Disclaimer: Crimson Peak belongs to Guillermo del Toro and The Lodgers belongs to Brian O'Malley.

Summary: Sean Nally was supposed to die that fateful night when he tried to help Rachel escape her fate. He was supposed to be the price of her freedom. So why and how did he find himself in Allerdale Hall, far from home, serving the Sharpes?

Author's note: Please note that my first language is not English, it's French. If you find any mistakes or weird sentence, let me know, so I can better myself. While I know I am almost fluent and while I do read after myself and use Grammarly to help, sometimes, a mistake can pass by.

Entwined Souls

Chapter 9

Despite her fatigue, Rachel was adamant on staying awake, fighting her closing eyes, Sean's regular breathing being the only thing that managed to keep her away from Morpheus' arms. It sounded so painful she could feel her own lungs burning. The marks on his neck were now cold, slightly vanishing away. She took a sip from her now ice-cold tea, trying to stretch, her body aching from her nap in her seat. Shivering, she regretfully left the warm embrace of her blanket to revive the slowly dying fire in the fireplace. A soft knock on the door startled her. Lucille's graceful form appeared as she opened it.

"I was just checking on you. How is he?" She asked

"Slightly better, I think." Rachel said. "His fever seems at the start of breaking down."

"Do you want me to watch over him so you can get some sleep?"

The young woman smiled at her cousin.

"I'll be fine. But thank you very much. I appreciate it."

"I'll bring you some more tea, then. It's the least I can do."

"Thank you so much."

Lucille left her, not without looking at Sean before she did. Rachel actually liked Lucille but she was very hard to read, leaving her always puzzled as her true feelings and thoughts. There also was something dangerous about her. She reminded her of the belladonna flower: beautiful but deadly. Rachel never really knew how to really act around Lucille, always careful. Thomas was way easier to live with. He was so open, so warm, so friendly... And so innocent. She knew it was weird to think that about a man grown, Thomas certainly wasn't a saint, no man from the aristocracy really was. No one really was except babes on their mothers' breasts. But while Lucille was a diary with a lock, Thomas was an open book, his posture, his expressions, his eyes, everything gave him away and the person he gave away was someone genuine, friendly and to her own astonishment, tortured. She didn't know why. She didn't really meddle into it though. She was family, true, but above all, she was just a guest and unlike Sean, who worked in exchange for the food on the table and the roof over his head, she was just another mouth to feed who didn't add anything precious in the household. Her situation was precarious and she had to be careful, to walk on eggshells. Sean slightly moaned in discomfort, turning around in his sleep, before he seemed to find a more agreeable position to sleep in. Curled in his sheets, he seemed so weak and fragile it was scary. It was weird to think like that, especially when they had known each other for a few weeks only by now, but when he had shown up in her life, when he stood up to Dessie when he was bullying her, he had turned into a rock on which she could lean on, even mentally, to give herself hope and courage.

"Well, according to him, it wasn't our first meeting."

Sean had once told her, during a sleepless evening, that they had met before, she simply was too young back then to remember it and he had connected the dots only on the day he returned to the village after he saw her again, learning she was the girl of the mansion and her name. According to him, when he was seven and her four, he had accompanied his mother to the entrance of the manor, helping her carrying huge baskets of sheets and cleaned clothes. She had warned him on not entering the house and he had remained behind her the whole time. A woman had opened, Rachel's perfect lookalike, and behind her leg, a small curious girl with a thumb in her mouth, staring at her with her big expressive eyes. It had been the only time he had been to Loftus Hall, hence why he remembered it so well.

She walked to the bed, adjusted the sheets around his shoulders, noticing that, even asleep, he wasn't really peaceful, his face showing pain. He reminded her of a hurt animal, hiding away to lick his wounds, of a small puppy, lost, trying to get warm while desperately waiting for his mother to find him and lead him to the pack. Her eyes were drawn to the finger marks on his pale skin.

"Who did that to you?" She whispered "Father? Mother? A ghost of one of the staff murdered by my ancestors? Why are they doing that to you?"

She felt powerless and this sensation crushed her. Sean had saved her. She wanted to return the favour but right now, he was laying in front of her, suffering and she could not do anything about it.

"I'm so sorry..." She quietly said.

She felt tears burning her eyes, she quickly dried them with the back of her hand. She wasn't going to be a weak and sobbing damsel in distress. She had been that already and it had almost cost Sean his life. She stared at the moon outside.

"I know you are here." She started. "I know you are haunting Sean because he swallowed some of the water from the cellar as you tried to murder him. And now, you are making him sick for a reason I still need to discover. Don't be a coward and face me! Face the last heiress of your cursed family who broke free! If you need to have revenge, have it on me, not on the help!"

The fire in the fireplace flickered and the room suddenly felt icy. A small fog even came off her lips as she breathed out. She felt a presence behind her. Turning around, she discovered her brother. The ghost of her twin brother, standing there, pale, translucent, smiling at her with such fondness she found herself smiling back.

"Edward..."

"Rachel!"

She could see how he yearned to hug her and how it destroyed him inside to know he couldn't, not really.

"You came!"

"Well, you called."

"I need your help." She explained. "Someone from our family is haunting Sean, putting his life in jeopardy for a reason I cannot grasp."

His smile dropped.

"Don't you know who he really is?" He carefully asked

"He's from Wyatt Nally's family. The man who spied on our ancestors when they moved in Loftus Hall."

"He's his direct heir. Our family showed me their past."

"How did they?"

"We're not on the same existence plan, you and I. Anyway, they showed me. Sean is Wyatt's direct descendant and heir. And as if that was not enough, he is Wyatt's exact replica. Wyatt destroyed our ancestors' world in England by spying on them while in Ireland and his doppelganger destroyed our world, sending you back in England. How ironic."

"Sean's innocent! I'm sure he does not even know his ancestor is linked to ours! I don't know who haunts him but please, tell him to stop!"

"I can't."

"You can't or you don't want to."

"Both."

Before she could even muster a reply, he added:

"I'm the one who haunts him."

Edward could see the betrayal and disgust in his sister's eyes and it hurt him.

"I thought you were sorry they took him..."

"I didn't know he'd betray you, even after I saved his ass."

Puzzled for a moment, she realized the voice Sean had heard in the cellar, begging for his life, was Edward himself.

"As I was dying, the ghosts came to me. Some of them. I asked them to set him free if it wasn't too late. You were saved and according to them, you'd certainly go back home as Life is just that twisted. I told them he could protect you. I had no idea they'd send him directly here, in Allerdale."

"He betrayed me, you said?"

"You should read his mind! You rule his entire thoughts. And yet, he wants to let you go. He won't fight for you. He won't even fight the order to have you. Why should I be glad he'd let you go when the only reason he's alive is that I said so?"

Rachel was looking at him with all the contempt she was able to gather.

"You sound like a petty child." She spat. "Don't you think I'm aware of some of his feelings? I share them! I wouldn't fight either if it meant he's happy because I bloody don't deserve him!"

"He doesn't deserve you. All he's good for now is serve you. After all, Wyatt served a Sharpe. If he even tries to leave you to have his own life, I'll take his heart in my hands and squeeze until all of the blood in his arteries drown his lungs."

"I thought we were past that when we last talked when you were alive... But even dead, you are still under their curse. I pity you, really."

He seemed about to reply when someone knocked on the door. He vanished as quickly as he could.

"Come in!"

Lucille opened, carrying a tray with hot tea and some biscuits. And for one, her face was just like Thomas': an open book where Rachel could read shock.

"What is it?" She asked

Lucille quickly composed herself.

"I thought I saw something. Just a shadow. Drink while it's still hot."

"Thank you."

As Lucille closed the doors, her eyes hardened.

Sean Nally was dangerous indeed:

Not only did he carry her secret, but he also brought a new ghost in this already haunted place.

She'd have to tell Thomas about it.

To Be Continued