note: Another quick update (this chapter was actually finished yesterday), cause it's short. I'm really excited to write the next few chapters (and beyond), so I'll probably be working on that today... as usual, big thanks to everyone that is reading! You guys are kind of awesome... and I promise that some things (backstory stuff) will start getting clearer eventually. One thing, for the record - there has never been anything, nor will there ever be anything between Swifty and Sofia.

seventeen: sacrifice

It was late morning by the time I woke. I could tell because the room was empty, save for some unexpectedly bright daylight. Apparently the previous night's clarity had managed to last over until morning. Groggily I wondered if you could see the sun outside.

I rose slowly, achy and stiff from sleeping on the hard wooden floor all night. I allowed myself a few minutes sitting on the edge of one of the beds to gather my wits about me and fully wake up, then I shook my head a little and made my way downstairs. Hopefully someone was home and I hadn't been abandoned for the day. I was a little surprised that I hadn't been woken before.

The main room was calm and quiet and so I was a little unprepared for what greeted me as soon as I opened the stair door. The only one around was Dutchy, who was sitting in one of the chairs looking a little uncomfortable. Immediately, I saw why. His shirt was off and his head was tipped back a little so it could rest on the chair back. He was absolutely covered in leeches.

I felt a wave of nausea at the sight and almost turned around to go back up. "Uhhnn?" I said, cautiously taking a seat as far away from him as was possible. I tried to resist counting how many of the dark, fat worms were attached to him and instead focused on meeting his eyes.

"Surprise," he said with good humor.

"You could say that again," I muttered, my mouth turning down. "Dutch what the hell are you doing?"

"Volunteered blood!" he said triumphantly. "Another one of the ingredients, remember?"

I remembered. "Uh, ok, but who said it had to be yours? And that it had to be… ugh…"

"Sofia," he said. "She said mine would be best because, you know, I'm his Love, and because I would be so willing to give it. Volunteered. That's the key word."

"Right… where is Sofia now? And where did you get the leeches?"

He shifted a little, careful not to disturb any of his new friends. "She went out, she left awhile ago. You've been asleep forever, you know that? Boots and Swifty are in the kitchen finding something for lunch. During breakfast we decided to do this whole thing, since you were out cold and we didn't have anything else to do. We tried to wake you."

"Really?"

"Really… it didn't work. Anyway, Swifty went out and found the leeches, no one asked him where, and Sofia got me all set up and then she went to get something; bandages, maybe, I wasn't really listening. She should be back any second."

"Um, sounds good, Dutch," I said, then stood. "I'm, ah, I'm just gonna go see if they need any help in there… ah… shout if you need anything?" I flashed a half hearted smile and ducked quickly into the kitchen, almost knocking Boots over with the door in the process.

"Mornin, sunshine," Swifty said dryly. He was putting together a few thick sandwiches and Boots had been carrying over some cheese.

"That is fucking weird," I said, wide eyed, pointing toward the now closed door. "I did not expect that."

"Well, we tried to warn you," Boots told me, rolling his eyes. "You wouldn't move. But then Dutchy reminded us that we don't need to ask you to do everything – "

I raised an eyebrow, and Swifty snorted.

"- so Sofia was like "alright" and we got started and figured you could catch up… well, if you ever woke up," he added, and beamed innocently up at me. I looked at him skeptically and shook my head.

"Crazy," I muttered. "Damn crazy kids."

"I hope ham is okay," Swifty said.

"Ham is fine," I answered absently. "Where did Sofia go?"

"Out," Swifty said simply, "the real question is, where were you last night?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," I said, and grinned a little.

"We'll see," he said. "We'll see once you tell me. Here, take this…" he handed me a plate and then brushed by to open the door. Once he was in the main room he hesitated a little in front of Dutchy.

"Uh… Dutch, what do you want me to do with this?" he asked, indicating the plate with Dutchy's sandwich.

"Um, I guess put it on my lap," Dutch said. I saw now that he had a leech on the back of each hand. Sofia had really gone all out. I smothered my laughter and returned to my spot on the couch, a good distance from the mess. Swifty grabbed the chair next to me and so Boots was left with the seat adjacent to Dutchy, and he didn't look all that pleased about it. Dutchy, meanwhile, though a little uncomfortable, seemed pretty content.

"They've already grown a lot," he told me.

"I bet," I said through a mouthful of ham and cheese.

"Hey, where did you go last night?" he asked, looking up from admiring the worms.

"Jeez, you too? What, is there some curfew in the house I didn't know about? Forgive me. How did you know I left?"

"Well," Swifty cut in, "for one, I was awake when you came back in, no one remembered you coming in earlier after your, uh, 'smoke,' and oh, yeah, we found a gross bag with dried up chicken feet next to your head this morning."

I gulped. "Yeah, about that…" I said.

"It's ok," Swifty continued as if he hadn't heard me, "we took care of it… I threw the bag out the door and the feet into that pot on the stove, they're bony but they should be good for stock."

I paled, stammered, "I… uh… that…"

"Just kidding," Swifty said with a sardonic smile. I busied myself with a huge bite of my sandwich, annoyed but also extremely relieved.

"Good," I mumbled. "That… that would have been bad."

"So what is it?!" Boots exclaimed. He'd probably been wondering all morning.

"Lucky feet," I said. Now it was my turn to be all smug and triumphant.

"You're kidding me," Dutchy said flatly.

"Nope."

Swifty leaned forward, intrigued, and rested his elbows on his knees. "How'd you know?" he asked with a frown. Either he was confused, or he was irked that I'd figured something out without his help.

"I didn't," I admitted. "And I really did just go out for a smoke. It was clear outside last night, too… right, anyway, this guy approached me and said that One Lung Pete wanted to talk to me. That he had something for me. I didn't really know why Petey wouldn't just come himself, but, oh well, so I followed the guy."

"You do realize that goes against everything you've ever told me about this place, right?" Dutchy asked. I ignored him.

"Wait, who was this?" asked Swifty.

"I don't know. Anyway, I followed him uptown and we went into this… party. In a big building… a big room. I think it might have been underground, but honestly, I'm not sure."

"This story just keeps getting better and better," Swifty retorted. I chose to ignore him, too.

"Well, Petey was there after all. Now, he'd gotten that last elixir alright – oh, that's in my pocket, by the way – but he'd made kind of a hasty decision before I'd arrived… see, he bet the elixir an- ah, against some old rich guy. Meaning, if we won, we got the elixir and Lucky feet, and if we lost, we lost… the elixir."

"Perfect," Dutchy said with smile. "Perfect for you, I mean. What kind of bet?"

"They were stakes on a game… poker – five card draw. Easy, right?" The others shrugged in general agreement. "Wrong. The guy had Luck on his side. Literally."

"What?" said Swifty.

"Lady Luck. She was with this guy. In the flesh."

"That's ridiculous."

"You're tellin me. I didn't know it at the time, I just thought it was a pretty dumb game I'd been tricked into. Fortunately, One Lung Pete did something – I don't know what, and I don't really care – and got the woman out of the room, so I ended up winning." I didn't mention the cheating part. That wasn't really quite necessary.

"I bet you cheated," Swifty said, sitting back in his seat.

I cleared my throat and said, "I did no such thing. And either way, now we have these Lucky feet. And the elixir."

"Whoa, wait – the woman had chicken feet?" Boots asked, his face all screwed up as he tried to figure it out.

"Ah, not quite… she… she had chickens. Petey swore it would work, and she didn't look too happy about giving them up, so if they don't work after all, I guess we'll just have to take it up with him."

"Great," Dutchy grumbled. "If it doesn't work, we'll just come back and gather all this shit all over again. Yeah, Specs will love that."

His comment created an awkward silence that no one was really willing to break. He realized this and looked down, pretending to rest, and I tried to catch Swifty's eye. "What did you really do with the bag?" I asked him.

"Oh, it's still upstairs… why?"

"I have the elixir right here… maybe we could go and add them with the others?"

Swifty nodded and stood, setting his plate down on the table. I followed suit and we headed back up the stairs together.

"You slipped," he remarked as soon as we reached the top.

"What?" I said. I was still on my feet, so far as I could tell.

"In your story. You slipped. So, tell me, what did you leave out?"

"Nothing," I said, giving him a level gaze. He looked right straight back.

"Nothing?"

"Nothing."

He dropped the subject and dropped to a knee. I found the bottle with the last elixir in my pocket and handed it down to him. He set it on the floor and went to work prying up the floorboard, asking, "So, what are you going to do with him, anyway?"

"Wha- who?"

"The kid. Boots." Apparently it didn't matter if I told him the whole story or not. He knew. He moved the wood out of the way and looked up at me. "You gonna keep him forever, or what?"

"We'll get him there when we get him there," I shrugged. "We just haven't really gotten around to it yet. We've been busy, believe it or not. And he's been pretty helpful. He found Sofia's locket, and the ingredient list, too."

"No kidding," Swifty said sarcastically and fit the bottle down in with our other objects. The feet – still in their paper bag – went next, on top of it all.

"He's a good kid," I said pointlessly. He hammered the board back in with the heel of his hand, then stood and brushed his palms off on his pants.

"I'm sure he is."

That's about when we heard the crash. We exchanged a glance and practically fought to get out of the room and down the stairs.

At first the only thing I saw was Boots, standing wide eyed and frozen in front of the fireplace. He knew we were there but his gaze never moved, he just started shaking his head. "I didn't do nothin. I just turned around. I didn't do nothin."

I took three quick steps forward so I could see over the back of the couch and there was Dutchy on the floor and shaking so bad he was moving the chair he'd just fallen from. He was deathly white and his eyes had rolled back in his head and his skin and his clothes and the floor were covered in blood and I just stood there with one hand reaching out and felt panic set in and take over right there behind my eyes.