Notes:

Hi again, lovely readers. It's wild mystery time.

And as always, if you see something grammatically off, let me know. I always appreciate it. I'm also not a Victorianist, nor am I a biologist. I just pretend to be. ;)

Jezabel

Cain rushes to the corpse, in that characteristic, foolhardy fashion of his, and I take my leave of the matter. I have little desire to deal with Scotland Yard right now, nor do I feel particularity inclined to humoring Cain with yet another investigation. Hardly caring how suspicious my absence will be, I escape to another room, far away from the screams and commotion. That horrible man's tale of blood sport has made me sick; I can hardly force back the terror that that innocent must have felt. But I forget myself—this is how the nobility amuses itself.

Still, I cannot shake the feeling that I know him from somewhere; a half-memory tugs at me, but it falls like water through my hands. And still I wonder if it is within my power to simply ensure an accident for him. A slip in the dark. Cut brakes. A fall from his horse. All perfectly tragic acts of God. What a shame. What a loss.

A terrarium, tucked away in the darkened room, catches my eye. Against the glass, tiny plants, paper butterflies, and cold ponds make a perfect microcosm of God's divine order. (But where do I fit within that order? I am still a murderer, with my father's blood on my hands, and the blood of a thousand animals.) And in that perfect order, a longing for Father strikes me again, a sudden pang; his love was a constant fire. If I touched it, I could only blame myself for my impetuousness. And yet, in its radiant destruction, it begged to be touched. I am not supposed to long for such a love, but I do, for I have not changed. I will always be half in love with him, I fear. I have a half a mind to get up to some foolishness with another man, just to let him use me badly, if only because it will bring me closer to that fire. (Such men are easily procured. Too easily.)

And yet, this love that I cannot abandon now co-exists with what Cain has given me. He is a variable that I cannot solve, for even as I see the workings of Father in his posture, his carelessly ruffled hair, the tilt of his porcelain jaw, he stays within a role that no one can fault him for. I, on the other hand, only wait for a question that has already been answered. Sometimes, I think it is caught in his throat, like a snare, like a stone. A stone that will weigh both of us down. Some days, I wonder if it would be easier just to weigh down my pockets with stones than endure such a trial. I had hoped that time might have returned, or at least softened, my heart, that if I would only wait, then I should find everything restored. What a foolish thought. A space still remains there, the most important piece taken away. I cannot bridge the distance between what I am and what I might be.

Mary grows older, into an unchild, while Cain gradually takes on Father's form, line by line—and I? I am unchanging. Perhaps it is by my own hand, my hesitations conspiring against me, but I no longer care. I cannot decide what to do in Father's absence. Cain has given me a life that many men would not be dissatisfied with, but one devoid of a purpose. Do I take my duty towards him as my new purpose? We are undeniably close, perhaps closer than is proper, but in due time, he will inherit a new life, one of small governing and small concerns, and I will be alone again.

(There is another thought that accompanying this one, but I cannot bear it. It is too terrible an outcome, I fear.)

"Jezabel?" My blood runs cold, as Father—unmistakably Father—calls out to me again. "Jezabel? Where are you?"

I clutch the windowsil, half afraid that Father has returned to punish me from my failings, and half elated to know him again. I cannot decide whether or not to throw myself out the window, or face him and repent of my sins. I will never leave him if I see him again, and for some reason, the knowledge of that certainty pains me. Footsteps resound behind the door—my heart stills from fear. He has come to finish what he began—come to take everything away. It is not a question of how Father has been made flesh again, but an inevitability. Father is beyond the bonds of the flesh, a constant in this world of blood and terror. It has only been a matter of time before he exacted his judgement. The rational part of me argues for something more sinister, a fractured mind, but this is so terribly real.

It must be real.

"Jezabel?" Again, Father. His voice is closer now, to my left this time, instead from behind the shelves. "Jezabel, it's not like you to keep me waiting."

He is here, I am certain of it. It's too late, and I cannot decide—fear has turned my mind to water. It's too late, and Cassian is bleeding in front of me, and my sisters writhe in their own intestines. It's too late, and I am bound to the man whose love will destroy me, and my hesitation has ruined any chance of escape. It's too late, and—

"Jezabel?"

Candlelight awakens the room, but I see only Cain, all boyish excitement. It requires all my effort not to slump onto the floor, and I barely conceal my trembling. I cannot suppress an exhale of relief at what is distinctly Cain's voice. Unmistakably Cain's. He gives me a strange look at my state, and I pray that he chalks it up to the aftereffects of that horrible man's story. Although concern briefly shows on his face, he quickly abandons it, in that joyfully flustered state that only a murder can evoke.

"I've been looking all over for you," he begins, launching into a breathless retelling, but none of his words register with me. Instead I cannot recall now if the voice was really Father's or Cain's. Did I confuse the two? I never have before. Was Father truly here or—my blood runs cold as I consider the other option, having ruled out the presence of another person in the room, for I saw no one. Delusions. Madness. An abrupt decline.

Noticing my lack of engagement, Cain regards me closely. "Is everything alright?"

I hesitate. If I tell him, then there will be talk I don't want. Talk of madness and sin. And—

(Delusions.)

I disguise my fear with petulance. "Awfully convenient of you to care now," I retort.

"Oh," he says, drawing back in surprise. A haughty stare then graces his features; despite myself, I am immensely annoyed that it only strengthens his beauty. "I suppose you're still upset with me."

I only cross my arms in response, refusing to look at him any more. I am almost beginning to persuade myself into a state of anger. Good. It will be better for both of us if he thinks that. And I cannot deny that I still entertain the ranklings of anger over his little charade.

"Oh, do come to your senses," Cain continues. "Brothers quarrel, but they never mean anything by it."

I give him a cold stare—one of my best, usually reserved for Cassandra's propositions.

"Oh, do come on." He acts like a small child now, frustrated with my sulkiness. "There's a murder afoot. A ghastly murder. How can you just stand there when we have records to pull and suspects to charm?" Retrieving a small vial from his pocket, he shakes it slightly so that its contents—coagulated blood, most likely—shift. "And tests to run."

While I cannot deny that particular appeal of making the body yield its secrets in the way that only I can, I cannot placate my anger towards him for his most infuriating behavior at dinner. "The last time, you got yourself shot," I point out, coldly. "In the shoulder."

Cain shrugs. "An occupational hazard."

"You're so careless." I find a perverse comfort in my anger, as it will raise fewer questions than fear, and give into it. "You're the selfish one here. You fly from crime to crime, if only because it will distract you. You crave that sensation of setting things to right, even though, even though—" Even though neither of us can set anything to right. I can only watch as the tides take back the little house on the sand that I cannot call my own. My hands grip the window ledge, tendons rigid with tension.

Something (melancholy, disappointment?) moves across his face. "Maybe I have been selfish to ask this of you."

And that note of quiet sadness drives me into a panic—not out of empathy but the realization that he wanted to be with me, that he was looking forward to it, even. I cannot bear that: if I become too accustomed to his presence, he will be taken away, even if Father is not around to make good on his word. It will happen, somehow. (Maybe next time, it will be a critical vein, or a lung—or the brain.) Everything has an end.

Confusion registers on his face, and he fumbles for the words he won't say, because he knows, as I do, that only children believe those words. He remains there, in a state of inaction, his fingers wringing out the words he can't bring himself to say. (And for a moment, Father stands before me, bloody and amused. "What am I to do with you?")

What a pathetic pair we make. Both enslaved by the past.

This paradoxical urge to push him away, even as I want him closer, resurfaces, and it occurs to me just how easy it is to provoke the dreaded end into existence. As easy as a few nasty, unspeakable words. But do I dare ruin this? Or by doing so, do I escape the inevitable reveal that his brotherly affection was all a show, meant to confound and entrap? Merely a trick of the light and just as substantial?

I can hardly breathe now. I force my lungs to work, but the air seems to have thickened into a consistency not unlike treacle. And for a moment, I am seized with the sudden fear that my lungs are filling with liquid again, like they did when I was still alive and did not know what had become of my sisters. (Why does this fear bother me now, when it would have been welcomed earlier?) I struggle vainly for a few minutes.

When my breath has steadied again, I find that Cain's hand now rests next to mine, as if he is fearful that I will reject him again. What a strange relationship we have. I had never thought him the type to care deeply about anyone besides himself—and his dead servant—but now, finding myself within his inner circle, there's almost a bit of an abandoned child to him, forever searching for the love that Father should have given him, had Father been a different man. When I am angry with him, that trait is pathetic, weak, and juvenile, but when I know a certain peace, it feels almost sad, perhaps even a little recognizable, and I do not dwell on it for long.

(I wonder, not for the first time, what he must think of me. I am no replacement for Riff, nor I am an adequate brother of any sort. I've spent so much time alone and apart, with Father, with Delilah, with the corpses, that I am not sure how one acts within a family. There are roles, I am certain of this, but I do not fit any of them.)

His mouth opens, full of questions he won't ask, questions with deep, bloody roots, questions that are too heavy and too much to bear, when he reconsiders and puts them aside. His fingers curl on the ledge, as if he wants to clasp my hand, but I know he won't without my say. He watches me, hesitating. Aware that what we have is only glass. Still glass, after so much time.

"Do you think it was Delilah?" he asks, quietly, so that only I can hear. Even though we are alone. Perhaps, he fears that Father might have been resurrected.

I shake my head. "It's far too clumsy of a murder."

He raises an eyebrow in jest. "Clumsy? That's a strong judgement on your part."

Against my resolve, I laugh a little. "It is remarkably clumsy. And badly covered up."

Cain smirks. "You ought to know."

The moonlight falls across his face, competing with the shadows of shivering leaves, and the sight bewitches me. I had often heard that he possessed an otherworldly beauty, not quite human in its sharp elegance.

"I can't run the blood analysis myself," he begins carefully. "And I hate to think what else I have overlooked."

I sigh, recognizing that I have been a victim of his charms. "You're luckier than you deserve." Still, my acquiescence does not come without a price, as brother dearest will soon learn.

"I know," he replies. Still that insufferable smirk, as he retrieves his ace in the hole—a small green parrot feather. "There's a parrot involved."

My hand instinctively goes towards the bread I keep on me, just in case I run into some of God's creatures, and Cain nearly laughs. "Jezabel, this is why we can't find you a valet. You keep enough bread on you to feed a small battalion of geese."

"Better to be prepared, than not."

"Indeed," Cain agrees, only half serious. Only those eyes reminding me that it is not Father who stands before me. A little chill runs down my back at the prospect that one day, he will wear Father's face. Will I, then, find myself unable to leave him, even if I summoned the will to? Already, distinguishing between him and Father has proven difficult. Was that his voice I mistook for Father? Or was it Father's? I am not so certain anymore.

I set aside my foolish thoughts, but my heart does not.

Cain

The guests depart the next morning, equally shocked and appalled at recent events. I hardly have a moment to myself, to prepare for the day's investigations, before Mary corners me in the hallway, her little arms crossed in annoyance. Still, even her frustration with me proves endearing.

"Big Brother," she begins in that telltale tone, "am I correct in the knowledge that a murder has taken place on these very premises?"

Reluctantly, I nod. "It's quite unfortunate."

"Oh, I knew it! Who do you think it was?" From the depths of her lacy pockets, she retrieves a magnifying glass. "I'll help you look for clues! I read a lot of Sherlock Holmes. We just have to look in the vents, or on the cuffs, or—" Her face falls when I shake my head at her enthusiasm. "Oh, Big Brother," she whines. "I'm so bored already."

I shake my head. "No. It's too dangerous for a child."

First, an willful retort forms on her lips, unvoiced, and then an unbearable sadness moves across her face; she looks at me as if she is seeing me for the first time. As if there is some distance she cannot bridge. As if she has realized that she is the one consigned to waiting faithfully—the one left behind. Too dear to risk and therefore left in the cabinet to watch the rest of the world carry on. It almost breaks my resolve, to see her so.

"I'll bring you back a doll," I promise, but that does not alleviate her state.

She hesitates, wringing her hands. "Just swear you'll return."

"Of course."

She gives me a long, searching look, as if she knows something I do not. "You wouldn't leave me, right?"

"Never." I hold her close to me, suddenly afraid of losing her again. "I will always come back."

"You must be careful," she whispers. "Oh, do be careful."

"I'll have Jezabel with me."

At her worried expression, I realize that he is the source of her fears. I exhale a breath of worry. "You have nothing to fear. I'll tell you everything when you're older." My words ring false, as I know that I entertain those same fears.

"I'm a year older," she protests. "I am a part of this family as well, and it seems unfair that you should keep such a secret from me."

"I'll tell you when you are a great lady, with a beautiful house of her own." I make sure to keep my voice light.

Frustration replaces fear on her face. "I'm not a child anymore."

"Of course not." I soften. "Go spend some time with Cousin Rose. It's not good for you to be constantly surrounded by men."

Recognizing that her cause is lost, at least for today, Mary reluctantly trudges towards the drawing room, her arms held close in worried contemplation. A final, long look before she retreats, as she is trying to remember every detail of my face.

It unnerves me to see her so upset, but I say nothing on it. I quietly curse myself for not providing her with a better upbringing. In seven years, she will be presented at court, eligible for marriage, and yet I fear that she will be an outcast, a black sheep, with her morbid interests and melancholy tendencies.

My heart heavy, I slip into the hallway, where the only telephone is located. Although the Hargreaves manor has one, such devices are relatively uncommon, so I was surprised to learn that Cousin Rose had one installed. It, I suppose, is a sign of modernity, yet another indication of the Age of Progress that we live in, but it only reminds me of Riff. How he would telephone the hospital to obtain medical records or make arrangements. And I am struck by the overwhelming loss that Riff's death has left me.

I can no longer recall his voice, its mellifluous tones. Only the sensation of love and security remains, and I am beside myself with grief. That I, of all people, should lose my only protector seems too cruel a fate. I want nothing more than to preserve his memory, but my wishes fall on the deaf ears of God. I collect myself, shakily, because I have no other option; I must carry on, despite this. The morning light on the pictures blinds me in my grief, and I steady myself near the telephone.

Listening to my brother make calls, however, is always a strange affair. He slips so easily into another persona, that for a moment, I forget what he is really like. All sweet earnestness and concern. Sometimes, I wonder if this is his real personality and the other one merely a guise, but then I am not so sure. Perhaps his acting is only his guess of what he would have been, had Father not had a thousand plans.

It strikes me as painfully sad.

"Yes, Doctor Anderson, it's Doctor Hathaway." Jezabel surveys me coldly, deciding on a plan, and with a sinking heart, I know he is about to exact revenge on me, in his own petty way. "Yes, my assistant—Dorian—could use some practice, and I hear you have Lord Pendleton's autopsy."

I panic a little, knowing only what I have gleaned from Riff's textbooks, but surely I can pass as knowledgeable, if only for an hour. No doubt, they will content themselves with small talk, maybe a brief show of my learning, and then complete the autopsy themselves. Surely my brother cannot be so vindictive as to botch an autopsy just to prove a point.

As Jezabel lapses into an attentive silence, the morning light catches itself in his hair. From a distance, it all appears to be equally greyed, but up close, dark grey blends with ash, and even perhaps a bit of blond. He gives me a questioning glance at my lingering stare, and I shrug, diverting my attention to less complicated matters. The murder, for instances. That promises a satisfying diversion.

"Five o'clock," he announces to me, hanging up the phone. "You'll be doing the majority of the autopsy."

"What? I haven't the slightest idea how!"

He smiles nastily. "How unfortunate."

The carriage ride is spent trying to teach me anatomy, but years of practice cannot be done in a matter of hours, and I enter the morgue with only the barest notion of how to hold a scalpel without injuring myself.

Perhaps, Jezabel actually won't go through with his petty plan, having already humiliated me with my lack of understanding in the carriage. Surely, there must be some vestige of professionalism that demands that a job be done well.

I shake hands with the other doctor, a pleasant fellow about my brother's age. I wonder if they went to medical school together. Then again, the fact that he used an alias suggests that they did not. There is so much in Jezabel's past that I am not privy to, and for some reason, that pains me. At the sight of the corpse, however, my thoughts turn to the task at hand. Donning the heavy apron, as coarse as a butcher's smock, I steel myself, all the while praying my brother comes to his senses before I ruin any chance of gathering evidence.

A certain calm comes over my brother, at the familiar world of medical science, a pleasant change from the unexplained agitation of last night, but, being confronted with the impossible task of feigning experience, I do not contemplate it for long. Jezabel opens the corpse with three lazy incisions, forming an inverted 'Y', and then takes a seat next to the other doctor, a darkly satisfied cast to his demeanor. Left alone, I fumble with the tools, aware that my performance is being judged, and begin my grotesque task. Given that the liver processes the body's toxins, I decide to start there, peeling back the cold skin.

"He's quite green at this," Doctor Anderson remarks, slight worry on his face.

"Very," Jezabel replies with the faintest of smirks.

I fake an abashed smile, knowing that this is Jezabel's way of getting revenge on me for my conduct at the dinner. On one hand, I am quite pleased that it affected him so; on the other, I do not relish being elbow-deep in a corpse, with very little direction. From here, everything looks the same—all discolored muck. I struggle for a few more minutes, wondering if I have uncovered the liver yet, and Jezabel finally tells me to check the stomach in a slightly bored tone. Another few minutes pass in agony, as I hear more concerned whispers about my ineptness.

Jezabel finally sends the other doctor away with a promise of filling out the report himself, and with a self-satisfied smile, he joins me at the autopsy table.

"This," he says as he points to an indistinguishable, slimy organ to the left of my hand, "is the stomach." He slits it open carelessly, as if by rote, and I almost vomit to watch it spill open. Unaffected, he delicately removes a sodden piece of the stomach, examining it in the light. I am beginning to become irked with his sudden change into tight-lipped mystery, when I recognize the faintest of lines of the piece. The veins of a leaf.

"Someone poisoned him with a derivative of cyanide." My mind spins furiously, as we return to familiar ground. "A plant. White clover. Cassava root. That accounts for the bitter almond scent."

Jezabel shakes his head, before resuming his grisly tour of the stomach contents. "This is not a poisoning, with cyanide or otherwise. The body would present differently." He frowns, as he begins to play with the ends of his hair, deep in thought. Bending then around his fingers, and streaking them with dark, shiny clots. It's half mesmerizing, and half nauseating to watch.

"This is not the cause of death, but then why go to the effort of pretending to poison him by faking the smell?" he continues. "I suppose the answer must lie in an analysis of his blood, then. It's a sloppy murder, to say the least."

"An amateur, then?"

He muses a little more. "Get a dish to preserve the sample. We'll need to determine its origins."

I stare at him, perplexed. "A plate?"

"A petri dish." A note of frustration creeps into his voice.

And I am struck with the understanding of just how different our worlds are. Only the circumstances of our birth separates us, but a chasm divides our respective experiences. The sensation of being trapped within my own skin, my own bones, my own mind, returns to me: am I to find no common ground with my blood kin? We are separate beings, true, but to be denied the closeness that I long for, especially now, seems unbearable.

While I fumble with the glass, Jezabel quickly fills out a form, listing the cause of death as ex-sanguination.

I frown at this, pocketing our illicit sample. "Not poison?"

'No," he replies in that vague tone that signifies that he is deep in thought. "It's such a strange death. And yet—"

Silence falls between us again, as we tidy up the room. Jezabel abandons the bloody instruments in the metal basin, and I have just removed my gloves when I catch the dried blood in his hair. An almost paternal sensation comes over me.

"Here." I offer him a washcloth. "You'll want to fix that before we leave."

He accepts it wordlessly, although a slight surprise shows. Perhaps he thought that I might reciprocate his petty revenge with some malice of my own.

"Are we done with this pettiness?" I ask, throwing my apron back into the musty closet. "I still have to tell you about the interviews."

He sighs. "For now. That was a terrible line to use on a woman. Incubi indeed. Why not bring up vampires next."

I smile. "Perhaps I will," I reply, reveling in his exasperation.

Yes, I am glad to no longer be at war with him.

Notes:

Did you all remember the parrot at the beginning? I hope you did, because we'll be meeting it next chapter. I regret absolutely nothing. This going to be a wild ride, folks.

Also, I live for Jezabel and Cain bickering. Just saying.

And as always, my eternal thanks and gratitude for continuing to read. I'm always honored and humbled.