"Ask him."
Ask…him? Arthur stared at her in surprise. What had prompted that reply? Carla had willingly shared information on every other child that had escaped that horrible place. Had something made her uncomfortable?
Carla pulled a face, betraying her sadness in a way that skirted the words she had not yet learned. "No one knows that," she added. "Silent doesn't talk."
Shock kept Arthur in place for another moment, then he slowly lowered himself to the cobblestones. Whatever this was, she would feel more secure if he did not tower over her. "He hasn't spoken at all? Has he made any kind of noise?"
"He screams loud enough," Carla nodded. "He can talk. He just doesn't. He didn't even beg for us to get him out of the closet that first evening. I thought it weird for our age, but…" The comment trailed away with a shrug. They had had other things to worry about.
"How old was he?"
She thought for a moment, darting gaze noting the young ones doing reading lessons in the opposite corner. "About Benny's size. He had curled himself into a silent corner, something clutched in his hand I never saw, but he refused to speak even after we coaxed him out. Gwen decided his parents had told him to keep quiet until he was safe."
Quiet. Don't say a word. We'll be back.
He firmly disregarded the memory. His own past had nothing to do with this. Silent, as Carla called him, still refused to join the rest of the group, and someone needed to intervene before that pained wariness became permanent.
"Do you think I would scare him by asking to sit with him?"
She indicated a negative, reflexively checking the others' locations. Two weeks had not yet broken that habit.
"I doubt he'll answer you, but I don't think you'd scare him. He always liked sitting with us. Silent wants the company. He just doesn't talk."
A frown tried to appear until she spotted Max and Eli nearer the entrance. He tried a different tack.
"Do you know anything about him at all? Anything from when he first arrived?"
A half shrug answered him. "His clothes were threadbare, and his shoes had a lot of patches. Nothing the adults did surprised him like it usually did the new arrivals. He already knew how to hide, and he could creep through those tunnels faster and quieter than any of us. I always wondered if he hadn't been kidnapped from kidnappers, but no, I don't know anything about him for real. We always relied on whispers to learn about each other, but he refused to use even hand gestures for the first moon cycle."
Her own flitting gaze changed from simply scanning faces to a full roll call. A few numbers joined the memorized list of names—mostly counted on her fingers, but Arthur still allowed a burst of pleasure at the sight. Carla had come a long way in two weeks.
Silent had not, however, and Arthur left Carla to drift toward the other side of the courtyard. The boy looked about ten, with the knobby knees and elbows that warned of the coming change. He always chose the shadowed corners, the quiet areas that let him observe the courtyard's typical chaos while remaining firmly removed from it. When mealtimes arrived, that small figure darted from his chosen seat to claim his portion, but he just as quickly took himself back to his spot. He never ate with them, never wanted to Run, and never seemed to leave the day's hiding place.
He looked up at Arthur's wandering approach, small arms wrapped tightly around his knees.
"Can I sit with you?" Arthur asked softly.
Wide eyes stared back, but Arthur received no reaction.
"Carla says you don't talk," Arthur tried again, "and that's alright. If you don't want me to sit with you, you could shake your head or move away."
Still no reaction. Arthur moved slowly closer.
"I won't hurt you. I hope you know that."
Nothing, which probably meant he did not mind the company. Arthur sat against the wall several feet away, pretending to watch the bustle though his true attention never left Silent.
"My name's Arthur," he started. "I've lived here for a bunch of years, now. I don't even remember how many, but I think I was a few years younger than you when I ran away. You're, what, about ten?"
Silent simply watched. Arthur waited only a couple of seconds before giving an exaggerated shrug. "Doesn't matter, though I do hope you like it here. When we realized just what was going on in that mansion…" He let the comment trail away, then cast a look he hoped conveyed sympathy. "We came as fast as we could."
Frightened eyes disappeared into his jacket, the small body curling against him in the semi-darkness. Age did not lend bravery. His own hands shook just as badly.
No. He shoved the memory back where it belonged. Just because recent weeks had somehow reminded him of his brother did not mean he needed to dwell on it. That had been years ago, and he had more important things on which to focus.
Like showing a young boy he was safe. A short pause searched for something he could monologue.
"Have you ever seen a map?"
Silent hesitated, then tilted his head in wordless question. Arthur quickly tempered a smile as one hand retrieved his work from its pocket. Silent might not be willing to speak, but he did not oppose interaction.
"A map shows information about a certain piece of land, like a city." Predictable movements spread the paper between them. "I made a map of London. It includes streets, businesses, and a few important notes about the neighborhoods, like this." He tapped the mark south of Regent's. "This is the Baker Street flat. If you ever need a grown-up's help, go here. The three adults you saw in this courtyard the night of the raid live here, and they'd do anything for you."
The younger boy looked at the spot, then continued staring at Arthur. If a response hid in that gaze, Arthur could not catch it.
"Over here is Whitehall." He referenced another mark. "Mr. Holmes' brother lives in this area. If we ever need help but can't find anyone at Baker Street, we can go to Mr. Mycroft Holmes. He likes to grumble about refusing to babysit for his little brother, but don't put too much stock in his words. He's helped Father Christmas deliver presents before."
The elder Mr. Holmes had actually been Father Christmas, but Silent was young enough to keep the magic. Arthur would not take that away from him.
"And you're here." He leaned slightly forward to tap the jewelry shop, gratified when Silent did not move away from him. "Mr. Hobbs owns this shop, Clerkenwell Jewelry, and our courtyard. He rents the courtyard to us on the understanding that we take care of the place. As long as we keep the courtyard free of weeds and debris—and tell him if something big needs fixing—we get to live here." He gave a conspiratorial smile. "I think he likes having us here. He helped us make a Yule fire one year, even gave us marshmallows and chocolate. That was my favorite Christmas."
Silent edged a few inches further away before bending to peer at the map. A glance noted the jeweler and Baker Street before wandering north, and his small finger landed on the top corner of Regent's Park.
"That's the zoo. They keep a bunch of animals there and let people pay to come look at them."
Another head tilt requested more detail—and sparked excitement in Arthur. Perhaps Silent needed only to be noticed.
"Mr. Holmes had a case there once. When it was done, he convinced the owner to let all of us go through for free as part of the case fees. The zoo has so many animals that London doesn't normally have, like lions and antelope, but my favorite were the monkeys. They climb trees, and they have a really long tail some of them use as another hand."
Silent looked between him and the map. Use their tail like a hand? that seemed to ask. Arthur barely concealed his pleasure.
"I'm serious. I saw one hanging from a branch by its tail, as comfortable as can be while it ate the supper the keepers left in one of the branches. I think the sign said it was a spider monkey."
The boy frowned, running his hand on the floor like a spider. Arthur shook his head.
"No, it wasn't the bug. A spider monkey has the same shape as a person—two arms and two legs—'cept its body is a lot shorter. Their hands and feet both look like hands, and they walk on all fours most o' the time. The sign said they eat fruits, nuts, bugs, and a lot of other stuff up in the trees."
Silent took a moment to process that, then knocked one knuckle on the cobblestone beneath them. Arthur made no immediate answer, trying to decipher the question.
"Do they ever touch the ground?" Silent nodded. "No, they don't leave the trees. They like it up there too much."
Well, that and one of the bigger cats might eat them. Arthur decided not to risk Silent wanting to go live in a tree.
Another nod accepted the answer, but Silent tapped the map again, obviously asking a different question. Arthur leaned forward to get a better look.
A bright light. Rushing wind. Screaming.
"Are you pointing at…the rail yard?" He hoped not, but Silent indicated a yes. "What about it?"
The boy gave a half-shrug, one finger still tracing the lines.
"We don't usually go there, if that's what you're worried about?"
That look conveyed a clear why not? Arthur chose his answer carefully.
"It's not the best place to look for food, and a lot of homeless adults hang around there. It's not really unsafe, compared to a few other places, but it's not a good place to be, either."
Which Arthur had no wish to change. He never wanted to go back there again.
A sudden silence. Mourning. Incoherent rambling…
He shoved the memory away once more, but Silent must have read something in his face. That small finger moved to reference the docks.
"We go there all the time. Frequently find food near the ships, and one of the other boys is hoping to get a job as a dockhand eventually."
What about the river? was his next question.
"Only in summer." He stretched far enough to reach their favorite swimming hole. "This spot on the canal has a gentle slope. We like to swim there when it's hot, and we can ride a raft down the current for a little ways. It always kicks us out in the same place."
Silent tilted his head again. Raft?
"A bunch of wood tied together." Arthur sketched the general shape against the cobblestones. "It's about the size of a shipping pallet, if you know what that is."
That partial shrug could be a "yes" or a "no," but Silent scanned the map again without bothering to clarify. He pointed to himself, then at the map.
"Where…are you?"
A wordless negative. He curled into a ball with his hands over his head, then unfolded to point at the map again.
"Where was the Haven?"
Yes. Arthur leaned forward, slowly reaching to lay a finger on the north end of Montague Street.
"The Haven was here, in this mansion we always thought abandoned. See the mark I put on it?"
Silent crept closer for a better look, and something like surprise appeared when he saw the bright symbol almost obscuring the building. Arthur had crushed a few rose petals to make a rudimentary red ink, so the map's only spot of color paid an eye-catching tribute to everything those children had endured. Even if the building changed hands or was torn down, Arthur's map would always mark that spot.
Why?
Arthur understood that question easily enough. "Because what you went through wasn't good at all, but just because it's over doesn't mean it's forgotten."
Confusion appeared, and a cautious gesture evidently referenced the littles now playing in the far corner.
"They haven't forgotten—" He barely prevented insistence from voicing the nickname. Just because the others called this boy "Silent" did not mean he appreciated it. "They're just moving on. Even if Mr. Holmes finds everyone's parents and you all go back home, you'll always be connected by that house of horrors."
Confusion changed to something more like sadness. He broke eye contact to trace another line on the map.
"You think you won't be able to go home."
Silent hesitated for a long moment, then nodded.
"Because you don't talk, or because you don't have a home to go to?"
Two hands lifted palms up, then clasped together, though Silent still did not look at him.
"Both?" A nod. "How do you know you don't have a home? Did something happen to it when those creepers grabbed you?"
Sadness deepened, but he indicated a negative.
"You…didn't have a home when they grabbed you?"
Silent pulled his knees to his chest again. No wonder he still preferred to stay separate. He did not yet feel like he belonged.
"You'll always have a home here. Almost none of us have any blood relatives left, but we have each other. Did someone make you feel unwelcome?"
A flinch, followed by another wordless negative.
"You…keep telling yourself that you're not welcome?" No reaction, but the lack of eye contact said everything. "Stop telling yourself that. It's a lie."
That wary gaze slowly met his, fear heartbreakingly evident.
"It's not true," he insisted. "We don't care who your family is—or was—or how you got here. Everyone in this courtyard has a past. Some are decent, some are downright frightening, but none ever stopped them even from helping with Mr. Holmes' cases, much less belonging here."
Silent opened his mouth, a gesture suggesting sounds that never formed.
"You think we won't want you because you don't talk? Why would we care about that? You're still you, aren't you?"
He stilled, then slowly lowered his hand as utter bewilderment appeared.
"Though I wish you would talk," Arthur added. "Then you could tell me what about that confuses you so much. Not to mention your name. Did someone before the Haven reject you because you refused to talk?"
Another flinch. That was probably a yes, and a horrible thought bloomed in Arthur.
"Did your family dump you there because you couldn't talk?"
No. Very clearly no, but another gesture suggested Arthur had hit upon half of it.
"Then…it was part of how you ended up there?" He paused. "Carla was right, wasn't she? You were taken from kidnappers? Someone…" He trailed off, struggling to piece together the memory putting such sorrow in Silent's face. "Someone took you from your parents, then either they dumped you at the Haven or the Haven took you from them?"
Yes. Such a resounding yes, and Arthur longed to hold the boy, to soothe the tears building in those eyes.
He could not, however. He could only speak.
"We won't do that. Ever. We won't push you out. We won't turn you away. You always have a home here. Did you see Henry a few days ago? The boy that befriended Levi?" He received a hesitant nod. "He first called this place home over three years ago. Mr. Holmes found his mum, and we didn't see him again until Middle Tim and I ran into him on the street last week, but he still has a place here. And he and Tim Major are still brothers. That'll never change. You're safe. You're home."
Home. Lips moved, though still no sound emerged as Silent stared in absolute amazement. Promise?
"Yes. I promise. There's no getting rid of us. We're your family now."
Another moment passed as the boy processed that, then a flurry of movement shot Silent over the map and directly into Arthur's chest, squeezing in an embrace fit to topple them.
Arthur merely caught the boy and held on—and resolutely concealed his relief. Two weeks after escaping that horrible place, healing had finally begun.
Looks like Arthur just found himself a shadow, but the story's not over yet. Any guesses on what you think will happen?
MHC1987: Thank you. Very much. I'm glad you so enjoyed the story
