Weakness Part Two
Disclaimer: I do not own Sweeney Todd or Mrs. Lovett or Toby (even though his name's just mentioned, ha)
She awoke to find the room cold and the fire dead. For a moment she tried to collect her bearings, dark eyes flickering around the familiar space as she began to relax, for some reason her heart racing in her chest. Her gaze roved over the empty fireplace, the last little embers that managed to survive the night still burning like tragic little stars far beneath the hearth, trying to cling to any amount of heat. She doubted that they would last long.
Her neck hurt, and she was not yet aware as to why. It was the first sensation she felt upon waking, and slowly raising her hand, she was startled to feel not only a small cut in the pale skin above her jugular, but also a small amount of crusted dried blood trailing in thin streaks down her neck.
Mrs. Lovett did not even have to think to know who was to blame.
The thought of Sweeney Todd doing this to her in her sleep—trying to kill her she was sure—was simply unnerving. She had always known that Mr. Todd did not like her, but she had foolishly never believed that he would hurt her.
As long as they were in their diabolical scheme together, he could not afford to lose her; after all, she took care of the evidence, and without her he would have surely been caught by now, certainly by the same man he had sworn revenge against. Through this she had felt invincible against him, immune to his threats. He could never risk killing her…
But as Mrs. Lovett began to scratch the dried blood, winced at the sharp pain in the cut, she wondered what had changed. He had threatened her before, but to actually harm her…
What had she done? She could not recall doing anything extreme that would insult him and provoke him into injuring her, let alone try to take her life. She had no doubt that killing her had been his intention, and she should be rejoicing that she was alive, but…
She couldn't; not so long as she knew that he had been the one to try to kill her. To die from the one you love…It would not have been so horrible a death; she mused, and hated herself for thinking of such a thing. She wanted to be positive, especially for him, wanted to be the light in his so dark world. And yet here she was, contemplating that ever tempting death…
She had to get up. With a groan she did so, grabbing her neck as a sharp pain went through it as she twisted it hearing the satisfying sound of her bones in her neck crack.
She knew that she had to stop puzzling over Mr. Todd; the man was just too impossible to understand sometimes, and she knew that it would be wise just to quit. And yet…As she entered the bake shop she barely noticed Toby smile and say good morning to her, too far drawn into her thoughts, as she usually was, on Sweeney Todd.
The man was…She had no words to describe him, nothing that fit. She could say that he was a monster, but she did not think that—he was just damaged, as all people were when she really thought about it. Could one seriously go through life without getting hurt at least once? It was impossible, but the hurt Sweeney Todd received was far worse than most. Life…if he was to be considered a monster, it could be said that he was only that way as a product from life. A cold, unforgiving world…
She could hate him for trying to kill her, for the stinging of the cut in her neck, but she knew that it was futile, and in some ways, in the darkest part of her, Mrs. Lovett thought that perhaps she did deserve it, that blade to her throat. She could by no means be considered a normal human being after all, not about what she was about to do.
Speaking of which… The bake house was hot, as usual, when she entered it, the fire that never died, that fire from hell, burning bright and startling in the center of the room. She approached it quietly, staring at it in an almost transfixed way. This fire that consumed her life, as deadly and beautiful as Sweeney Todd…
The door creaked on its hinges as she opened it, and the fire burned at her, the heat curling around her skin in a searing caress that sent chills down her spine. She should have been afraid of it, but instead she was entranced by the deadly way the fire danced, hypnotized by its heat. It was a deadly thing, just like the man that seemed to control it, seemed to embody it…Was that why she loved it? All for Sweeney Todd?
Most things in her life she loved only for him…
The pies were ready, having been quietly steaming all night long above the dancing flames, keeping them fresh. As Mrs. Lovett leaned forward to grab them, smiling slightly to herself, something stopped her, a familiar thing—
A blade to her throat.
Immediately she stilled, eyes widening on the leaping fire in front of her, sparking with the embers Mrs. Lovett was sure were sparking the exact same way in Sweeney's eyes.
She wanted to say that this unexpected attack was surprising, startling even, but she knew it would be a lie; Sweeney Todd always finished the job, and let no victim get away twice.
"Mrs. Lovett…" his voice was a deadly purr, the cool metal digging into the pale, blemished skin of her throat just as before, deepening the thin cut until a thin trickle of blood managed to work its way out, falling in a perfect streak down to her shoulder.
Under the pressure of the blade, to prevent her jugular from being slashed open at that very moment, Mrs. Lovett had to step back away from the raging fire back into the cold room, shivering as she tore her eyes slowly away from the flames to trail them up, always up, to the black blazing coals that served as the wicked man's eyes.
"M-Mr. Todd…" She did not sound surprised, or shocked, or scared; she could no longer force herself to express emotions she could never feel around him. The charade was up, and it only served to make his eyes alight even more, his mouth, those kissable lips, twisting into a dark scowl.
She knew what he was thinking—how dare this woman not feel what he wanted her to feel? It made no sense to him, as much as it made no sense to her. She had every reason to fear him, to hate him, and yet…She did the opposite.
What was it that Sweeney had called her, all those nights ago when their lives had been but a dance of death? A bloody wonder…
That she could truly, quite literally, be.
"Mrs. Lovett…!" He hissed her name, a dangerous sound that meant death to all that heard it.
In a way she could compare it to a siren's call, so beautiful and dark, yet oh so deadly…
"Do you know why I'm down here Mrs. Lovett?" he calmly asked, and she did not jump as his hand, that rough cold appendage, reached out to squeeze her bare arm, and she felt shivers overtake her body at the contact.
She did not look away from him, her face closed as she took on the illusion that she did not care, so long as she was near him. She did not care…poor Mrs. Lovett wished not to admit to even herself that it was far more than an illusion, and that word was false in every sense.
"To find me, Mr. Todd, I'm sure, and found me yeh did. Now what is it you want?"
She noticed the change that overcame him at her words, his already pale complexion turning almost gray and ashen as all the blood seemed to drain from his face. His grip on her arm tightened until it was painful, but she did not say anything; she hardly noticed, too caught up in the startling glint of something other than malice reflected to her in his dark eyes.
It was something she could not identify, an obscure emotion that fit so entirely out of place with everything—the situation, the razor at her throat, the madman known as Sweeney Todd—that she had to gasp. Never before would she have thought…
Her gasp had seemed to snap him out of whatever strange emotion he had fallen into, and before she could further try to decipher that odd look or try to understand how it connected to her question, Mrs. Lovett found herself hurled towards the open furnace, the flames burning bright and blinding in her eyes as she fell forward, a silent scream on her lips…
Only to be caught roughly by the neck by an enraged Sweeney Todd. She gasped and winced at how his fingernails dug into her tender flesh, the creamy skin glowing ghostly in the flickering firelight. She could no longer see Sweeney as he moved around behind her, keeping a hold of her shoulder and neck as he raised his other hand to place it on the slowly opening vein pulsating at her neck.
"What do I want Mrs. Lovett? Is that what you just asked me? Well my dear, you should know by now what I want… Revenge, pain…" He dragged the blade slowly across her throat to create another blood trail, the red droplets shining like actual rubies in the firelight.
"Why is it Mrs. Lovett, that you're the only one that drips true rubies? I've seen so any fall, but you…You…You…" He growled into her ear, his hot breath, smelling faintly of whisky, burning into the back of her face, her ear as he whispered into it, igniting her body in flames. She was engulfed, and there was no way to escape now, with the fire on both sides of her…
But she never wanted to escape, and never would.
"You're so goddamn different it's infuriating. I've wanted to slit your throat for months now, but…The opportunity never seemed good enough. But fire…Fire suits you love, don't you think? It suits us both, creatures from hell preying on the innocents, bloody wonders…"
He stopped to stare into the flames with her for a moment, and she was still, limp, and nearly dead in her heart in his arms. She did not say anything, waiting for him to continue not out of patience, but out of some form of shock. Sweeney Todd was actually talking to her, revealing at least something, and his voice…
His voice…
He was not growling at her, not threatening her, but actually whispering in her ear, his voice, that dark, soft voice…It held nothing but unrestrained, complete longing and, if she was not mistaken, deep despair, all of which he had carried with him for so long…
"You know what my weakness is Mrs. Lovett? I only have one real weakness that I'll ever allow, and only one, simply because I cannot get rid of it, no matter how hard I try. It's never going to leave, forever dripping rubies…Do you want to know what my weakness is, Nellie?"
She was struck dumb, blind, and dead; she could not seem to hear him, the roaring of the fire in her ears too loud. A weakness…
"Weakness…?"
Her voice was drowned out in the flames, lost in the pit that they existed in. With a growl he pulled her head back by her wild auburn locks—fire in their own right—and the razor trailed down, glittering with her blood, as hard lips, coarse from so much pain, slammed into those of blood red.
And the fire burst into an inferno. Mrs. Lovett couldn't breathe, a helpless victim as Sweeney Todd ravaged her mouth, that razor skimming constantly over the skin of her throat, the lick of a flame ready to consume her, turn her to ash. And to it all she obliged, indulging Sweeney's weakness as she succumbed to her own, all barriers dropping as the line blurred, the blood fell, and the flames danced.
And then, just like that he was gone, the taste of whisky still lingering on her tongue as Sweeney Todd left her panting before that furnace, kneeling before the flames. The razor, encrusted with her rubies would be all that he would keep of the event; the memory that he would slowly incinerate through that craving for revenge, the constant intake of alcohol.
The Devil after all, could bear no weaknesses…
Mrs. Lovett never mentioned the event to him again, keeping a scarf around her neck to cover the obvious wounds. No one asked, and Sweeney never looked; Mrs. Lovett knew that he regretted it, indulging his weakness, but she did not care.
For that day, that moment before the fire where everything was highlighted, she had gained a powerful piece of information, information that would keep her going, keep her sustained in smiling no matter what. And that was the simple truth:
Sweeney Todd was only mortal; how could he not have faults?
I hope you guys liked it, because I basically typed it all up in one night on a random writing spree. It didn't really turn out at all like I expected it to, cuz I was thinking of having Mrs. Lovett confront Sweeney, but…I guess I'll just use that idea for another one shot, ha! Please Review!