Chapter 9: The Dragon (Reprise)
Beware, the dragon.
Sherlock was sure his breathing had stopped completely. His lungs burned inside his body as he laid sprawled on the ground, but he couldn't suck in air even if that were a priority at the moment. His world had halted, quit spinning around and let him to drift away into the vast and cold unknown. There was a horrible sound in the air but he couldn't recognise what it was, the only thing he knew was his legs refused to move and his throat hurt as if he had been screaming. Something was pushing him down and down, trying to convince the ground to swallow him as the heavy air caused a compressing sensation on his chest. Sherlock had never been sure on whether there was actually a heart in there, not until he felt it shatter and take his life with it.
His silver eyes turned up, landing on the horrible reality that was John transformed into unmovable stone. His back was turned, but the mere image was too much for Sherlock's soul to handle on its own. No matter how many times he had seen such a sight before, this was the perfect culmination to the worst day of his life, and judging by how hopeless his cause seemed, days to come were sure to be more devastating. All the days it stayed like that.
For the first time in his life he was truly alone, having failed the sole purpose he had imposed upon himself; managing to muck up in the one thing he could think to do to help. His life had fractured, and he deserved it. None of this would have happened had he just managed to keep himself from acting exactly as Mary and everyone else thought he would. Devastation was the price for it, and all of them had payed it.
He knew. He just knew nothing good would ever come from trying to play a role he wasn't destined to play. His place wasn't next to the wonders life outside The Isle offered, he couldn't be trusted with such reality; and now he had gone and forced John, —perfect, righteous, stupid John— to sacrifice himself to keep his non-existing heart from breaking, obliterating it into existence in the process. He was a villain, and a villain will never be worth such devotion.
"See what you did?" Said a voice from behind him, barely cutting through the endless foggy cycle of his despair. It sounded like his worst fears being voiced. It also sounded like his sister. He turned his head and saw Eurus standing a few meters away, Victor and Sebastian flanking both her sides. "Specifically because of your high standards?" She continued, the dispassion in her voice making Sherlock's wound even deeper at the state he knew he was in and the fact he didn't care at all. He was not more able to stop the darkness from coming than he was of preventing the sun to come out in the morning. "Because you don't want blood on your hands your friends are as good as dead." Eurus stared at him, her words losing their cruelty by the fact of being nothing but the truth; by trying to go against his nature and fix something, he had managed to seal its fate.
The violet haired boy's weak arms managed to support his torso as he made to get up. The shaking of his legs impeded him from standing fully and forced him to remain half kneeling on the grass. He saw Victor snicker at him, and Eurus' teal eyes narrowed in interest at the sight he must present. None of this could overshadow his pain. "I told you, Sherlock." She said, "Emotional context destroys you every time." And wasn't she completely correct? Sherlock hadn't once lost when he was mischievous and free, back when he had shrugged off every time she mentioned such an idea, not thinking it relevant to himself; but the moment he had let love wrap its tendrils around him, the suffocation had begun, he had allowed hurt and heartbreak to enter his brain, and in it, it had made a home. "Not that I'll ever know what that's like." She added. His sister didn't appear phased about it but for the fact that it alienated her even more from her understanding of his person. Of why he could had been deserving of more than what she had gotten. He shared the same confusion.
Hot, scorching lava ran inside his veins at the sheer suffering and anger he felt, she had no right to comment on something she could never begin to comprehend. "You want to know what I feel?" He asked, his voice loud and echoing through the night. Accusing. "You want to understand me?" The boy challenged, and he could physically feel his eyes turning green with it. The words landing on the others as a load of stones. "Help me then," Sherlock said. "Help me save John Watson."
Victor's laugh resonated inside his skull at his words, "Your little lover is gone so now you want our help?" He said, crossing his arms and exchanging amused smiles with Sebastian to his left. "Though luck." Trevor shrugged, as if Sherlock had time for that at the moment.
The rebel's emotional quota was much too surpassed to summon a proper glare out of him, so he ignored Victor's jab and continued. "Together our powers could light the ember again." He said in earnest, finally standing up fully and looking at her as if she was the final drop of salvation on an endless, dry dessert of sorrow. Which, in a way, she was for him. "We can stop all of this." He tried, but could clearly see she was not impressed. He knew trying to appeal to a soul she didn't posses was futile, but his brain wasn't working. "John saw potential in you, and hell knows he's usually right about this stuff." He offered, and could hear the desperation in his own voice. The very name passing his lips left a bittersweet aftertaste in his mouth which he suspected would be impossible to erase any time soon.
There was a small pause, perhaps the three of them sizing him and his request up while he fell apart in front of them. Never in a million cycles would he have thought one day he would be begging on his knees for them to listen. Sherlock's ragged breath was loud in the silence and Eurus frowned and tilted her head in that unnatural way she did when she was attempting to understand him. "You're going to cry?" She asked, words laden with delighted rapture. "It's okay if you cry." She said, and Sherlock did his best to deny her the pleasure of witnessing it, but he wasn't sure he could hold it in for much longer. "I can help you cry." Eurus said.
Sherlock stayed silent.
After a moment, Sebastian thought it was time to interfere, "You talk pretty," He added, waving a hand at him in dismissal even though he knew the effect it would have, which seemed fair considering just a few hours prior he had had every intention of leaving them hanging despite giving them his word. "But she's already made up her mind." Seb finished.
Sherlock could see the validity of such statement painted on his sister's face, but he refused to give up that easily, "Please." He looked away as he whispered. He was aware no one could undo what he had done, and there was no guarantee there was a way to unbreak his own heart, but he had tried bargain, and logic, and flattery, and none of it had swayed her. This would have to do.
Eurus regarded him as she pondered whether his vulnerability was worth the trouble. Whether the raw emotion laid before her was enough to account for something she didn't want to do. Her mouth curled in distaste and she shook her head, showing him her pondering had not leaned in his favour. "You brought this on yourself." She commented, tone unyielding and clinical. "I want to see you learn."
Said violet haired boy exasperated, all but naked in his grief, exclaimed. "Learn what?" In that sort of voice typical of a man confusing an all-consuming fear with calm rage. His hands adopting life of their own as they articulated his deep infuriation wildly, almost in warning to choose her words to his liking. Which, in hindsight, Eurus did not heed.
"That you're not different than me." She said, banging in the last nail on the coffin of Sherlock's future. Not only refusing his only mean of solution but hammering home the reason why the boy had failed at preventing such problem. It was made worse by the fact that it was spot on. Somehow, at peeling off his skin to see how his muscles worked, she had stumbled into the correct answer of Sherlock's eternal fight with his own self, with only him as the loser.
His sister and her pirates were quick to walk away then; leaving him to rage or run rampant at his own heart's whim, which he was very tempted to do by the situation. Because why shouldn't he? He had tried this other person suit and had found nothing but ill-fitted sorrow and devastation, why shouldn't he act as the monster Culverton and his mother had ensured he was born to be? There are only so many ways one could do the math before you're forced to face the facts.
He had always been sure of his capabilities, if not of his motives; thinking himself special in a way which only came with talent and determination. That was the greatest mistake the violet haired had made after underestimating Mary's slighted wrath at being nudged to the side, and it was that despite all appearances, this was never, in any way, in any form during his long seventeen sun cycles of existence and even before that, about him. Reality kept spinning endlessly with him as just a plaything attached to it to fulfil a designed and already laid purpose, never once asking his opinion or consent on the matter. But he had been unwillingly dragged into it. Made by the sole motive of destroying a kingdom which had obliterated any opportunity for a few while keeping all of them for itself. His mother had decided he was to be a heathen, a threat to peace, a weapon; but the fight wasn't his in the slightly. And, in his fumbling ignorance of this fact, he had managed to make everything worse for everyone.
Sherlock raged against the ground, kicking, screaming and collapsing himself towards it as if he would be able to find solution and forgiveness in the self flagellation. Attempting to drown out the whispers and voices in his head which left the road he should take even more unclear. He could feel the beast clawing its way inside his throat towards his mouth, begging to be let out as the now green gazed boy swallowed it down. The sight of John's ring around his finger only making the urge grow.
When they had first met, Sherlock had often admired how John had embraced his born role as a ruler and king of the people so easily; being taught and trained for a sole reason since birth would do that to you, —he had thought— it had reduced his options significantly until he was unable to see himself as anything other. So why then had it never seem to stick when it was him? if he had been dealt a similar, if not identical, hand? Questions like those had made his resolve waver, his sense of reality blurred. He had learnt since then the king had too been thrusted with the task regardless of whether he wanted it or not, and he did struggle to fit so perfectly in said space despite the fact of actually wanting it, but there was a difference between the royal and him.
John had been brave; braver than he will ever be. The blond had gone and done what the first lesson in monarchy would teach you not to do; he had let emotions and personal desires control him to the point the kingdom was now one ruler short, with no one but a wrong person to fill the void, just because it was right, —despite not being wise at all,— and a whole kingdom was not enough to sway him when it really mattered. Not when the flame of determination and heroism had been lit. The violet haired boy was not like that, and probably will never be. And perhaps, for now, that was a good thing.
The rug had been pulled from beneath his feet and now there was no John to gently deter him away from the ledge of darkness, from surrendering to the desire for revenge, Sherlock flinging himself to it instead as he let it consume him. If Mary wanted to burn him at the stake of all hells for his sins, it was only polite he provided the flames.
The rebel woke from his stupor and breathed in the poisonous air of black magic in the air, chasing away all thought of sorrow or vulnerability from it for the moment. Reveling in the fact of his new found confidence in his devious purpose. He stood up and stubbornly wiped the tears from his eyes, his legs carrying him across the gardens like a man possessed; not pacing any longer as he knew exactly where to start now. Secrets usually followed Sherlock like a shadow, and devastation was his footprint wherever he placed his heavy boots, but he wasn't special, and he just had to make sure everyone else knew he wasn't alone in that.
The rebel stopped just in front of the changing statue of John's father, founder of the kingdom, and he smiled as his mind fled in concentration. He haughtily reverenced to it, from one beast to another, and his hands came up to his sides. Sherlock's inhale was big and long as he conjured, holding the air in for a second and letting his brain fleet momentarily towards John and his friends, to the vision he had lost. When he let the oxygen come rushing out, his mind was completely cleared, his eyes were focused and in his face there was nothing but a smirk. The ember's might was only extinguished by water, and Sherlock believed he may had found the perfect antidote to that.
In just a moment a myriad of small, orange flames sprung to life around him as if summoned from a deep sleep. Steadily growing in size and warmth guided by his magic, turning from mild auburn to blue to violent purple in mere seconds. The wild lapping sound of them enveloped his soul as he stood at the centre of it all, the conflagration ever extending through the perfect gardens of roses and forget-me-nots around him, and the temperature rose and rose until his very skin was close to peeling off. The whole world itself was burning but the rebel didn't feel the heat. The violet haired boy was sure Mary wouldn't appreciate having to rule a less than picture perfect kingdom, —being so passionate about it she had gone to insane lengths to preserve it,— and Sherlock could only smile at the thought of it and destroy it.
Violet fire consumed everything in its path, wild and relentless enough to make Sherlock doubt he would be able to stop it now he had released it, even if he wanted to. Which he didn't. He was done resisting, he was a monster by design of others, —people who had given him everything he had— and this is the world all of them had built.
Sherlock took the ember out from his pocket, a dull and dark symbol of his failure as it had become, and reached his hand to place it over purple heat. Coupling the action with a spell as he waited for it to regain its might and ignite again. But the ember stubbornly refused to change back, even when in direct contact to the tongues of fire, putting a halt to his satisfied manic glee. However, the silver eyed boy wasn't going to let that deter him away from his plan, he would burn the entire kingdom to the ground if needed. He refused to believe his cause beyond reverting. A burst of lightning ripped through the sky then, its usual companion roaring loudly over him as he recognised the use of transporting magic behind him, signalling Mary's entrance.
She came down in a swirl of pink smoke, trailing shinning smithereens of magic and landing herself on top of the highest tower of the castle at the entrance, forcing him to tilt his head and look up to witness her arrival. He saw as her eyes scanned the scene, an almost visible anger pouring out from her body at what she encountered. She raised the sceptre and disappeared again, this time no fanfare was put into the action, intending to reach the ground swiftly. When she did, Sherlock was quick to notice the outstanding change in her. Her lips, her fingers, the skin around her eyes, all of it was tinted an unnatural shade of black, and while her hair was bright and long, and vibrant, it didn't quite hide the fact she was never intended to have it. The magic she had stolen was not just sucking the life out of the realm, it was also consuming her.
Sherlock looked at the blue ember in his grasp, not even responding to his attempts to revive it and realised he would need more time than what Mary was sure to want to give him.
"What the fuck are you doing?" She exclaimed, loud enough for him to hear her over the cracking and burning, even from so far away. She sounded livid. Not at all like the poised and frankly clever young woman he had known her as. This was her with raw emotion and unhinged expressions for all the world to see, as if the mask had finally come away and now her true colours were revealed, but it all still seemed disingenuous to him. She didn't care at all the image she put out, which the violet haired boy would classify as a sign to worry had she not been the one to curse the very will to live out of him. As it was, he wasn't feeling terribly concerned at the moment; not when she was wielding his own mother's magic against him.
"Oh, you know," Sherlock replied back, waving a dismissive hand around, not giving her the pleasure of watching his squirm under the blatant threat. "Running rampant, laughing triumphantly." He said conversationally as his feet carried him in between the flames towards her and the big double doors of the castle. "Usual villain behaviour." His words were punctuated with a chuckle, knowing how much she'd despise it.
He could tell Mary was not impressed by his attitude at all, her hate towards his kind let him play with her reactions like a violin, and she knew that too. "I'm surprised you're in the mood for jokes." She replied, holding back every explicative and expressive reaction the rebel could see he had provoked in her and choosing instead to attack with stealth, to go for the heart. Sherlock chose to ignore the perfect jab completely, instantly deleting the hole it ripped through his flesh at the painful reminder. He didn't have to luxury of time to lose focus now.
"I saw you having all the fun and thought I should join in," Sherlock said instead, stuffing one of his pale hands inside the pocket of his beloved coat as the other remained moving and controlling the fiery spell around them. "Since my invitation seems to have been lost on the mail." He added, a smirk tugging at his mouth as he watched Mary being unable to hide her very displeased reaction any longer. It was common knowledge any mention of both their mother's past was often enough cause to bring a disgusted grimace out of her, but she wasn't in a permissive mood anymore. No, now she was furious.
She wasted no time in advancing towards him, hands poised ready to curse the very magic out of his rebellious behind, but the silver gazed made sure the flames blocked her path completely, she would sooner be burnt to a crisp before she could get to him; But that wasn't enough to stop the likes of Mary Morstan when she had been slighted.
The royal smiled as bright pink and blue locks of hair framed her determined face, and turned the sceptre to aim a spell at him; which Sherlock managed to swerve perfectly, not missing the glare of frustration appearing in her expression. "You're thinking this will go down as it did in the past." She said, the venom dripping from her fanged-mouth-spoken-words conveying the height of her disagreement with such statement. "That it will be easy like your mother cursing a defenceless baby and sending the world into terror just because she felt left out by people like me." She added, and Sherlock really hoped she wasn't too far gone not to see the irony in her own words; however, just one look at her face told him of her deep belief of being in the right. It didn't matter whether it was true or not, no one was getting her out of said notion. "But you're not even half the villain she was, and I'm not nearly as dumb as my grandparents." She gestured both of their states and how evenly matched they surely were. The violet haired had started to suspect that even if you took the genetically identical powers from her she would still mirror him perfectly, and he took a moment to wonder if that meant John had a type, and whether it made any difference in what he would have to do to defeat her.
"You won't win." She said, her voice calm and confident once more, slicing through his thoughts and obliterating their meaning as she successfully refuted the notion in his head. Her fingers traced the length of the sceptre's handle, the adoring caress almost obscene in how essential and natural it looked to her. The rebel doubted there could be any way back from the abyss into which they both had so willingly fallen. Hell wasn't known from spitting out its victims.
"Perhaps I won't." Was his answer, passion evident in his otherwise flat tone. The roaring fire around him a tacky and dramatic contrast with his ability to accept he could be bested by her, all while still relentlessly wielding the upper hand. "But will you?" Sherlock queried, knowing he was attempting to bring back the unreachable, it wasn't anywhere near likely they were about to lay down their weapons and call a truce. Still, he needed to know, and the answers weren't exactly forthcoming. "Can you? After all of this?" He said, and could tell the words had made an impact on her, left behind an imprint on her skin even if she didn't care enough to heed or consider them. All they had was this moment. The both of them had blurred and abused the laws of good and evil so many times that not much else was left for either of them now.
Sherlock tilted his head to inspect her in the calm of her reaction and took several steps back. The vision of her getting lost as he let the flames engulf his surroundings and consume the space where he had been standing a few seconds prior. They hid him from her sight effectively and allowed him to focus on his attempt to light up the ember once more. In his proximity, Mary's shouts of rage and frustration were easy to hear, their intention to draw him out to play evident in the little digs thrown at him. He ignored all of them, as he desperately searched for a solution. He was taking a risk at drawing back and letting her stew a bit more on her determination to harm him, but clever banter was of no use to him save as a way of gaining some time, —which he did need to get back the sole advantage he had planned to eradicate the threat of the princess doing exactly what he had done to Moriarty and turning his own spells against him— but it didn't help in any way . If he had kept his stupid mouth shut, the useless gem would be working and none of this would have ever been an issue.
Just as he had predicted, Mary's spells had grown with her anger in her search for him. When the violet haired boy turned his head he realised she had managed to snuff out a few flames and open up a passage for attack. Just as Sherlock rose to create a counter curse and send a powerful wave of magic her way, she beat him to it by knocking him flat on the ground with one of her own.
All the wind was pushed from his lungs and his own irritation rose to the top of his throat as he rolled onto his front. The ground under his fingers was smouldering as he knelt with hands on the floor, knowing his opponent would surely use the opportunity to strike him again if he didn't get up soon. He managed the task, but the pain was taking a toll on his body already, and he doubted he would be able to keep running on adrenaline for long. Still, he stood defiant, glaring at her as if daring her to give him all she got. No matter how much hatred for him or his actions she put behind it, he could take it.
Mary smiled at his stubbornness, sizing it up with lights in her eyes. "If you think I'll show you mercy just to honour John's last wish you clearly don't know me well enough." She was confident, but the boy couldn't help but disagree; he thought she was the only one in the kingdom who truly understood him. John was the best and wisest man to have ever walked Auradon, but he was often naive —or wilfully ignorant— at his intentions. Sherlock loved him, it had brought a fair amount of havoc into his own self-views for him not to admit it now, and was well aware that, in a way, she loved him too, and that's what made this scene all the more tragic. "He may have chosen you," She continued, "But that doesn't mean I have to do the same." The girl punctuated her point with another spell, this time hitting his previously injured leg. Making the most out of his distressed emotional state and enjoying every second of it, not allowing him time to recover, instead following up with a series of spells, quickly fired and aimed to render him unmovable. Which they wasted no time in achieving. By the time a pause was made on her end Sherlock was already gasping in pain and all but defeated, his body too badly damaged to be of any use now.
Villains were often destined to fail, to succumb to heroes in their most victorious of moments. All his Goodness 101 classes, —even some people he had encountered in the kingdom,— had often told and repeated to him how his quest for heaven would never, in a million cycles, be achieved by leading a life as the one he did. But none of them realised paradise wasn't something which was in the violet haired boy's nature to desire, and he felt his true purpose grow inside him now. "It doesn't change anything." Through his wavering voice he managed to let out, not turning his head towards her. Not sure if he even could, at that point. "After this, you'll still be a traitor and a bastard child." He said. "Like any of us."
It was needless to check whether the whispered words had sunken into the princess, the long pause they created in her spoke for itself. "Go to hell, Sherlock." She said as the only answer. Sceptre poised to curse and end him once and for all, but the rebel thought she had perhaps forgotten about something.
The deep chuckle inside him hurt his ribs as his chest moved. "Oh, Mary." Sherlock breathed, as gravely as he could. His eyes changing into deep pools of bright green and turning towards her. "Where do you think I came from?" He said just before his body collapsed unconscious to the ground and a big cloud of smoke rose from his back. Shining purple lights shot up towards the sky as an intricate web of protective thorny rose bushes came to cover his semi mortal body completely. The Dragon was let out of its bodily confining reins inside him and allowed to soar free in all its terror. Now that protecting John, —or any of his friends,— wasn't a concern taking up all his magical energy, there was nothing holding it back anymore. He felt his very mind release and leave his almost empty body behind.
He could see Mary was startled back at her own oversight. Now watching with big, round blue eyes as Sherlock circled her from above as a predator would to an easy meal. The control he held over the beast was faint at best, as it was often prone to actions which were more instinctual and dangerous than the boy was used to being. Nothing calculated about its ferocity. A translucent but quite heavy wing crashed against the statue of John's father, sending it tumbling down to the ground to be lost among the conflagration, narrowly missing the girl.
The purple flames below had devoured most of the gardens and he did not hesitate to send a blast of magical combustion to make them grow larger, to keep them from exhausting back into embers, erasing every happy memory there could be embedded inside of them. Mary stayed silent, but he could see his victim attempting to find a way to circle away before she was trapped inside them with no way to get out. She'll figure it out, or she wouldn't, the fire wouldn't probably harm her more than any common curse would, and Sherlock wasn't about to waste brain power over it, for the moment his focus was somewhere different. The Dragon just flew past her towards the castle. Fire roaring in his belly already. All of his own rage at the events of the past day —the past cycle even— piled on to fuel his attack on the institution's structure, bringing some of the once perfect stonewalls to come tumbling down and causing the front windows to shatter. After what everything it represented had cost him, —what it had cost John— it had no right to still be standing when he wasn't.
When the walls were decimated to his liking he switched to the towers, tall and proud and completely making his insides crawl with disgust. So consumed was he in his task of reducing anything that had even the slight hint of mockery to his current reality he almost missed the direct attack land at his proximity. When The Dragon's eyes turned, rays of light shot up from where the girl was standing, free of the maze of flames and visibly loathing, sending curses to try and bring him down; attempts to spell something which was made out of nothing but air and pure magic itself.
It was a devastating truth to note he wasn't fairing much better. The boy could feel his mind slipping away at the cracks. The Dragon was not only devouring all his energy, but it was hungry for his life force as well. There was a reason why John pursed his lips in worry every time he did this, even when he was around to protect him. However, Sherlock was not sure how to stop. He didn't think he should stop.
At the sight, he remembered his fight was not solely with the unfairness of the world that had made him who he was, that had taught him how to make himself, but also with the girl the both of them had wronged in so many ways and who now sought to wrong them in return, and enjoy it. But without the aid of the ember there was not much else he could do.
The dragon turned and soared low, passing just shy to knocking the stolen crown off her coloured head, displaying the extent of his abilities and taunting her on the still inexperienced approach she took. Perhaps he shouldn't be dangling with fate like that, since he could already feel the physical energy drain from his body below and threaten to bring him down to earth at any moment. But too long had he reined in his instincts, the kingdom had stripped him of the vast opportunities he had at the isle to indulge in his deplorable behaviour, and now Mary had given him the perfect excuse to just let go. It didn't matter to him whether she spelled him or if his self destructive actions ended up obliterating his existence too. He had come to a point where she should be afraid of what he was, as he surely is too. Dreamlike paradise had bled into a nightmare of her creation, and Sherlock was going to ensure she drowned in it with him.
Mary had known this was always a possibility. In fact, she was slightly confused as to why the miscreant hadn't unleashed his true monster on her sooner as he was famed to do with everything that wasn't up to his liking, walking around Auradon as if he owned it; but she was in no state to ponder such things, the aftermath would bring much needed clarity after the kingdom, —her life— was purged from the venom in which it had been bathed.
She attacked precisely, her new found command to her magic making the most of what power she could feel growing within her, but the other just stuck to sending back retaliating spells. Matching her every time. None of them even able to do much but inconvenience her, and she wondered what his real game was, what he was hiding and why was he holding back. Because villains, —specially Holmes-type villains,— always had something up their sleeve. And this stalemate in which they surprisingly encountered themselves was not going to sustain for much longer for either of them.
Still, he couldn't be allowed to continue like this. The customs, the honour, the history and values of precious Auradon were clearly of no concern to him. She could have destroyed all of it, —as he was currently attempting— and he would have probably cheered her on. It was just the fact she had made it personal, set her blue eyes on something that he had claimed, when the game was really over. And Mary figured that was exactly how she would win, with the open wound his absence had left behind. She couldn't very well resist to dig the dagger deeper.
"You promised me you would take care of him." She yelled, loud enough for him to listen, "You didn't do a very good job of it." She heard the beast roar at that, guttural and fierce, and that's exactly what she wanted, to make him angry and sloppy, not at all like he always was. The graceful movements of the winged snake didn't balance out the horrifying sight of an enraged Dragon charging at you though, but they very well marked her accuracy.
She felt rather than saw the attack when it had already made collision on her abdomen, much stronger than she had anticipated and causing her to doubt the course of actions she had taken. The motion of falling caused the bottom half of her hair to be snatched by the flames, resulting in it falling away like leaves on autumn breeze instead of burning off, leaving strands of vibrant pink streaks scattered on the floor around her.
Falling on her back was painful, but not enough to surpass the panic she felt at losing hold of the sceptre, which flew out of her grasp and rolled away on the ground. Her hands shook as it was her only source of magic, without it she was utterly defenceless.
She turned her blue eyes up, exhaling sharp pained breaths as she looked at the night sky, —dark with hardly any stars— and felt her mind scrambling to focus on something practical, anything other than how she couldn't let him win that easily, how unfair it would be after all the effort she had put in to save her kingdom from the skeletons in its closet. Every victory she had had couldn't be in vain.
She stretched her arm towards it as far as it could go, knowing if she were to feel once again the sweetness of the magic run through her she would be able to get up and end this; she would be complete again. But despite all her efforts, the sceptre was just out of her reach, and Sherlock didn't hesitate to use the opportunity to hit her with another spell.
This time, she did see it, but both her arms still fell limp at her sides from it, keeping her from rising or rolling. He was clearly adamant on preventing her from gaining back his mother's power source, and she was reluctant to admit she could conceive no flaw in such plan and no way out of it for her. She was strong, and smart, and very determined when it came to what she wanted; she didn't know what he was willing to do to satiate his thirst for vengeance, —when he would stop himself— but even if he was merciful, there was no way she would win without the floating, vibrating aid of stolen sorcery.
Her eyes closed tightly, not willing to see her own cause obliterated. Feeling the heat of the flames around her lap at her skin and match the shame she felt corroding inside, wishing she had been born with the gift of conversation that was magic, the ability to convince the forces of the universe to bend in your favour and to then force their hand, as so many so unjustly had done before her, with much less noble causes. In that moment, just as she was about to give in, her fingers started twitching, and in a second she was startled to find the sceptre back between them as if it had never left. Her blue eyes opened to stare at it with confusion, and at the corner of her vision she could make out the contour of sparkling violet lights halting in surprise with her.
After that, there was no more time for questions.
She broke the other's spell like a villain would take an apple from a kid and stood up as if risen from the dead, the cool wind once more playing with her pink hair. She smiled as she expertly took aim towards the beast and hit it cleanly in its chest for the first time. The satisfaction she got only fitted for a dream. Her curse caused the beast to falter, toppling him over in its own weight and almost propelling him unto the floor; the Dragon swayed close enough for her to notice it carried a gem on its chest as it fought gravity. Only his tightly reined skill managed to keep him afloat, but Mary planned on changing that very soon.
Her own spells grew larger and larger, and soon she was delighted to recognise they surpassed the ones with which Sherlock was capable to answer, despite really trying this time. She continued as an urgent need inside of her drove her ever onwards, so bewitching in its insistence that she barely even registered her own actions, let alone their causes. Pushing, pushing, pushing until it was impossible or unbearable to ignore. She was finally able to reach out and grab what had been promised to her for so long, what she had though lost for so many nights as she cursed at the unreasonableness of it. She was delighted, happy, happier than she had ever been, but it didn't take long for her to realise something wasn't quite right. Every time magic was used a choking pain ran through her limbs, her whole body went numb and aching as the black on her fingers climbed up until it reached her elbows.
Her teeth clanged and echoed inside her brain and her vision doubled as she continued fighting, but the sentiment behind had changed. Anger veered drastically towards something more resembling urgent fear as she sought for a way to stop it all, to end her attack even if that meant losing; but she was physically and emotionally unable to do so. A puppet chained to her own strings rather than the master she had thought herself to be.
When the terror of loss of control remained, she soon found the sole way to destroy it would be to satiate it completely, and as she looked around for a way to stop, a ring of purple, poisonous flames parted in the far distance where they had eaten through a thick thorn bush and revealed a very much forgotten aspect of their fight.
There, a very tangible and very vulnerable unconscious body laid with a shock of bright violet hair.
Sherlock wasn't stupid or blind, despite his self being essentially divided in two at the moment. Something obviously wasn't right with Mary. She had lost her iron grip on the sceptre and even if he didn't grasp fully the mechanics or reasons of her ability to hold it, much different was to be doing advanced magic on her own without the aid of an object. And that's not even taking into consideration how her ruthless attacks were not only growing in size and skill, but they were also rapidly declining in control. The magic she was using was overpowering her, and by the evolution he had witnessed, he knew he wouldn't be able to hold her spells off for much longer, if at all. He was losing the fight, and unless he managed to light up the ember in the incredibly near future, he definitely would.
He flew right over the flames, creating more of them inside him in an attempt to reignite the lost vitality beneath the gem, fire filled with magic and heat which should be enough to make the object restart. Had to be enough. Had to deliver him the solution for all the things he had been fucking up since he had been born, and apparently even before that. Having discarded all external plans and deciding in finding his own way around the upside down world.
He evaded each and everyone one of the girl's offences, but not by much, and he was having trouble controlling everything at once. His focus wandered away too often and left him locked in halfhearted compromise which served neither of his tasks. The sorrow he still experienced was the last drop of the fuel behind his embarrassingly desperate attempt to regain victory, but it won't carry him forever. Searching for the win was almost futile at the moment. He kept at it anyway.
As he flied lower, a hope for a new day appeared as a spark igniting inside the crystals of the ember. Not big enough to be of any consequence, but a clear sign his efforts were not wasted. Its might was growing too and soon he would be able to direct it towards his chosen victim. Strip away her powers and leave her as nothing more than the slighted mortal she was underneath. Easy match for him even with his lessened disposition.
He got closer as he waited, staring her down and poised for the offensive for the second he had the sufficient tools to rain down on her what could ever only be a mild punishment after what she had done, and yes it was not lost on him how hypocritical it was feeling entitled to judge her for it.
Mary turned her delicate face to him, but while her face showed alarm, a deep seated panic and helplessness evident, her eyes were focused at something different. Her attention diverted where one would think a magical being waiting to devour you would gather more notice. His gaze of light followed hers, and the reality of what she intended to do hit him instantaneously. Because she was smart, and he had stupidly put himself on a silver platter and given her the possibility to use it, thorn bushes clearly a poor protective mean. If his want to win —survive— was genuine he had to strike first. Preferably soon. Or now. With an ember at half its power and a spell with which he wasn't as confident as he accustomed, he released the most powerful curse he knew, hoping the small flame inside would serve as enough energy to at least knock her out. To give him some time to get it working properly.
He didn't know how it happened. Not until he had been graced with the gift of hindsight. But in a second, just before she was about to strike at his laying body, the glowing blue ember ignited fully, its effect much too aggressive for what he had intended, but too late to change it now. The cruel curse flew swiftly and smacked her without mercy, causing the last motion of her hand release an attack of her own and result in unbearable, searing pain right in his heart.
Then everything went black.
When he next parted his eyelids, he was back inside his own physical body, apparent by the deep, torturing pain at the centre of his chest spreading to the tips of his fingers. He looked up at the frowning face of the girl above him, her wet teal hair still stuck to her pale face.
"What did you do?" He choked out, as Eurus crookedly smiled down at him.
"What you wanted me to." She answered.
Author's note: We're getting near the end, I hope you all are enjoying the ride.
Next chapter up 29th of November.