A/N: I hope you guys have some tissues...there's some Sweenett but this isn't going to be a happy chap. Thanks to SweeneyToddRocksMySocks, XxRazorPiexX, lilNellBell, AngelofDarkness1605, Carameltoff and linalove for reviewing! Points to those who can spot the Sleepy Hollow reference!

~City on Fire~

The city was burning. It was always burning – why couldn't they see it was burning?

Water, water, surely that'll do the trick, Nellie thought. That'll douse the fire.

"My dear," came the assured, familiar voice, "take pains not to distress yourself."

It was the Judge.

Nellie knew the voice before she saw his shadow in the doorway – yet still – she couldn't remember why she loathed him.

"The fire!" Nellie said hoarsely. She had smelt the smoke first, and then the flame rose high and stole into her room like a foam wave above the rolling ocean.

"You mean my candle?" The Judge crossed the room and held it up distinctly for Nellie to see.

"See, dear child," he smirked, drawing the candle close to his face. He lowered it by the bedside and smiled. For a brief moment his face disappeared into the shadows, and Nellie was reminded of the headless horseman in the legends she'd been told as a child.

"I ain't – I ain't a child," Nellie whispered.

She watched him drop to his knees, that dusty, creaking, worn-faced Judge, and begin to laugh.

He was mocking her, Nellie realised.

"Ah but you are. You are helpless, my dear. Did you really think there was a fire?"

Nellie gave the briefest of nods. She could barely move her head.

"T-take…take it away," she tried again, forcing her mouth to form the words. Her large eye darted to the flame by her bed side. It was completely still, but Nellie could imagine it flickering, flaring up and striking out at her like a snake.

"Take what away, child?" Turpin knew exactly what she was referring to. He was testing her. Testing to see how much she remembered.

"The fire," she breathed.

"I will do so," said the Judge sternly, "only when you remember."

It stunk, actually. The room stuck. It smelt of urine and unwashed flesh.

He would have to speak to the maids. Briefly, he studied the woman wrapped up in bandages.

If it weren't for her faces, she could have been one of those mummies that had become so popular of late in all the musuems. The bandages, however, were no longer white. They were black and dried in places. Red and seeping in others. Underneath, Turpin could envisage the rotting flesh.

That was what the room stank of, he realised, scrunching his nose.

Rotting flesh.

"Go away," Nellie prayed. She felt the smoke go up her nostrils, and imagined it singeing her lips, the flames prying their way into her mouth.

On the unblemished side of her face, she could sense the heat-warming against her cheek, and could only close her eyes and hope it would all fade away.

"It won't go away, Mrs Lovett," he droned, his voice sounding close to her ear. "I won't let it."

One, two, buckle me shoe, Nellie sang in her head. Keep singin' it, keep repeatin' it, an' 'e'll leave me be ta rot an' dream –

Suddenly something rough grazed her cheek. Something odd and wet pressed against it.

Her eyes flew open, and stared into that grey, leering face. "Don't," she pleaded.

Turpin ignored her. "Who are you dreaming of Nellie?" he asked.

The eye twitched, and sweat glistened on her cheek.

Still, Judge Turpin would not relent. Joanna, and Lucy, her mother before her, had displayed the same fear. He would not be thwarted a third time.

He found himself staring at her lips again, those odd half-full lips –

"No one," she shuddered, wishing she could wipe away the foul kiss that lingered on her cheek.

"Come now, Mrs Lovett. I do not take kindly to liars in my house."

He didn't strike her. She was already half-dead. "Perhaps," he said getting to his feet and blowing out the candle, "you are dreaming of your Sweeney Todd."

"Sweeney – " Her eyes locked on the shadow of the Judge. "How d'ya know – who is 'e – "

"Don't play coy, Mrs Lovett. He will not be coming to your rescue."

And the door was shut, and Nellie was plunged into the darkness again.

* * *

"Sweeney Todd," she whispered on her lips. Who is he? Mrs Lovett. Who is she? Sweeney Todd. Mrs Lovett. Mrs Lovett Mrs Lovett –

And then, as if someone had whacked Nellie over the head with her old rolling pin –

Eleanor Lovett remembered.

It was the same night when she'd curtsied the Judge, and he'd pretended he wasn't interested.

Nellie remembered, on account of her favourite dress. She'd worn her favourite dress.

The black and white one with the frills. The one she'd scrimped and saved for and after a long night of all them noisy customers she'd just gone up them long stairs and knocked on the door and –

Sat in that big, comfy-cosy chair, the same one her Albert –

"Mrs Lovett!"

Sweeney Todd was looming over her, his dark eyes crooked in the light.

"Wot?" Nellie jumped a little, until she remembered where she was. Nice and snug in Mr T's Tonsorial Parlour. "Oh, is you Mr T. Musta dozed off."

Nellie propped her head up on her shoulder. Her rolling pin was sitting in her lap.

"What are you doing here?" he asked coldly, dragging her out of the barber chair.

Nellie stared at him, and caught her own reflection in the mirror. She wasn't a mess tonight, she decided. For once, her hair was proper curled. There was no flour as thick as London mud nesting in her hair. Her skin was clean and smooth. No pastry dough and splattered meat stained her pale chest, and there was no gritted dirt and blood under her nails –

"Try to pay attention, Mrs Lovett."

"Is awful hot down there Mr T, in th' bakehouse. I need a rest, wot's all. An since we's finshed up for the night why dun we 'ave a nice hot toddy – "

Before Sweeney Todd could change his mind, Mrs Lovett bustled over to Sweeney's desk where the bottle and glasses were sitting on a tray.

"One for you, an' one for me."

Sweeney accepted it without scolding her. He downed the glass, and muttered: "the Judge didn't come tonight."

"Oh love," Mrs Lovett soothed, putting her glass down and reaching for his arm. "The night's still young – "

Sweeney threw the glass across the room. But his voice remained still. "He'll never come."

"Love, look at me." Mrs Lovett turned his face in her hands. Those dark, bottomless eyes funnelled into hers. Bottomless like the London night. "He'll come, I promise ya."

Nellie let her arms lower, so that they rested on his shoulders. He did not move or brush her off, and she swayed gently next to him.

"Mr T," she hummed. Her hair brushed against his chin. "D'ya think I'm attractive?"

"I cut seven throats tonight," he murmured.

"Splendid, Mr T. But you is avoidin' the question."

Sweeney Todd shuffled uncomfortably. "You're a woman. Ask another woman."

"An' you're a man. You 'as eyes in ya 'ead. Wot you think?" Nellie tilted her head up, so that she caught him unawares. She went on her toes, and caressed under his chin with her lips.

"Mr T?"

He didn't answer. His eyes were shut, and he swayed just slightly against her.

Nellie felt bold. She guided his head so that it was level with hers. She met his lips, and pressed herself against them as if she were linking a necklace around her neck.

He didn't move, not even when she touched the top of his lips with her own, and then the bottom.

They were slightly chipped, Sweeney's lips, and with her caress they felt like grains of dough and flour being kneaded down. Her lips met the same spot, over, over, and drew back, taking with her drops of him like dew from bark.

There were no floorboards. No broken glass. No boots. No barber shop. No blood splatters and dreams of cleavers slashing down into the night –

Then Nellie kissed the air. He was gone. Sweeney had crossed the room and dumped himself in the chair. But to Nellie, he was flying.

Flying far away from her, brooding with those razors like they were his children -

"You didn't answer me," she said, gently taking the razor from his hand and putting it back in his vest pocket.

She knelt by the chair, by his feet, as it were an altar. Nellie waited.

"I forgot the question," Sweeney said, and his face crumpled into something odd.

He didn't have blood in his thoughts then. He was staring at Mrs Lovett, wondering. How she was just like those pieces of broken glass on the floor.

When the shards break, something deeper bursts beneath, Sweeney thought. The flood of all things breaks through.

Joanna's rattle flashed through him. The tide sweeps, and we are all broken in the same unforgiving flood –

Mrs Lovett's hands reached up to him. Her eyes were wider than the men whose throats he'd cut and sent on their way down to hell –

"Please, Mr T."

He couldn't refuse her.

He drew his face towards her, and stopped just near his knees. The curls and the lips were the same colour as the glow in the bakehouse below –

Nellie drew herself up to meet him, resting her knees on her skirts.

They met again, and his lips were shut like the gate to a fortress city.

His nose brushed hers, and when Nellie's hand pressed into the small of his back, she realised he was trembling.

"Relax, Mr T. It's not so hard," she whispered against his lips.

They fell to silence, and when she touched his mouth a second time, Nellie understood why he was trembling. She was trembling as well.

There was something waiting for them beyond their pressed, silent lips.

Her hand rested beneath the nape of his neck. Sweeney's hand found the curve of her jaw.

There was prison and torture and hanging and madness all just outside the barber's door –

But together, they'd found another door.

At last, his still, sewn lips parted like the opening to an infinite cave, and she entered –

"Witch! Witch! City on fire, smoke out the witch!"

The door between them died, as the real door opened.

"Witch! Witch!" It was the old woman, clutching her rags and spitting on the floor.

She pointed at Mrs Lovett. "Witch! Witch! Sir, we must tell the Beadle!"

Sweeney leapt of the chair, advancing on the woman. "Tell him what?"

Nellie was still on the floor among the shards of broken glass.

"Tell him! Tell him! Tell the Beadle-deadle!" Her eyes rolled around in her head.

"TELL HIM WHAT?!" Sweeney roared, shaking the beggar by the shoulders.

"BEADLE!" She pointed.

Coming just round the corner of the street was the Beadle, strolling beside the Judge.

"Inside!" Sweeney commanded, pushing the beggar woman in the shop.

The door slammed, and Nellie watched as he swung his razor high.

He spilled Lucy's blood like a sacrificial lamb. Nellie wondered why she wasn't pleased.

"Help me," he hissed, and together they moved the beggar woman onto the chair, and pulled the lever.

They watched as she tumbled down like a bruised piece of fruit from a table.

Nellie looked up again, but the barber was pacing, slashing his razor wide.

"We'll walk down naturally," Sweeney said, as he heard the sound of the bell jangling. "You distract the beadle. Hold him till I come for you. I'll bring the Judge up here. The boy mustn't interfere."

Now Nellie knew why she wasn't pleased.

Sweeney had returned

* * *

On the bright side, Nellie is getting her memory back! I have the next chapter ready, so I'll post it up soon if you guys want. Let me know how often you want me to update!