"There's someone out there, Jean," Halcyon said nervously, hovering near the door. It was well past midnight now, and Jean hadn't slept a wink, hadn't even changed into the nightgown she'd brought with her. There was no sense in going through the motions, when her nerves were too frayed for her to sleep, when she was too consumed with worry over Lucien, when all she could do was ask herself, over and over again, what would become of her if she lost him. Practical concerns aside - though Lucien did provide her with a roof over her head and a livelihood for herself - she feared what might become of her heart, should he not return to her. Should he be lost, and all her tentative hope and all her gentle longing with him, should fate, or God, or the universe itself tell her, once and for all, that such quiet dreams of love and belonging were not hers to reach for. Should that come to pass she feared she would be as a ghost, no more than a shadow of a woman who once had lived, and now could no longer, whose days of joy and love were well behind her, and would not come to call again.
And now someone was in the corridor outside the little room where she was sequestered away from the world, waiting for daylight and the final judgment. There were no other rooms up here, just this little nook tucked away beneath the attic, and if anyone else was lodging at the Colonists' this evening they'd have no cause to visit the highest landing. It might have been Cec, but Cec was a gentleman, and would not loiter outside her door, and likely would not come to call on her so late in any case, would instead leave her to sleep in peace. Who then could it be? That dreadful Major Alderton, or his murderous stoat, come to...to what? To hurt her? To what end? What good would it do him? Had Lucien been right, to think that Derek believed Jean to be the key to bending Lucien to his will?
"Who-"
There came a gentle knock upon the door, then. Not the loud, furious banging of a man come to kill or kidnap her, nor even the careful, professional knock that heralded Cec's arrival. It was a tentative knock, a soft one, made by an uncertain hand. Slowly, very slowly, Jean approached the door, and pressed her ear right up against it.
"Who is it?" she called softly, while Halcyon fluttered near her cheek, listening as intently as she was.
"Lucien," came the answer, and Jean swung the door open at once.
His tie was discarded, likely tucked into the pocket of his trousers, and his waistcoat was unbuttoned, and so too was the collar of his shirt. His hair was mussed and rumpled, his face haggard. But he was there, Lucien, standing right in front of her, in one piece, accompanied only by Nemea, and Jean's restraint broke, then. With a low cry she flung her arms around his neck and clung to him, and his own hands reached for her clumsily, pulling her in close against him, so close she could feel the rise and fall of his chest in time to his ragged breaths. He had survived, Lucien, had come back to her unscathed, and she was so grateful for it she could have wept. For a moment she simply stood there, holding him, feeling him hold her, feeling him against her, warm and alive, and all the hopes that had very nearly been dashed on this night sprung once more into glorious flame, burning away her doubts and her fears.
Only for a moment, though, for then it was Halcyon's turn to cry out.
"Nemea!" his little voice trilled. "What happened?"
Jean pulled back from Lucien just far enough to turn her attention to his daemon, and saw then the jagged cut at her temple, her soft golden fur matted with dried blood.
"It is of no consequence, little one," Nemea said. "We are well, and we are safe."
"Come inside, both of you," Jean said, stepping back from Lucien, a furious blush rising in her cheeks as she realized how forward she had been, wrapping herself around him like that. What must he think of her! She ushered them both into the room, guided Lucien to the edge of the little bed and encouraged him to sit down there, and then she knelt beside Nemea, captured the great beast's head in her hands and examined the wound for herself. It was not often such things happened, daemons being injured, but Nemea bore an ugly scar across her face already, a scar that proclaimed she was no ordinary daemon, and had lived no ordinary life.
"Does it hurt?" Jean asked her. Nemea did not eat, nor did she drink, but surely, Jean thought, surely she could feel pain. But would a bit of Bex and a bandage heal her? Did daemons take medicine? Lucien would know, she thought.
"Not any more," Nemea said, regarding her with warm yellow eyes.
"I'll tell you, mine does," Lucien grumbled from the bed, and Jean rocked back on her heels to look at him, watched as he ran his fingertips gingerly over the back of his head.
"Oh, Lucien," she sighed, and then she rose and went to him, took his face between her hands same as she had done for Nemea, tilted his head down and looked at the place where is own blonde hair, so like Nemea's, was likewise crusted with dried blood.
"Will you tell me what happened?"
She kept her hands on his face even as he titled his head back, felt his skin sliding against her palms until his beard was brushing her hands. His eyes were soft, and sad, and so blue they made her ache.
"Derek is...is...he's gone, Jean."
Fear froze her belly solid as a block of ice. Oh, Lucien, she thought, my Lucien, what did you do?
"It was Hannam. Hannam killed him. Derek had gone quite mad, I'm afraid. He'd been working on a program to separate men from their daemons. That's why Hannam had no daemon we could find, Derek had taken her from him. And that lad he killed, that lad was just trying to get away from him. Derek meant to hurt you, Jean, just to make me do as he asked. But Hannam put a stop to all that."
Jean moved without thinking, then, sat herself down on the bed beside him and rested her hand gently, comfortingly on his shoulder. It was unthinkable, really, that a man could be driven to such lengths. What had compelled him? Greed, or bloodlust, or power? Did it matter really, now? One of Lucien's oldest friends, a man he'd once called brother, had gone mad, and been killed, and Lucien had to see this man cut down, and no matter how far gone Derek might have been Lucien had loved him, once. Oh, she thought, how Lucien's heart must have breaking, and how her own broke for him.
"I went to Matthew. Every policeman in Ballarat is out looking for Hannam, but they'll not find him. He's vanished."
"But you're safe," Jean said. That was what mattered to her, more than anything else. Let Hannam go where he pleased; as long as he stayed well away from Lucien, Jean would be content.
"I am," Lucien agreed. "But Derek isn't the only one involved in this scheme. Something must be done. I'll be making some calls, in the morning. Other doctors, other soldiers. We must point out the folly in this plan, and put an end to it before we find ourselves facing an army of Dereks. A man who has divorced himself from his own soul is a danger to the whole world. We cannot let them continue."
As Lucien spoke Jean's gaze flickered down to where their daemons rested. Nemea was lying on her belly, and Halcyon had tucked himself between her chin and her paws, nestled against the warmth of her. Those two creatures were dear to her, precious to her. They were Lucien and Jean themselves, and she shuddered to think where they'd be without them.
"In the morning," she said, wanting Lucien to know that she understood his desire to fight this evil, and that she supported him in it. "But now you need to rest."
"I'm so tired, Jean," he said. "I feel like I've not slept properly in years."
Maybe that was true, she thought. He'd lost his family, fought a war, been held captive, traveled all over doing god only knew what with nothing but grief for company, returned to his home bitter and cross, and Jean had, several nights, heard him banging on the piano, crying out in terror in his sleep, weeping. When had he last been able to simply rest, without the weight of the world on his shoulders? Wasn't it time, she thought, that he enjoyed some of the peace he'd earned for himself?
"Come on, then," she said.
It was very late, and Lucien was in no state to drive them home, and Jean had no interest in doing that herself. There was a perfectly serviceable bed beneath them, tucked against the wall in the corner of that room, safe and sheltered beneath the roof of the Colonists', and so she urged him back, and he went, pliant as a child, stretched himself out on the bed with a weary sigh. With Jean's help he shuffled around enough for her to free the blanket out from underneath him, and cover him with it. There wasn't another bed in the room, but there was a hard little chair, and Jean meant to sit there, and pass the rest of the night in prayer, keeping silent vigil over him. Lucien, it seemed, had other plans.
"Jean," he murmured her name sleepily, reaching for her blindly for his eyes were already closed. "Stay with me."
She ought to have said no; a man and a woman, both unmarried, spending the night alone in a room together was shocking enough but to actually crawl into bed him would be a gross breach of propriety. But her heart ached for him, and he was so lovely, and he was hurting, in mind and body both, and what did it matter, anyway? If anyone found out they'd been together they'd whisper no matter how diligent Jean tried to be in respecting the boundaries of decency, and their daemons loved one another already, and Lucien was fond of her, and she of him, and what did it matter? What difference would it make? Either she could tell him no, and wound them both, or she could tell him yes, and comfort them both, and she knew which she wanted, in that moment.
"All right," she said, and stepped gingerly out of her shoes. Lucien held the blanket up for her, and she slid in close beside him. The bed was narrow, and he turned on his side, facing away from her, and she pressed herself up against his back. In a fit of daring she draped her arm around his waist, and felt him reach for her hand, lacing their fingers together and bringing them to rest against his chest. Jean pressed her forehead to the broad plane of his back, just between his shoulders, and breathed in the faint lingering scent of his cologne, and felt her whole body relax into the thin mattress, then, relieved.
"I love you, Jean," Lucien whispered. "I don't know what would have become of me if Derek had hurt you."
Through her exhaustion her heart began to race; had he really said that? Said that he loved her? Did he expect her to say it back? Why shouldn't she, when she had spent the evening in this room, thinking precisely the same thing, that she would be lost without him? Didn't he deserve to hear it, to know that he wasn't the only one who was fond? She had been trying, for quite some time now, to keep her feelings to herself, but that, she thought, would only hurt them both, in the end. He had been brave enough to speak the truth; she could be brave, too, for his sake.
"I love you, too, Lucien," she whispered. "Now get some sleep."
"Yes, ma'am," he said, and they both laughed, and drifted off to sleep holding on to one another.
And on the floor beside that bed Nemea closed her eyes, and Halcyon burrowed a little deeper into the warmth of her fur, and they slept, too, content.
