A/N: Here we go again. I'm off to a rough start here, though, as a recent shoulder injury has limited my typing ability to one hand for at least a few days. I did not want to leave everyone hanging, so I managed to get this much out tonight. I'm hoping for the first real chapter in two to three days. Afterward, I hope to be back up to at least a chapter a day until this is finished. Thank you for your patience.
bar·gain
1. an advantageous purchase, especially one acquired at less than the usual cost
2. an agreement between parties settling what each shall give and take or perform and receive in a transaction.
3. such an agreement as affecting one of the parties
-ing (verb)
1. to arrange by bargain; negotiate
2. to anticipate as likely to occur; expect
Prologue
Holmes' mind swirled and screamed and raged through a haze of darkness as he shivered beneath his coat in the freezing morning air. The raging maelström of thoughts and feelings combined did more to numb his senses than any exposure to that soggy March morning. Watching the coffin being lowered into the cemetery plot beside Mrs. Mary Watson, reserved by a Dr. John Watson, he couldn't quite comprehend how it had come to this.
Part of his mind wanted to know how something so simple could have grown so complicated. How had something so ordinary turned so deadly? Part of his mind dove through all the accumulated evidence and facts as it tried to put them into some sort of order. Part of his mind rebelled at what he was seeing. Part of his mind wanted to crawl into the darkness and never come out again. Some tiny part of his mind screamed for something to make the darkness go away.
He still craved.
It was always there, still calling to him. But after his unspoken promise to Watson, he would not turn back.
His Watson had kept his word even in the face of death. Holmes would do no less.
He had little need to remind himself of those promises, even with the cravings and the calling of the darkness to his mind and soul. There was too much work to be done for him to spend too much time wallowing in his own misery at the injustice and unfairness. There would be time enough for that later. Instead, he turned to the other promise he had once made to his dying friend.
The service was over.
The burial completed.
The white marble headstone stood out starkly against the freshly disturbed earth.
He stood alone now.
In the stillness of the cemetery, his violin began to speak. The world ceased to exist as his heart told the story his mind could not put to words.