A/N: Here we have it, the eleventh installment of Haunted. There is only one chapter after this one! I thank everyone for their continued support of my story, and I hope to continue writing for the Sweeney Todd fandom after it is finished. :)

Without further ado, here it is.

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Moonlight streamed bright on the reflective flakes of snow that blew down from the navy sky, the stars hardly visible under the harsh streetlights that adorned the wealthy neighborhood where they now stood. The party of four loitered in the shadows between the beadle's mansion and the adjacent house, the horses tied down the street in front of a shop. "Now what do we do?" Anthony asked in a loud whisper.

Gathering the heavy skirt of her dress, Johanna clomped around the side of the house. Mrs. Lovett's boots were too big for her. Anthony traipsed after her through the snow. "I'm going to get a look at the whole building. The lights are on in the parlor—that means he's awake. Faster we can figure out where she's being held, more likely we are to get out with our skins." Sweeney put a hand on the small of Toby's back like an escort, and they followed the ferocious young woman around the corner of the building. He watched her from behind in the dress that belonged to his Nellie, big brooding eyes on the mansion, her jaw grinding as she thought. She wasn't like he had imagined. Perhaps a physical clone of Lucy, but much more than a fair and tame lass lay behind the very dark eyes they shared. "Mr. Todd, what does this Mrs. Lovett look like?"

"Sort of short with really frizzy reddish hair. Big brown eyes. I'd imagine she's the only woman inside."

"Yes, I'd imagine. They normally off themselves pretty shortly after he gets them, in a few months, or he finds a way to dispose of them." She spoke in a flat, matter-of-fact manner that left Anthony's jaw dangling open in horror. Sweeney tightened his grip on Toby's shoulder. "Even a man like him wouldn't aim to keep two of them at one time. He's a pervert, not an idiot."

The sailor adjusted his hat. "You mean that this has been going on before? That is, the beadle taking women and, and just shutting 'em up like bloody animals for transportation? That's awful wicked!"

She snorted. "Of course it's wicked. He's done it for years in coordination with my father." Sweeney ground his jaw. He is not your father. "Every time there's a ball, it's for a woman the beadle wants. That's how I came under the judge's care—my mother offed herself after the beadle put his slimy hands on her. My governess told me so." She continued to sweep the side of the building with her eyes. They misted over slightly as she spoke. "I always thought my father to have a cleaner heart than that nasty man, but I suppose it's proved now that they both have dirty hands and souls."

Anthony pressed, "Didn't you have a real father, though?"

Her eyes flitted back up to him. "Transported for life for petty theft and battery." They have lied to you, and I am so sorry. Abrupt, she cleared her throat, and she swung back to face the building. "I'd put three pounds that she's in that room with the barred windows." Faint light streamed through; the bars had stark silhouettes. She drew nearer to the brick wall of the house. "But I can find that out for certain. Anthony, give me a boost." She hauled herself up onto the windowsill of the first window, but she wasn't quite tall enough to peer into the second story, so she jumped back down onto the ground.

"What?" Mouth agape in shock, he gawped at her a moment. "Uh… Sure. What do you need me to do?" He followed her to the edge of the building, head tilted backward and upward at the lit window.

"Throw me high enough to grab that window ledge up there, so I can pull myself up and see if she's in there, see if she's in fair enough shape to get the hell out of here once we have a free break." She looped her arm over his shoulder. "Come on, give me a good toss."

Skeptical, the young man raised an eyebrow. "I don't think that's such a good idea." She glared at him. "You could fall, or bust your face open, or something, dear. Couldn't we find a ladder or something so we can just climb up and see that she's in there? Or throw a rock at the window to get her attention?"

Johanna rolled her eyes so hard that, for a split second, her pupils disappeared entirely in the back of her skull. "You're a yellowbelly. A rock or ladder would get his attention." She removed her arm from around his neck and approached Sweeney. "You do it, then. You're stronger-looking than him, anyway." She crossed her arms, and their pairs of fiery black eyes met, an incubus and his cambion. "Well?" One tawny eyebrow arched in a challenge.

"Alright." His tone held steady. So young to have already made her first kill. She looped her arm around his neck, and he seized her by the waist. Anthony covered his eyes with his hands, face drawn downward into a fearful frown. Sweeney heaved her upward. Like father, like daughter.

She caught air, sailing like a bird until her hands caught onto the windowsill. Her boots scrabbled against the brick wall for a grip. A stone fell loose. Toby dove forward to catch it before it clattered loudly to the ground, and she used the resulting hole as a catch to hoist herself up onto the window ledge. Once she sat safely atop the ledge, she tapped at the window. "She's in here—looks like she's asleep. Psst! Psst!" Johanna drummed at the window faintly with her knuckles. One hand gripped a bar to keep her steady at the window. "Psst! Mrs. Lovett!"

With baited breath, he waited until Nellie's haggard face appeared behind the glass, and she slid it open as far as it would go—about two inches. She blinked out at the unfamiliar blonde girl. Her jaw was swollen, her lip split, her eye blackened; dried blood ringed under her nose. She looked so very broken. His breath caught in his throat, and Toby flung his arms around Sweeney's waist and hugged him to muffle the snivels in his coat. "Hush, Toby, hush," he attempted to soothe, patting his head and shoulders.

"Mrs. Lovett? My name's Johanna. I'm here with Anthony and Mr. Todd and Toby. We're gonna get you out of here, okay?"

Her voice came, frail like a very old woman's. "Is Sweeney okay?" Her whisper was hushed and brittle. "I was worried they'd killed him—or worse." She put a hand on the glass, mouth right at the crack so she could hear her rescuers. "What I last saw, they was bludgeoning him. They was bludgeoning him like they wanted to smear all of him across the pavement."

Johanna placed her hand over Mrs. Lovett's on the glass. "He's a little worse for wear, but he's in one piece. Tell me, what do you know about this house? Can you tell us how to get to your room, or where the stairs are relative to here? I can pick a lock, I'm not worried about any keys or anything, but once we're in we need to be out fast with you. Can you get around? Are you hurt?"

Shaking her head, Nellie quickly revoked, "No, 'e hasn't hurt me badly. I haven't seen much of him since last night when he brought me here, except when he brought dinner up, and that was hours ago." She cleared her hoarse throat, and from below, he could see a spark return to her chocolate eyes. "The back entrance is the closest to my room, but it's a big vaulted room that connects to the parlor, and he's waiting there in the front parlor, told me himself that he knows somebody would come for me. You'll never get past him. All three the entrances go through the parlor, unless there's another one I didn't see. I was fighting like the devil and not paying too much attention to my surroundings."

Johanna shook her head. "No, that's normal so that fewer guards are needed to stand sentry and can still keep the place safe. But you're certain it's just him, and no officers?"

"I hadn't seen nobody but him. Not even no maids for cooking and cleaning."

The blonde hesitated a moment, biting her lip, and then she nodded once. "Okay. I'm gonna drop back down now. I've got an idea. Is there anything in there you could use as a weapon? A poker for the fireplace, or some big book?"

"I've still got Sweeney's razor." She set her jaw. "And I'm ready to use it, now—looking forward to it, actually, if I speak the total and honest truth on the matter."

"That's great. Hopefully we'll be inside within the hour. We've got to cook up a diversion to get in, and that might take us a bit, but then we'll bust you out and run back to the docks. We're gonna sail away from here before the law detects us, all of us. Just hang tight. Is there anything else?"

Nellie pressed her forehead against the glass. "Tell him I love him," she whispered. Then, lower, "Bloody hell, girl, you have his exact eyes."

"What's that?" Johanna's brow fuddled in confusion.

"Nothing, dear. Go on your business and don't worry on me. I'll be here when you come for me. I've nowhere else to go, now, do I?" The next attempted smile was a half-grimace, but genuine with the intent behind it. They exchanged a final nod, and she retreated from the barred window.

Johanna peered down at the other two men. "Anthony, can I trust you to catch me, or does Mr. Todd have to do that, too?" The sailor blushed red, shuffling forward with his arms out. "If you drop me, I'll flip my grits on you." She dropped into his arms, and Anthony staggered and landed on his ass in a snow drift. "For a sailor, you're not very strong." She popped up and dusted off her skirts.

Anthony stood after her. "So you have a plan, then?"

Crossing her arms, Johanna gave a curt nod. "Of course I have a plan." Retreating back into the side alley, she grabbed Toby by the hood of his coat and tugged him after her; his crooked limp followed in an amble, the men immediately after them. She knows how to call the shots. "Toby, listen to me. I want you to be very brave for me so we can get Mrs. Lovett out of this nasty place. Do we have a deal, eh?" The boy bobbed his head. "Good lad. I want you to try and distract the beadle for us. Go to his front door and act like a lost little mite—"

Sweeney interjected, "He'll be recognized." She glanced up at him from where she crouched, face to face with Toby. "He's Mrs. Lovett's ward. The beadle will know his face." He doubted, in fact, that the beadle would remember the unremarkable dirty face of a boy from the workhouse, but he doubted equally that the man would offer any solace to a lost peasant child regardless of recognition.

"Then we'll make him not look like himself, won't we?" she snipped in return. "Scrub the dirt off of his face and brighten his eyes a little, clean his hair and his ears and his hands—"

Snorting, Anthony pointed out, "We gotta get her out of the mansion before sunrise. It'd take hours to do all that!"

"God, Anthony, you're bloody rude!" Johanna waved him off. "Don't listen to him, Toby. Now, lad, have you always had this limp? No chance we can get rid of it for a little acting?"

Toby shook his head. After a moment biting his lip, he proposed, "But we still got my wig, don't we? I can just throw that on—oye, that's cold!" He flinched away from her handful of packed snow that she ground against his soft face.

Humming, she agreed, "Yes, a wig. Hold still while I scrub this soot off of your cheeks and throw a pretty wig on your head. What's a boy like you doing with a wig anyhow?"

A sheepish chuckle came forth from him, and he mumbled, "That's a bit of a long story, m-miss." His cheeks and nose flushed red from the exposure to the snow. "Um, ouch." She picked at his every soiled orifice with her long fingernails to scrape some of the crust off of him. Toby shot Sweeney a pleading look, and he replied with a half-smile of encouragement, though his fingers tapped anxiously at one another, and he checked his watch each passing minute.

Dropping his backpack, Toby fumbled in it for his wig. He grappled it by the pale yellow locks and secured it over his scalp. "Look at it now, clean and precious, a little cherub. You'll certainly win the beadle's greasy heart. Now, I'm gonna make good and sure he knows who you are and who you're not. Are you listening close to my words, lad?" He bobbed his head again. "That's right. Your name is Henry Turpin. You are the nephew of Judge Turpin. Repeat that."

"Henry Turpin, the nephew of the judge."

"You were meant to arrive from Belgium yesterday for Christmas, but the seas were choppy and the ship arrived late, and now you're hopelessly lost in the streets of London. You haven't found anyone who knows the way to the judge's house, but a beggar pointed you to the beadle's home because you were so hopelessly wandering and so bitterly cold. You request shelter until dawn, when the sun will rise and light your way to your uncle's house. Repeat that."

"Off a delayed ship and lost in the weather looking for a place to warm my bones until the morning," parroted Toby, eyes apt and bright.

She patted his shoulder. "Good boy. Now you run to the front of the house and knock at the door. He should be right there in the parlor. Try to get him to give you a biscuit or something out of the kitchen so we can get through the parlor and up the stairs without him noticing."

Anthony mumbled, "What if the beadle don't let him in?"

"Oh, he'll let him in. The name Turpin makes that man excited as a kid in a candy store."

"And how am I to get out? Once Mrs. Lovett is free?"

She grinned. "Tell him you've got to use the loo, and when he goes to get a chamber pot, you run straight out of the house, real simple like." Standing upright, she addressed Anthony. "Keep your gun loaded in case we need it, and don't be bloody gutless next time you're pointing it at somebody."

Sweeney picked at his fingernails. "Chances are good he'll find us out," he muttered, not entirely sure he meant for either of them to hear it, though they both did. "A player knows what a play looks like when it's coming against him." Baited trap. Played us like a fiddle. Maybe he's still baiting us now. "Are we dawdling for now reason? It's after one."

Toby hauled himself up out of the snow and lumbered around the side of the mansion to the front, and the rest of them split to the back door. "Does anyone have a hairpin?"

"Do I bloody look like I carry hairpins?" growled Sweeney.

She knelt in front of the doorknob. "There's no need to get all snippy about it," she mumbled in return, eyes narrowing to analyze the lock in the dim light. From within, Toby's knocking at the door echoed through the walls. "This is a pretty big lock," she observed. "Quick, give me your razor. I think it'll break it open."

Pale hand extended, her black eyes met his. Tilting his head, he placed with deference the handle of one silver razor into her palm. An electricity passed between their fingers where they brushed. The judge has never looked into her eyes without seeing me. Grim satisfaction stirred in his gut at that thought. "Thank you, Mr. Todd." Her voice changed under his peculiar gaze, a subtle shift into distrust and uncertainty, as she flicked the blade out like she had handled the razor her entire life. She forked it into the lock.

Jiggle. Jiggle. Click. It was much louder than any of them intended, and Anthony gulped audibly as a cringe passed across Sweeney's and Johanna's faces in coordination. The muffled voices from within the mansion ceased into a brief, terrifying silence. He's heard us. He's going to fling open the door and find us. The certainty swelled in his chest the longer the silence stretched. Then, Toby's voice began again. "Sir?" he pressed. "Is something the matter?"

Clomping, heavy footsteps approached the door. "I thought I heard a noise, boy, that's all. You didn't hear anything?"

"No, sir." None of them dared to breathe, let alone move or speak. Johanna rose from her knees without moving her feet, flanked on either side by Sweeney and Anthony, so near that he could smell the slight perfume that clung to her body. Their hands brushed again when she returned his razor. Then, Toby's earnest voice piped, "Sir, I—I really hate to trouble you at an hour like this, but I haven't had anything to eat or drink since I boarded the ship. If you've any tea, or ale, or even a biscuit, I'd thank you much graciously."

The footsteps paced away from the door. A puffing sigh rushed from Anthony's lungs so forcefully that Johanna's hair whipped up. "Alright, boy. Let's put on some tea. I could use some, too, actually…" As the footsteps grew fainter, so too did the voices until they were indiscernible and then inaudible.

Sweeney cleared his throat, and he took a confident step forward. He did not falter; a twist of the door knob followed, and it opened without a creak. No more wasting time. Onto the hardwood floor he proceeded, glancing over his shoulder in the new light from inside the home. Anthony's countenance had turned white as a bleached sheet. Johanna's dark eyes and pressed lips gave her a resigned look. They grasped hands tightly. This is on my account. To the left, he saw the winding spiral staircase. Right out in the bloody open.

The teakettle burst out in a whistle, a catalyst; he dashed to the staircase on light feet, his tiptoes, and didn't dare brush his hand on the railing of the stairs. The second to last stair creaked, but the beadle and Toby continued their muffled conversation without hindrance.

The second floor split out in two wings, and he chose the left wing. There were five doors on each wall of the hallway. "Which one do you suppose it is?" Anthony whispered.

"The locked one," Johanna muttered in reply. They all sprang forward and jiggled handles. "This one, it's this one!" Johanna put her eye to the keyhole. "Mrs. Lovett, are you in there?" She blinked but could see nothing except for the faint light and a wall.

A shuffling noise followed, and a brown eye met hers. "Yes, I'm in here."

Johanna took his razor again. "I'm going to bust this lock, and then you'll be out and we can run." She struggled to fit the tip of the razor into the door. "Oh, bugger, it's too big. Are you sure you don't have a hairpin?" Pressing harder, she twisted, but it wouldn't budge.

"No, I don't have a hairpin!" Sweeney snapped again.

She opened her mouth to answer him, eyes flashing, when an irate voice jolted the house. "You're that daft boy from the pie shop! Agh! Out! Out with you, out!" Toby's desperate wail echoed up the stairs through the hall. Goosebumps erupted over his neck.

He pushed Johanna out of the way and kicked the underside of the doorknob. The lock snapped, and the door flung open. Nellie dove at him in a flurry, her arms around his neck, his around her waist. She babbled softly an assortment of things that he couldn't make out, and he shushed her with a whisper to her ear. "I love you." He lifted his hand to brush his favorite curl behind her ear. She gazed up at him in astonishment, plush lips parted and chestnut eyes wide. More than anything, he wanted to kiss her.

But footsteps thumped below, and he knew they had more important matters at hand. "He's on the stairs! We're trapped!" yelped Anthony, panicked hands frenzying around his face.

"Like hell we're trapped!" Johanna dashed into the next room over where the window was not barred and snatched it open, pulling the curtains back. "I am not going back to any bloody asylum!"

"We're a story up!" wailed the sailor. "We'll break our necks if we jump!"

"Not if you do it right—listen to me, you drop onto your feet, bend your knees, and roll through the impact—"

"Nellie!" roared the beadle from the hallway. Johanna dropped from the window and vanished from view. Sweeney rushed to the window to gaze after her; she popped back onto her feet and waved for him to follow. His torn eyes flew back to Nellie, who clung to his shoulder like a bird on its perch, and Anthony, whose dazed expression fluttered alive when the beadle rounded the corner. "There you are, you old cunt!"

The sailor reached for his gun and pointed it too late; the beadle hurled himself at Nellie, and Sweeney stepped between them. They gnarled into a brawl. He reached for his razor, but his empty pocket reminded him that Johanna still had it, and the beadle kneaded him the ribs. He wheezed in pain and doubled over, knees suddenly weak. "I've gotcha now, you shithead! Can't mind your own, can you? I'll teach you to mind your own!" Hands tightened around his throat. He slammed hard into the wooden wall, mere inches from the open window. Grappling for the beadle's grasp, stars danced in his eyes.

He's going to kill me. Anthony quivered all over like a cold dog in the snow, and he knew with a sorrowful resignation that the boy would never fire the gun, not even at the beadle, not even to save his friend. The stars blackened into pits. His grasp weakened. Heat flushed from his toes all the way to his ears. This is not how I want to die. His eyes struggled against the pull of gravity. Everything smeared in shades of gray and blurred out of focus. He saw nothing but the beadle's face, and then he could make out just his nose and his beady, ugly eyes.

Knees sagging, the heat abandoned him. A frigid cold followed it, far colder than when he had awoken outside the judge's house after lying in the snow for hours. Johanna I love you Nellie I love you Lucy Lucy I'm coming and I'm so so sorry deliver me Nellie Nellie I'm sorry what I haven't done right what I haven't done right at all I'm sorry please don't hang on my account it's my fault I love you I love you I love you I should have said it a thousand times more I would if I had another chance—

Just when he sagged, almost succumbing to unconsciousness, a howl like that of a banshee convulsed in the air, and an impact slammed into the two of them and wrested the beadle away from him. He collapsed and gasped for air, vision skewing back into view. Nellie hung onto the back of her captor, one arm around his neck and legs wrapped around his back like a backpack. In her right arm, she wielded his razor—the one he had given her after the beadle attacked her weeks ago in her bedroom.

She plunged it into his flabby gut once, twice, and then moved northward. Sweeney massaged his throat, eyes transfixed on her in awe until the beadle smashed her against the wall, and she lost her grip, sliding down from his back. The enemy staggered away. His hands moved over his wounds like he couldn't decide which one to touch. Blossoming stains sprouted from each of them. He opened his mouth, and blood ran out of it and trickled out his nose.

"Go out the window, you fool, don't just stare at him!" Nellie hauled Sweeney up under the arms. "Anthony, come on!" She propped the barber up onto the window, and he swung crookedly out of it. "Just don't break your neck," advised the baker.

He released his hands and tried to follow Johanna's orders, bending his knees and rolling with the impact. A burst of pain shot through his chest, and he found himself wheezing again, sprawled on his back in the snow. Johanna crouched over him. "Mr. Todd! Are you hurt?" He didn't have enough air in his lungs to answer her, so instead he ogled at her from below, mouth and eyes wide open. She gazed back at him with compassion until Nellie landed beside them, and Johanna gasped. "Oh my, you're all bloody!"

The dark haired woman wiped her mouth with her arm. "It's not mine." She slid an arm under Sweeney's shoulders and tugged on him with a strength he didn't know she possessed. "Sit up, you poor blighter, get off your arse. I know they knocked you one good." The clopping of hooves on payment drew nearer, though he couldn't see Toby. His eyes wouldn't move from her. She hoisted him up on her shoulder. "C'mon, your legs work. I've gotcha now."

Gulping at the air, he staggered but managed to stay upright. A frozen hand brushed against her soft cheek to smear away a thin trail of blood. "I love you," he whispered again. His grip tightened on her bicep where he held to keep himself on his feet. Then he said it again, just to be sure she heard him. "I love you."

A grim smile crossed her lips, and she leaned in nearer to him. "Took you long enough." He blinked in confusion, eyes narrowing. Surely she hadn't waited this long, pined for so long, to reject him. "I love you too, you demon." She kissed him, and she tasted like blood.

"Where is Anthony?" demanded Johanna, and they both lifted their heads to the window. "Anthony! Come on down!"

The sailor boy appeared at the window. The beadle grappled him by his locks of hair, streaks of blood on his face. Neither spoke, but the enemy made deep guttural noises in his throat, groans of pain. From his open mouth, blood streamed faster, but not fast enough. Anthony, too fearful to struggle, gazed down upon them. Then the foe heaved him upward, and he dove headfirst at the asphalt.

When his skull cracked open and a slosh of pinkish fluid and tissue flooded the snow, Johanna sucked a deep breath, and Nellie clapped her hand over her mouth. "Don't scream, lass." The girl curled up into her embrace and shielded her eyes.

Lolling in the window like a balloon in the sky on a hot day, the beadle pitched forward himself. He landed atop his head as well. In a shocked horror, Toby whispered, "Just like hulling a walnut," and Johanna split away to vomit against the side of the house.

Sweeney approached the two bodies cautiously, his eyes dark and wary. He crouched a moment by Anthony's side. The sailor's face was almost unrecognizable. He pried the gun off of his belt. "Not even to save your own life, boy," he breathed. Clutching the pistol, it warmed in his hand. A friend that I did not want and do not deserve. He wasn't certain if the thought applied to Anthony or to the gun that he had taken from the corpse.

Nellie shamelessly picked their pockets like a scavenger. "We need to go now before the law arrives," Sweeney announced. He pivoted on his heel and grabbed the reins of the gelding from Toby. "Come on." With more effort than he should have exerted, he heaved up onto the horse, who again started up a series of bouncy dances. He pulled Toby up by the arm.

"Where are we going then?" Nellie clambered up onto the other mare. "Come here, dear, sit behind me," she beckoned Johanna, who teetered on her feet, face as white as Anthony's had been inside the mansion. Nellie lifted her up. "Good lass. You hold on tight to me."

"Back to Fleet Street," growled the barber. His heels tapped the gelding, and like before, the sorrel horse reared upward.

She gawped at him in disbelief. "You can't be serious. That's the first place they'll come to look for us!"

"That's what I'm banking on." He twisted his neck back, a sneer on his face. "The judge will come for me."

"You and your revenge—Sweeney, we've got bigger matters—"

"If he lives, he won't rest until Johanna is his caged bird again." His expression gnarled like the roots of an old tree in pain and hate. "She won't live in peace until he is dead. And I owe it to Anthony to ensure that, if nothing else."

The girl burst into tears. He studied Nellie's grim countenance a moment more before he forked his heels into the flanks of his horse, and they both galloped down the streets just as the skies began to gray in the earliest hints of sunrise.

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