Headcanoned with and beta-ed by graceonce
Music: What's Happening to Me by Two Steps From Hell
"Promise me you'll be strong, whatever happens."
Lana glanced sideways, her knuckles tightening on the steering wheel. "Me?"
"I know it doesn't settle well with you when I do this."
"It doesn't settle well with you either." She reached over and turned the windshield wipers on, fat drops of ice cold rain splattering against their windows.
"Promise me, Lana."
"What else?" the brunette asked, voice low. "What else would you want of me tonight?"
"Don't interfere."
Lana clicked her tongue, sparing a look out the window. "You're asking a lot."
"I only want you safe," Mary murmured. "I wouldn't ask anything of you unless it was to make sure you were."
The woman's palm abruptly hit the wheel. "I'm the one who's supposed to watch over you!"
The blonde's blue eyes scanned her lap.
"I-" Lana's voice broke and she swallowed heavily. "I'm the one who's supposed to make sure you're safe."
"I hate it when you blame yourself," the blonde said. "You can't. This isn't your fault."
"Isn't it?" she spit back. "I told you to go right on ahead, I didn't stop you when I should have."
"You told me not to, I went on. If it's anybody's fault, it's mine. But it's not." The girl looked to her. "This is no one's fault. And it's definitely not yours."
"It was my job to keep you safe."
"And you did," Mary assured her. She reached for her hand, unwrapping her locked fingers from around the leather and squeezing them tight. "I'm still here. See?" She placed the woman's hand in her lap, leaning in. "See?"
Lana's gripped tightened on her thigh and she turned her black eyes on the blonde, confused and hurt, and Mary closed the gap between them to kiss her cheek, the bones beneath her eyes, the tip of her ear.
She pulled away when Lana's lip finally quirked up, her flush fighting her all the way, and she smiled too. Lana looked her over, the beginning of a grin skirting her features and Mary grinned back, golden eyes darker than bronze.
The journalist's face fell. "Mary-?"
Sun turned to ice. "Lana!"
The brunette turned back to the road.
She pulled on the wheel tightly, foot slamming on the brake at the same time and they began to spin on the dirt road turned to mud by the storm outside.
Spun and spun and spun until they weren't spinning anymore, Lana straightening out the car for mere seconds before they slammed into something concrete. They fell forward both, the brunette's chest hitting the wheel and the horn ringing out in a short gasp, Mary's shoulder twisting into the dashboard. Smoke rose from the bent hood, from the tires where they'd drifted. Their ears rung.
The tree stood tall, the car damaged beneath its branches.
Lana's eyes were wide and she watched as the deer she'd tried so hard to avoid walked past them almost nonchalantly, almost smugly, animal gaze wild and yellow in the faded headlights.
She looked right, alarmed. "Mary?" Lana reached over, stammering over the rain pelting the roof. "Are you alright? I'm so sorry-"
"I'm okay," the girl whispered. Her neck was turning red where her seat belt had dug into her throat. She rubbed at her arm. "I'm okay." She began to cry and she fought to swallow her tears. "I'm sorry."
"Mary, no-"
"I see things happening through its eyes and I'm powerless to stop it." The blonde wiped at her nose with the edge of her jacket's sleeve. "Are you-?"
Lana ignored the burning in her lungs. "I'm fine." She undid her seat belt and pulled the girl to her, their heartbeats matching in a heightened rhythm. Mary sighed into her neck, arms tight around her back. "We're fine."
The silence was deafening though the rain drummed on above and around them, the woman's fingers sifting through yellow locks.
Lana let go and leaned forward uncounted minutes later, wiping at the fogged windshield with the back of her hand, peering out into the darkness. "It doesn't look too bad, I think we can still drive." She looked up the tree. "We can't stay out here in this weather." She reached for the keys, but waited a moment. "You ready?"
Mary breathed out. "Slowly, please."
The brunette brought the blonde to her and kissed her forehead firmly before starting the car and backing away from the tree. She took her time reaching the Walker home, black eyes fixing the road as she leaned over the wheel to be as close as possible. When her chest touched the wheel she winced, but she didn't risk moving her hand to her collarbone to rub the pain through her skin.
She helped Mary out of the passenger side and pulled the girl's hood up over her hair, holding her trembling fingers in hers as she herself took the storm and as they walked the kilometer to the cottage.
She held her hand out to knock but faltered, glancing back at Mary shivering behind her. She breathed in tightly. "Kit knows."
The blonde nodded minutely. "I figured."
The young man was eager in welcoming Mary back into his home, kissing her cheeks and taking her coat from her to hang it up. He'd changed his bandages to fresh ones, his grin lopsided though his knee moved back and forth in something akin to anxiousness.
He rubbed the palms of his hands together, eyebrows worried. "So tonight's the night, huh."
Lana's knuckles rapped against the bible she fetched out from underneath her arm.
"I can't thank you two enough."
"We haven't even started, Mr. Walker," Mary said. "You're putting too much faith in us already."
He laughed nervously. "You would know about faith, wouldn't you?" He shook his head. "Father Tim told me you were the best, and I haven't been proven otherwise just yet," he added softly.
The blonde watched him for a moment before turning her eyes away. "You're very kind." Lana mirrored her gaze but didn't flinch. "Would you give us a moment?"
"I'll be on the porch."
The brunette traced to the fridge once he left and reached into the freezer to pull out an icecube tray. She shook the cubes into a plastic bag, wrapped it in a towel, and handed it to Mary who placed it against her elbow, the skin there raised and quickly turning purple.
"Won't he mind?"
"That he doesn't have any ice for his next whiskey?" the brunette replied. "I'll make some more." She shrugged. "He looks like he drinks beer, anyway. How are you feeling?"
"Shaken," Mary admitted. She sat in the nearest chair. "I would have that feeling of premonition, that out-of-body experience, having potentially almost died? But I don't. Perhaps it's because I always feel that way." She looked up. "Or do you mean for tonight?"
"Both," Lana answered. She looked down and away. "I'm sorry."
"I really don't want to hear it," the girl sighed. She placed her elbow on the table but paused, sitting back instead. "It's my fault too."
"Were you driving?"
"It was my body against the driver's." She glanced up, memory seemingly confused. "Wasn't it?"
The brunette chewed the inside of her cheek as Mary passed a hand through her hair, the palm of her hand resting on her forehead.
"It's not here, you know," the girl murmured.
"What isn't."
"The demon." Mary tilted her head, her eyes closing beneath a light scowl. "Maybe I was wrong. Maybe there's nothing here but that spirit, maybe you were right when you said I was only mirroring myself." She blinked. "Maybe I'm strong enough now that I'm detaching from my body, roaming free." She laughed, shaking her head. "Ridiculous, right?"
Lana said nothing.
The blonde bit her lip. "No, I was just wrong. There's nothing here. I'm not myself, I'm not thinking straight. I just have to find a way to keep this spirit calm while we exorcise it. I don't want a repeat of L.A.," she told her. "I need to think. I wasn't able to last night. Or this morning."
Lana nodded. "You slept."
"I couldn't not," Mary murmured, sheepish.
The brunette walked in a tight circle, arms crossed over her chest.
The sister sighed. "I need to think," she repeated. "I need space."
Lana acquiesced of her head, watching a watery blue gaze carefully. "Okay."
"I'll call you back in when I'm ready to start," Mary added. "Don't worry. I won't do this without you. I never have and I wouldn't start now."
The woman went to move towards the girl but left instead, already pulling out a cigarette. She shut the door behind her.
Kit held his lighter out for her and she accepted it easily, puffing away and with her thumb flicking the end back and forth quickly.
"Mary, uh, Mary told me that there's nothing else but your poltergeist, after all," Lana said softly. "I don't want you to worry, so I'm telling you. Her educated guess was wrong."
"No demon, then. That's good, right?" He played with his lighter. "Huh." He flicked it shut, then open again. "Don't tell Alma I said this, but I wish this was pot," he muttered, his hazel gaze fixed on his own cigarette.
"Don't tell Mary I wholeheartedly agree."
He took a moment to speak. "You know, you're alright, Winters."
"Don't flatter me, Kit."
The young man smiled and they smoked in unison.
She huffed out, looking up at a clearing sky, the hills rising with fog. "I kinda scuffed the car on the way here. I'll go take a look."
"Don't trip on that mud, I won't know to come and pick you up outta there."
She waved at him vaguely as she began the walk back to the dented car, more damaged than scuffed, and she left embers in her wake, a stub too. She had issues lighting her next cigarette, the strong winds putting out the flame every time she flicked the lighter open and she walked backwards to shield the fire before straightening back out again.
She didn't pause to look at the car's hood twisted in on itself, black eyes on the door instead. She slipped into the car heavily and rested her forehead against the top of the wheel, breathing out harshly, shoulder blades hiked up.
She didn't react when the passenger door opened and when a figure sat beside her. She spied a flash of white skin when she opened her eyes, but she closed them again, digging her head into the wheel.
"She loves you," the devil sighed. "It's so beautiful, don't you think? I would cry if I could. I might let her." She spared a glance at the brunette. "It's not unlike Romeo and Juliet. Doomed to die in Florence."
"Verona."
"Fair Verona, where we lay our scene," she murmured. "Who shall die for the other first? Who is the Capulet, who is the Montague?"
"Neither."
"Oh, play along, Lana." The girl settled back in the car seat, raising her knees until she could rest her feet on the dashboard. She scratched errantly at the skin that showed when her skirt fell down her calves. "I could be Mercutio. Or Tybalt."
"They both die."
Mary smiled ruefully. "They all do. But Tybalt lives by me, on my throne. He holds me at night and whispers in my ear of all the star-crossed lovers he would wish to vanquish. I wouldn't say the same for Mercutio, so strong-hearted towards Romeo as he was. He would say naught to me. He would turn his cheek to me."
"He would bite his thumb?"
The blonde's smile grew into a grin. She rested her chin in her hand, her elbow on her outstretched knee. "I do love my scholars."
"They must keep you entertained down in Hades."
"You'll know soon enough," Mary hummed. "Would you recite me Homer?"
"It depends on which."
"If Mary is your Helen, then the Iliad." The blonde cocked her head to the side. "Would you steal her away from her husband? Whisk her to your city with Aphrodite at your back cloaking you in darkness? Or would you be the one taking her back, the one rowing across the Aegan until you saw the great Trojan shores and Athena herself?"
"Who is the husband, who would I steal her from if I was to steal her, God?" Lana glanced at her. "Or you?"
"A question in itself, what would be worse off?"
The brunette pursed her lips, gazing back to the front. "She's not mine to begin with."
"You've always looked gorgeous in a cloak of darkness," the girl agreed, purring. "It suits you." She reached over, fingers whispering through chestnut strands. "My poor Paris. My poor Alexander."
Lana's voice was soft. "Does he die?"
Mary grinned wolfishly, tugging on her hair. "His old paramour lets him die." She shifted wholly, sitting up on her knees now, facing the woman. "If not an ancient tale written in my bones, then Cyrano."
The brunette laughed bitterly. "And I would be Cyrano?"
"I would only have to cast Christian." She leaned in, framing the journalist's face with lithe fingers. "The leaves-"
"What color, perfect. Venetian red. Look at them fall," Lana murmured.
"Yes, they know how to die," Mary recited back. "A little way from the branch of the earth, a little fear of mingling with the common dust, and yet they go down gracefully, a fall that seems like flying." She breathed out, lips to the woman's ear. "Would you like to fly?"
"With you, I would only fall." Lana untangled herself from the blonde's grip and the girl fell back into her seat, huffing out. Her eyes danced on the house in front of them, the night's silence permeating the air filtering in through the car's cracked window.
"Aren't you annoyed?" she demanded, all grace from her voice gone, replaced with a harsh stone rubbing on another. Her gaze blazed with a golden fury.
Lana glanced at her, brow furrowed at the sudden change that was all too common. "Annoyed?"
Mary angled her head, her gaze following a moment later. "That I can't give you what you'd want of me."
The brunette's grip tightened on the wheel before she let her hand fall into her lap, elbow coming up to lean on the door as she looked outside. "I don't want anything from you. You know that, I told you before. I don't want anything you won't want to give me. What Mary won't want to give me." She spared her a look. "Are you done with sweet words and poetry?"
The creature beside her laughed lightly, giggles spewing out of its mouth. "Oh, how beautifully worded." She turned to look out the windshield, giddy. "Wouldn't you stay if she did give herself to you? I know you're thinking about leaving, no matter you told her you wouldn't. I know you said you weren't going anywhere, I know in your heart you promised her silently, but you're going to get bored at one point. It's nice to watch alabaster skin from behind closed doors while she's changing-"
Lana flushed angrily. "I don't do that."
"-but you'll get bored of even that. And then you'll leave." Mary turned her golden eyes onto Lana. "Why not just take me now and run away after with your shame? It'll be easier for the both of us. The both of you." She shifted in the car, throwing her leg over the console and straddling the brunette, arms intertwining at the nape of her neck as she grinded slowly. "There's no need for broken hearts. I'm all wet, Lana. I thought of you all day," the demon breathed in her ear.
"I don't want you," the brunette hissed, pushing. Mary's back dug into the steering wheel and she let out a tight gasp, forehead falling to Lana's. "You tried to kill me. Us," she whispered, her grip closing around a risen skirt.
The blonde smiled. "I'm not me, I'm Mary Eunice. Your Aryan songstress. The one with the rosebud tits," she enunciated. "Wouldn't you want to die with me? So we could be together forever?"
Lana's black eyes closed and she pushed a little more forcefully, trying to hold her at arm's length. "I don't want her either."
"You're lying, Lana, your heartbeat's taken you over. Can you even feel my touch against yours or are all your nerves focusing on your throbbing clit?"
Lana's hand clasped at the door's handle and she threw it open, arm hanging out of the car, gaze following her fingers as she breathed in and out harshly.
"Get out."
Cold fingers shifted through her hair. "Oh, Paris," Mary murmured. She pressed a kiss to Lana's cheek, the brunette's eyes closing. "You never were your brother." She untangled herself from the seat and left her side, disappearing into the darkness and leaving Lana to cry, a red lipstick smudged on her cheekbone, smudged into nothingness by her knuckles and her tears.
The brunette looked up moments later, wiping at the corners of her eyes and taking a hold of herself when Kit knocked hurriedly on her fogged window. She only had seconds to compose herself but she left the car and looked up into hazel eyes, terror settled there around his irises.
She was already walking towards the house, her voice quivering dangerously. "What's wrong?"
"She started somethin', I don't even know. I was out smokin' on the porch where you left me and I heard her talkin' Latin or Greek or somethin' and the walls started rattlin'."
She muttered out a curse and ran up the porch, Kit close behind her.
Mary turned, standing in the middle of the living room with her finger to her lips. The house was still, quiet, around her. Lana watched carefully, ignoring that Kit closed the door behind them, her black gaze on a light blue one. The blonde looked her over quizzically but turned back to face the wall. Lana stepped closer, wanting nothing more than to hold her, but Mary held her back.
"It's here," she murmured.
"You said you wouldn't start without me," the woman hissed back.
"You were busy."
Lana's face twisted into a grimace but she bit her tongue, reaching for the bible she'd left on the coffee table, the Walker father in a corner of the kitchen.
Mary glanced at Kit, her smile as gilded as the gold hidden behind her eyes.
"You know who's haunting you, don't you. Who's been pinching and slapping your daughter every night?"
The young man's jaw was tight. "No."
"Say it, Kit Walker. Say out loud who you buried out in the backyard. Tell me who died in this room and never left. Tell me who's secret you're keeping."
"It was an accident," he said. "I swear it."
"Because who else could possibly hate a child," Mary continued. "But the wife, the mother who didn't give birth to it?"
Kit's voice trembled. "Grace loved Julia."
"Trauma leaves no peace," the blonde snapped back.
"Mary!"
The girl's sharp gaze turned to Lana and she bit the inside of her cheek, reigning back the demon.
"Let's get started," the brunette advised firmly. Blue eyes raked over her and finally Mary nodded, taller than Lana still even though she hunched over.
The blonde hiked her sleeves up her forearms. "I don't speak French," she murmured.
"It can't be Grace," Kit muttered, hands to his head. "It can't."
"Mary's right, and so are you," Lana replied. "Trauma leaves no peace. It's not her, Kit. Just her spiked feelings left on this earth. It's not Grace. Just some memories left scattered."
"Don't give me that poetic shit, that's bad enough!" he snapped back. "You don't think I feel like shit that my wife killed my other wife? That I didn't turn her in and that she's raising my children? And now I've got my dead wife's ghost in my house? Fuck your poetry!"
"Sit down, Mr. Walker, I won't have you here if you'll be hysterical," Mary warned.
The man turned his gaze on her, fury in his locked fingers, but he said nothing, fearful as much as angry though only blue eyes fixed him.
"It's here," the blonde said.
A book fell.
A low moan traveled across the kitchen floor.
"Are you watching, Lana?" Mary asked softly. "Watching that ouija board?"
"My eyes are wide open."
The woman handed the nun the bible when she reached back for it, fingers outstretched.
Her Latin was hesitant at first, like Mary's had always been, but it grew in volume and power, her nails traveling down the page. Lana stood for support, as she always had, her eyes darting to and fro for solid danger, for anything threatening a danger.
She flinched when a voice whispered by her side, a voice so like Mary's. She'd have been fooled if the blonde hadn't been speaking other words entirely at her side, if the voice hadn't had a twinge of an accent that just never left.
She turned her head sideways, staring into light green eyes that shifted between her own two black ones. Grace Bertrand floated, peering curiously at her.
"Lana, what's wrong?" Kit asked. "What are you lookin' at?"
"Nothing."
"Help me, please," the spirit whispered. It twisted in pain when Mary finished her sentence, pausing long enough to stare at the young blonde. She turned back to Lana. "I've been framed."
"Lana!"
The brunette glanced at Kit, the young man scowling.
"I haven't hurt anyone. I wouldn't hurt anyone."
"It's fine, Kit, I'm just listening."
"Trapped," Grace continued hurriedly. "Trapped I'm trapped-Tell her to stop, it hurts!"
"Tell me!" Kit demanded.
Lana watched him, brows together. "Who killed you?"
He stared back, grimacing. "What?"
Mary paused, dead language on the tip of her tongue.
"Kit," the brunette breathed. She stepped forward, effectively pushing Mary behind her. "Who killed Grace?"
Kit's fingers twitched, his broken gaze flitting between the women. "I-"
The front door's handle jiggled horrifyingly, the three of them pausing long enough to glance back over their shoulders. Keys jiggled into the lock and the door slammed open, the light switch was hit, and the young man jumped back, his spine hitting the kitchen counter.
The figure in the door was solid, feet on the floor, taller than Lana, thunder in its eyes and behind it. The woman's voice shook dangerously with a cold fury.
"Get out."
"Alma," Kit breathed out.
His wife ignored him, stepping into her living room. She pointed to the sister and her journalist. "You two, out."
"Ma'am," Mary began. She walked forward, hand raising. "Please, don't get agitated."
"I'll get agitated if I want to, this little séance is over. You two are fakes, you know that?" Alma continued, waving her arm towards the girl. "You stand here and talk gibberish and scare my kids and act like saints, and I'm tired of this, of watching you two gallivant around like you know what you're doing." She didn't tower over the blonde but she was close. "You don't think I noticed the missing jewelry? The missing funds? My husband might be blind but I'm far from it, and I want my home back from you two thieves."
"Mrs. Walker," Lana started.
"You shut your mouth, you're nothing but two fakes! Did you know I called the church registry when Kit first told me he hired you two loonies? They only just got back to me, and surprise, they don't know you."
"That's-"
"Get them out, Kit, they're doing nothing but playing with your superstitions. A ghost? Are you kidding me? You know the doctor said Julia was merely hurting herself in her sleep!"
Kit turned quizzically, gazing over the two women. "Lana? Mary." His voice fell flat, disappointment dripping into his shoulder blades.
The blonde shook her head, blue eyes wild, bible falling shut in her fingers. "Kit, no, it's not-"
"You, you lied to me? You stole from me?" he enunciated. "Are you kiddin' me? This was all, all fake?" He stepped away from the counter.
"Kit," Lana warned.
"Get out," he breathed. "Now. Before I fetch my huntin' rifle." Alma's smirk was deep, wide, and Lana looked her over as she pulled Mary behind her.
"I hope you didn't give us your real names," the black woman hissed. "I will have your asses in court." Beside her, Kit couldn't face them, his hands balled into fists. Angry tears threatened the corners of his eyes.
"Kit-" The girl turned. "Lana, we'll lose Grace-"
"Mary, come on," Lana muttered. She tugged on the blonde. "Come on!"
The blonde followed haggardly, a little lost.
Alma sneered. "That's it, Paris, run with your tail between your legs."
Lana's hand fell limp to her side and she turned slowly, gaze narrowed. "What did you say?"
"Lana, no, please," the girl begged.
The brunette began to scowl in disbelief. "It's her."
"Lana-"
"She's possessed," the woman continued. "Her eyes-"
She fell back with the blow she was given, a right hook to her jaw.
The back of her eyes exploded in stars when she hit the floor, Alma above her and snapping her jaws near her throat, Mary's high pitched screams matching Kit's yells.
Lana yelped out when teeth sank into her skin and she tried pushing the woman off as best as possible, but the creature wasn't budging, in too deep. Nails raked at her ribs, tearing clothes in ribbons as they grew in size and width and Lana could only gasp as the thing drew blood.
She was counting the seconds, though she couldn't remember how long it took for a body to bleed itself out.
She should have known.
Kit was suddenly yanking his wife off, hand around the scruff of her neck, Lana's own fingers wrapping around her throat, red wetting her palms.
But Alma turned on him, ripping at the fresh bandages until they weren't fresh anymore, bleeding again through the white patches.
She was thrown off, Grace shimmering in between the fabrics of space, and Kit rolled onto her, trying his best to hold her down with his knees on her shoulders. He looked back, wide eyes searching for Mary.
"The bible!"
The girl stared back, blue eyes so lost, and it was Lana who pushed the holy book towards the blonde, the tips of her fingers turning the pages crimson as her black gaze swam. She fell onto her back, breathing out harshly and with blood bubbling out her wound in a sickening sound.
"Mary-"
The blonde knelt by the brunette's side, hands shaking as Alma spit venom from the back of her throat, Kit's hair singeing at the edges. "I can't, I can't do this-"
The woman bared her teeth and she shoved the girl forward. "I'm right here-".
The girl looked down, the brunette pressing her rosary into her fist, free hand pressing against her neck as she thrashed lightly with coming shock.
She stood and fell back immediately, Kit slamming into her as he flew off Alma. She scrambled out from under him, the boy groaning out and unable to raise.
The demon rose triumphant, eyes the same gold as what Mary saw in the mirror in the morning and the girl flinched before the creature now cackling wildly from the back of its throats, yowls like a jackal.
Lana's eyes were rolling into the back of her head, her mouth counting silently, arms shaking up to her elbows.
Mary flipped through the bible shakily, unconsciously finding the pages she needed and beginning to speak the words in a language dead to them all but for the creature inside her and inside the woman in front of her. Alma grabbed the book out from under her nose, ripping paper out by chunks with jaw and claw and Mary was pushed back until her spine hit the wall.
Alma hovered above her, as if sniffing her out, nose to her ear, growling so low the girl thought it was her own lungs rattling.
"What now, Helen? What now, Roxanne? Will you cry and cry and cry like your forebearers?"
"S-s-"
"Stop? Stop stop stop!" Alma sniveled for her. She pushed the girl into the wall a little harder. "I belong to Hell, you're only a vassal. When your mortal body is shattered and your piece of Satan, whatever piece took interest in a little, cowardly, girl, is brought back to Hell, then I'll stop." She leaned in to whisper. "I'm a fetcher and I will fetch your heart back to Osiris's side."
"My heart is mine own-!"
Alma cut her sentence short, hand digging into her throat. "It hasn't been," she hissed.
The creature drew back, jaws opening wide and saliva linking the canines together,
But Mary pushed forward, bloody rosary before in the between of her fingers now pressed tight to Alma's forehead.
The devil's wife screamed out and the blonde took her weakness to switch their positions, taller than before in how she kept Alma against the wall now, in how she began reciting the passages she knew by heart, Latin spewing from both their lips, fighting each other in spits and sweet words.
Alma screamed and tore at skin and clothes as her head began to burn, her phrases hiccuping. The palm of Mary's hand smoked too, edges turning red and bloody with unseen flames and cauterizing over but her words were strong, the gold flowing like the Acheron in her eyes.
"I banish you to Hell!"
The woman's head flung back, her throat throwing out gasps and groans and moans that had even Lana, comatose on the floor, flinching.
Kit's wife fell to the floor in a heap, gold flittering off of fingertips,
And Mary followed her down.