Lost and Found
By the Lady Razorsharp
AN: Inspired by Granada Productions' version of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories The Final Problem and The Empty House. This particular interlude inspired by "Arabian Nights" from 'Harem' by Sarah Brightman.
Interlude: Horizon
I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.
Aeschylus(525 BC - 456 BC), Agamemnon
January 1893
Dawn shrouded the countryside in a blue mist, revealing layer upon layer of switchback hills stretching off into infinity. No breath of wind, no song of bird or howl of beast disturbed the stillness. The last rays of starshine and moonlight glittered upon the snow, and the very air seemed to have cruel, needle-sharp fangs.
At the edge of a snowy courtyard enclosed by waist-high walls of ancient stone stood a tall man, a rough woven rug thrown about his thin shoulders. Under the woolen wrap, sheepskin boots peeped from beneath the hem of a long white robe. The man's dark hair curled in untamed waves against his forehead, and a scraggly beard obscured the sharp outline of his jaw. The skin stretched taut over the man's high cheekbones was tanned the color of chestnuts.
The figure stood so completely still that he seemed to be more like a statue than a human being, a sentry posted to guard the ancient mysteries housed in the monastery behind him. Only the glittering grey eyes that peered out from the tanned, bearded face gave any clue that the figure was indeed alive.
When he had first arrived at the monastery, he had been so exhausted that the monks let him sleep well past sunrise. Eventually, as his mind and body regained their balance, he took to rising at first light with the ranks of saffron- and crimson-robed brethren. At first, all he wished was to turn his face to the sun, soaking up its warmth until the ball of icy dread in the pit of his stomach finally melted away. When he had had his fill of sun and wind, he retreated inside and wandered through the halls, marveling at the rainbow of colors adorning every surface. Every hue had meaning; every shade was designed to draw the onlooker into a deeper, richer awareness of himself and the world around him. He had been transfixed as he had not been since he was a child, when he watched the play of light through glass prisms dangling from the lampshade at his mother's bedside.
Days and nights became an effortless dance of cobalt sky and quicksilver moon, his heart keeping time as he stepped clumsily at first, then more smoothly. Sometimes he stayed indoors and sat quietly to the side as the teachers and learned men instructed the monks in the ancient sutras. He honed his mind to a razor-keen awareness through meditation, and eventually slept without dreaming of a thundering flume of whitewater or long, spidery hands that clutched at his throat. Supping on the monastery's modest fare pared his slim form down to a whippet-thin column of lean muscle and hard bone. He had even forgotten his own name, had not spoken a word to anyone in his mother tongue nor heard it spoken—until that very morning, when he heard both in his dreams.
Someone was shouting his name—a long, drawn-out sounding of the first syllable, tinged with despair and panic.
Holmes!
He looked down to see Watson standing precariously on the edge of the wet black cliffs. Once more, a cry that seemed to spend every ounce of effort in his friend's sturdy frame was sent upon the humid air.
Holmes!
His friend's name was on his lips, yet stuck fast in his throat. Watson…
The sun chose that moment to appear from behind a curtain of mist, and something glittered in the tangle of green covering one of the rocks. His friend fell upon the object—a silver cigarette case—and discovered the paper beneath.
Time seemed to stop as his friend read the scant lines of penciled script. After an eternity, Watson folded both papers and case into his coat pocket, buried his face in his hands, and wept.
Holmes awoke before dawn with the echo of Watson's name in his mouth. All around, the monks breathed deeply in the depths of sleep, and Holmes lay for what seemed like a long time in the darkness before rising silently to put on his boots. He picked up his sleeping rug and folded it about his shoulders, and stepped out into the starlight.
He remembered everything now; Moriarty in the sitting room at Baker Street, the worry in Mrs. Hudson's kindly face, the temporary shelter in Watson's consulting room, the sting of the carbolic acid on his knuckles. Mycroft's face and ponderous form came back as well, and then the mad flight to the Continent. Green hills dotted with patches of white snow, huge foreboding crags against azure sky, Watson saying what he thought to be a temporary farewell—it was all there, even the struggle on the cliff face, and the sickening lurch as Moriarty succumbed to the pull of gravity and fell into the raging torrent below.
Holmes turned his face up to the lightening sky. It was midnight or thereabouts in London, the hour when the great metropolis lay deeply asleep under her blanket of dirty white snow, the hour when the hooves of cab horses plodded dully through her streets. The windows of Whitehall and Scotland Yard would be dim and blank, save for lamps that burned at the desks of the diligent. He felt a smile curve his lips the barest inch; perhaps Lestrade or Gregson were yet toiling in their goodhearted yet inefficient way. Mycroft, he had no doubt, was long abed and snoring.
All would be quiet at Baker Street as well, with the shutters of 221B closed tight against the cold and the fire in Mrs. Hudson's kitchen stove banked low with ashes. He could see the good woman herself in his mind's eye, her faded auburn braid trailing down her back from under her kerchief, a candle in her grip as she tapped on the door to young Billy's room. Hopefully she would find the boy asleep, his books tucked away for the night.
And what of Watson? Simple logic told him that the doctor would be snug and safe in the rooms above the surgery, Mary close beside. There was no doubt in Holmes' mind that Watson had dreamt of the falls as he himself had. Sometimes the players changed places as if in a morbid game of musical chairs, and more than once Holmes had felt the cold, wet soil beneath his knees as he threw his voice down the falls, calling Watson!
To Holmes, the name of his friend spoke of steadiness, of solidity, of dependability. Over the years, it had become the symbol of the one and only venture toward another human being that Holmes had ever attempted. Mycroft was family and therefore a part of himself; the same blood sang in their veins, even though the art carried within had manifested itself in different forms. No, Watson had reached out, and in doing so created an unprecedented desire within Holmes to reach back.
A vision of Watson came back to him then: The doctor, clad in tweeds and gaiters, waving a gloved hand carelessly in farewell, the brain behind the blue eyes already leaping ahead to the preparations for making the consumptive patient comfortable. Without warning, Holmes was seized with a longing to see his friend so powerful that it took his breath away.
His finely tuned senses told him someone was near, and he turned quickly to his left. Standing a few steps away was a short, solidly built man with a thin moustache and a sparse goatee. A voluminous length of dark fabric, reflecting dull red in the meager light of dawn, was wound neatly around the man's frame. The dark eyes glittered like obsidian under a forehead as bald as a peeled egg.
"Good morning, anagarika," said the newcomer, in lightly accented English.
"Good morning, Gyawa Rinpoche." Holmes inclined his head in respect. "I'm sorry if I disturbed you. I found I could not sleep."
"It is I who am sorry—sorry that you could not sleep." His Holiness Thubten Gyatso, the 13th Dalai Lama, smiled gently at the tall Englishman. "The brothers hear you call out to your friend. They are concerned for you."
Holmes stood silently for a moment, watching the snow turn from brilliant silver to matte blue. Finally he turned to the Lama, but found he could not meet the wise one's gaze. "I apologize, Gyawa Rinpoche, for disrupting your sacred place," Holmes said quietly. "Perhaps it is best if I move on."
"If you do, you will certainly live up to the name the brothers have given you." There was a glimmer of wry humor in the Lama's eyes. "Anagarika, the one who wanders, yet is not a monk."
Holmes looked toward the horizon, a slight smile on his lean face. After a moment, the smile faded. "I have been wandering a long time," he mused.
"You will know when it is time to turn your steps toward home," said the Lama, "but first you must know yourself." He gestured to the monastery waiting behind them. "Come and learn, and put aside your wandering for a little while longer."
Holmes bowed his head in reverence. "Thank you, Gyawa Rinpoche."
With a warm smile, the Lama turned and headed back into the monastery.
The sun was turning the valley below into a basin of sparkling crystal. Holmes stood looking down at the jumble of snow-frosted buildings, and found his numb fingers slipping inside his warm robe to a small pocket—no more than a square of fabric crudely stitched onto the interior of the robe—to retrieve several much-folded telegram flimsies. The first of the forms dated from the previous May, while the second to last recorded his abrupt end to the conversation with his brother by wire.
17 JUNE 1892
SIR STOP I AM GRATEFUL FOR YOUR COUNSEL AND ASSISTANCE IN YEARS PAST HOWEVER MY PATH LIES ELSEWHERE STOP YOU WILL NOT BE HEARING FROM ME AGAIN STOP
Mycroft's reply was typical: Sharp, commanding, and full of the manipulation that was his trademark both as a high government official and an elder brother to a precocious sibling.
19 JUNE 1892
DEAR SIR STOP HAVE A CARE FOR PROMISES MADE TO A CERTAIN LADY LONG AGO STOP I EXPECT A REPLY SHORTLY END
Sherlock smiled faintly as he reread the message. At the time he had received it in Delhi, it had made him feel claustrophobic, unable to escape the confines of his old life even from halfway around the world. Now, after long months of self-imposed exile, it was somehow reassuring to know he was worth resorting to such a cheap shot.
Of course, that did not mean he was in any way ready to go back to London; just the thought of doing so set his skin to crawling. Yes, he had hurt Watson, he had hurt Mycroft—but those were the lesser of many evils.
You will know when it is time to turn your steps toward home.
Holmes folded up the telegrams and slipped them back inside his robe, then turned and went inside the monastery.