I doubted I would ever get his nose out of books again.
The next twenty minutes I spent arguing with him on the ways of holding a pencil. The vampire stubbornly wanted to hold it like a block of wood which ended in him scribbling nothing like his name or the letter A. Finally he gave in and allowed me to instruct him and I watched hiding my amusement as he huffed and puffed over the notebook, his nails denting the paper until I told him to relax. Eventually his A's began to look normal and not deformed lines crossing each other. He used up every inch of space to write the letter and by the time he finished that half of the page I could see his handwriting style. It was slightly messy but refined at the same time. He set on his name with a vehemence that surprised me but watched silently as he struggled. Offering him advice seemed to send him into an offended sulk so I just let him figure out how to space the letters and write them down.
By the time he finished I was barely awake but I groggily wrote down the letters B and C for him to do along with my name at his insistence. When I had my head turned to look out the window I caught him ripping a corner of the paper off. I pretended not to notice him tucking the scrap into his vest pocket. It was part of the page with his name written on it and he had taken the very last one he'd written which was the most neatest. He did my name before the single letters and took a scrap of paper from that sheet too, waiting until I looked away again. It was like he had forgotten that I had vampiric hearing too and the telltale rip of paper was not to be mistaken for anything else.
I fell asleep when he was halfway done with B.
R&R Please? :D :D :D