Yao turned on the stove, taking a quick glance through the kitchen doorway to check on Ivan. He was seated at a mahogany table, eyes covered by the blindfold Yao had insisted he wear — at least until dinner was prepared.

Yao's eyes lingered perhaps a little too long on Ivan, having to tear his gaze away in realisation of this. It was strange, this feeling. Suffocating slightly, heart burning up feverishly — Yao could almost believe that he was sick. But he knew this was not the case, and wasn't sure what to make of it. All he knew was that for some reason, making Ivan smile, impressing him in some way, had become important. It was almost necessary, in a peculiar kind of way.

He set the pan onto the stove and searched through the cupboard, struggling to find where the damn woman kept her frying oil. It wasn't his kitchen, nor Ivan's, and so preparing dinner was a bit of a challenge tonight. He had to make do with whatever this house had to offer — bringing his own culinary supplies would have certainly given it away to Ivan. Yao rummaged through cupboards and drawers, eventually finding the bottle of oil and pouring it generously onto the frying pan. It sizzled, and Yao was sure Ivan would have heard it. But the dinner wasn't the real surprise, only the pretty little bow that would decorate the gift that Yao had prepared so carefully.

After throwing together a somewhat decent meal — something stir-fried that Yao could thankfully say for certain wasn't human meat — he carried the two plates to the dining room and set them on the mahogany table. He would have brought a third plate for his special guest too, but there was no need to let food go to waste like that.

'It smells good,' Ivan smiled, hand tentatively reaching up for the blindfold.

'No, wait.' Yao hurried over to Ivan's seat. 'Let me.'

Yao stood behind Ivan's chair, tilting Ivan's head slightly to the left, so that he would see Yao's surprise immediately. His hands hovered over the knot of the blindfold, hesitating. Was it really the best idea? Yao had gone through all the trouble to prepare it — and it certainly was a challenge — but a flicker of doubt persisted. What if Ivan felt sick at the sight of it, the way he had with the rose man? Perhaps they were not as beautiful as Yao had though they were — perhaps his creations were not beautiful at all, but hideous and ugly instead.

There were no needles this time, no flayed flesh — not even a bloodstained patch of skin! Yao had made it rather tame today.

(It'll be fine.)

And yet, somehow, Yao feared Ivan's reaction.

'Is something wrong, myshka?'

'N-No…' Yao said, voice trailing as his hands twitched slightly. He wanted to show Ivan, for him to like it, and so Yao pushed aside his doubt. Delicately untying the knot of the blindfold, he let it fall loose and waited.

A breath of silence, before it was broken by Ivan's soft voice. 'Her heart…'

At the head of the table, a seated woman was adorned in red spider lilies — intertwined in her grey streaked hair, resting on her pale white shoulders, and sprouting from a cavity in her chest. Her eyes were left wide open, still contorted with the terror of an agonizing death. Head titled down, these eyes gazed at a scorched, black heart, cradled by her curled and bony fingers.

'Why is it burnt?' Ivan asked.

Yao released a small breath of relief, his hands still hanging where they had untied the blindfold. They sought to fall on Ivan's shoulders, to brush against the pale neck that was so adamantly concealed, but doubt once again overtook his hands. Yao let them fall onto the back of the chair instead, and chuckled nervously.

'Don't know. Just thought it would look nice.' Yao made his way around the table and sat across from Ivan. 'What do you think of it?'

Ivan's eyes were still fixed on the woman, lingering on the chest cavity from which the lilies seemed to burst out of. 'Sometimes I feel like that…' he murmured.

'Like your heart's burning?'

'No…' Ivan turned back to Yao. 'Like it's fallen out. Don't you get that sometimes?' Ivan pressed his hand to his chest, lilac eyes faintly glazed over. 'It's like something is supposed to be there, but it's not. Like someone's carved a piece of your chest out.' Ivan looked down at the table, at the plate in front of him. 'When I was little,' Ivan chuckled weakly. 'I used to think it was because I was born without half my heart, as if I was supposed to earn the rest of it somehow…'

Yao stayed quiet for a moment, chest aching oddly as he heard these words. They sounded broken, ringing in the air so softly, so hesitantly.

'Do you feel like that now?' Yao asked.

Ivan looked up, his expression surprised slightly, quickly replaced with a gentle smile and a shake of the head. 'No.'

Yao watched as Ivan picked up his fork and began to eat, eyes lingering on Ivan's expression, on his smile and wondering if it was forced. When Yao had reassured himself that the smile had not been a mask, he picked at his own food. Yao wanted to eat, his stomach felt so empty, but even so his appetite had been lost somehow. Ivan's words rang in his head uneasily, each time the meaning of them changed, warped so that the smile Yao had seen was no longer warm enough — no longer convincing enough.

Yao glanced back up at Ivan, yet again stealing glimpses of the pale face that seemed to dictate his thoughts for the past few months. He watched as Ivan scarfed down the dinner Yao prepared, and was reminded of how Yao used to be the one watched at meal times. Amused by this, a quiet chuckle escaped his lips.

Ivan looked up from his plate, smiling. 'You've been watching me, myshka.'

Yao chuckled again, a smile barely withheld across his warming up face. 'Sorry.' Yao averted his gaze back to his plate.

'Don't be sorry. It's nice to have someone look at you like that.'

'Like what?' Yao snapped his head up, a slight frown settling on his brows.

Ivan's smile only widened at this, lilac eyes lingering on Yao teasingly before returning to his plate. Nothing was said, and this only furthered Yao's puzzlement. Or rather, the uncomfortable air in which Ivan had left for Yao to fill in with his own conclusions. Yao fretted over this perhaps a little too much, Ivan's words once again having found their way into Yao's head.

Yao had long since given up on trying to finish his dinner when Ivan spoke up again, pulling out his flask of vodka from his pocket for his usual after meal drink. Ivan held the flask towards Yao.

'You want?'

Yao shook his head, the sharp smell of vodka overpowering even from this distance. Ivan chuckled and took a generous sip from it.

'You know, myshka,' Ivan set the flask down, smile still weakly gracing his lips, but eyes pensively drawn to the table. 'I was thinking that maybe I should take care of the killing from now on. So that you don't have to worry about it.'

Yao furrowed his brows. 'But I want to do it. It's not — I'm not doing it because I feel like I have to.'

He wanted to say more, to say that he actually had started to look forward to spilling blood, to arranging dead bodies in fascinating and spectacular ways. How it had gotten to this point, Yao could not recall exactly. All he knew was that guilt no longer plagued him — perhaps because the people he slaughtered were no more than wild beasts, or perhaps it was because he had Ivan to share the blood with. Either way, Yao did not want to stop now.

'It's not that...' Ivan's hand started to fiddle with the vodka flask, turning it around and around in a way that was so familiar, so strangely reminiscent of something to Yao. 'I don't want you to get caught.'

'What about you?' Yao leaned forward in his seat, wanting to see Ivan's lilac gaze, to see the emotion behind them. 'If you get caught? What then?'

Yao wasn't stupid — he knew their dangerous 'night errands' wouldn't last forever. No matter what, a trail was always left, and the journey would always end.

'It doesn't matter if I get caught,' Ivan said softly, the flask still spinning around, grating and irritating in Yao's ears.

'What does that mean, it doesn't matter?' Yao reached forward and stopped the flask mid-spin. 'Why the hell wouldn't it matter?'

Ivan said nothing, his hand still resting on the flask, beneath Yao's hand. Yao waited for a response, for a word or a glance, but there was only stillness. It was with this silence that uneasiness sprouted in the pit of Yao's stomach. His hand was resting on Ivan's, cold and smooth and beautiful in every way that Yao had imagined it to be, and yet all he could feel was dread closing up his throat.

'What did you mean by that, Ivan?' Yao drew away his hand, voice shaking faintly although he did his best to keep it even. 'Why doesn't it matter?' Yao burned his eyes into Ivan's downcast ones. 'Tell me.'

Ivan exhaled slowly, hands fidgeting. Looking up, Ivan's eyes met Yao's wearily. 'You know the room I told you to never go in? I sit there every afternoon, and I look at the pictures on the wall.'

Ivan broke his gaze away, taking a breath before continuing. 'Then I open the chest, and I pull out my gun.'

Yao got up from his chair, so abruptly that the vodka flask nearly toppled over on the shaken table. 'Ivan?'

'I hold it to my head, and I ask myself: Whose life will it be today? Mine, or theirs?'

'Ivan.' Yao walked over to Ivan's side of the table, voice trembling and breath shortening as realisation settled in.

'I pull the trigger.'

Yao exhaled sharply, finding his hands grasping onto Ivan's coat, fingers feeling as if they were slipping despite his grip. 'Wh… What?'

'There's only ever one bullet in the barrel,' Ivan said calmly. 'And it's been there for the last three years.'

The world around Yao became hazy, the air suddenly stifling and thick as he struggled to wring the words out of his mouth. 'How… How could you?!' Yao took hold of Ivan's shoulders and shook them, chest feeling as if it were being crushed, still squeezed by the poisonous snake he thought he had been free of. 'You idiot! Why would you do that?! Even…' Yao felt his voice crack beneath the surface, weakening. 'Even until today?'

Ivan said nothing, a sad smile creeping across his lips. A broken, pitiful smile. Tears stung Yao's eyes as he shook Ivan again, this time more violently.

'This whole time you've…' Words failed Yao, stumbling and stopped short by the lump in his throat. Yao felt his legs crumble, weakly holding his trembling frame up as he held onto Ivan to keep from falling.

'Yao…' Ivan said softly and pried Yao's hands off, letting him collapse to the floor. Ivan slid off the chair and sat on the floor with him, cold hands taking hold of Yao's wrists. 'It's not something I can change.'

'Let go of me.' Yao tried to yank his hands away, voice trembling as tears threatened to flow.

'I won't.' Ivan pulled his hands closer. 'Not until you promise me you won't kill anymore, myshka.'

'Don't fucking call me that!' Yao snapped, struggling to free himself from Ivan, only to be pulled in against his chest.

'Promise me.'

'Why should I?!' Yao hissed, trying to not listen to Ivan's heartbeat against his ear, to not let himself be lulled by it. It was still there, Ivan's heart, still whole. And yet somehow, Ivan was convinced that it was incomplete, broken in some way. Broken enough to make his life a gamble, a ridiculous stroke of luck. It infuriated Yao, unnerved him so much that he wanted to push Ivan away and be done with him. But it also hurt so much that he wanted to stay, to let Ivan heal the wound with fake, meaningless words.

'Yao, I'm not hearing your promise,' Ivan crooned.

'I can't promise you that,' Yao said, muffled against Ivan's coat, tears drying on it. 'Because if you die on me tomorrow, I'll kill the whole fucking world.'

Ivan chuckled, the sound of it reverberating in his chest.

'I mean it,' Yao said, words wobbling as they left his lips, unsteady and fragile as they were spoken. 'I'll kill everyone, including myself, if you leave. And then it'll matter, won't it?'

'Yao…' Ivan murmured. 'You don't understand. You can't.'

'Only because you make it so difficult…'

Ivan stayed quiet, hand caressing Yao's hair as the silence enveloped them.

'I don't have anyone anymore,' Yao choked out, hand grasping Ivan's scarf. 'You're the only one left.'

'I know,' Ivan said softly, his voice overtaken by the sound of his beating heart. Yao listened to the throb of Ivan's heart, every rise of Ivan's chest heavy with the luck of a man who had dodged the same bullet for the past three years. A man, who at one point, was nearly choked in his sleep by Yao. It was a horrible thought, wondering what might have happened if Yao had been brave enough to go through with it. Without Ivan, without his cold hands and gentle eyes that dreamt of sunflowers. Yao could no longer imagine a world without him, and it hurt to realise this. It ached in his chest, pained at the thought that there was someone in the world Yao treasured in this unusual way.

'I'll promise not to kill anyone,' Yao said, face still buried in Ivan's coat. 'But that's only if you promise to stay alive. No stupid gambles with guns.'

Ivan chuckled, voice ringing with a light-heartedness that Yao did not realise he needed until he heard it. 'I promise, myshka.'

Yao felt a breath of relief leave his lips — a release of fear, of anxiety and the fluttery feeling in his chest. But despite this, his chest still ached, sore as if a hole had been born into it. Mangled and torn, it was as if Yao's scorched heart was seeking something to fill in the void that had made itself present. It was a dull pain, an ache somehow blanketed by the feel of the scarf Yao held on to so tenaciously. An agony numbed by the sound of Ivan's heart, of the other mangled heart that bore the same wound.

It was because of this that somehow, in a strange and inexplicable way, Yao was afraid.

.

The dogs whined as they pooled around the door, noses pressed to the gap beneath from which the shadow of a man lingered. The sound of knocking resounded loudly, impatiently, and riled them up. Alfred approached the door with heavy footsteps, not having to glance at his watch to know that it was far too late for anyone to be visiting — let alone a pissed off Englishman.

'Open the bloody door!'

A hand rapped onto the door once again, stopping Alfred in his tracks. For a moment, he considered not opening the door. Having not said a word, Arthur might just assume that Alfred was fast asleep. Alfred could simply make his way back to the living room and get on with his work, undisturbed — free of whatever theatrical revelation the Englishman was planning on demonstrating with his ridiculous cane and idiotic smirk.

'I know you're awake, James. No point in tip-toeing away.' Arthur tapped the door sharply. 'I could say it from out here, if you like. Granted, it's pouring bloody cats and dogs out here, but at least I've got a much larger audience —'

Alfred swung the door open, the cluster of dogs scattering away as he did so. On his doorstep, Arthur stood with his hand leaning onto his cane. His hair and coat were soaking wet, although he did not seem to mind this.

'That's better,' Arthur smiled, walking past Alfred and hanging his cane and wet coat onto the coat rack without invitation. 'You wouldn't happen to have tea by any chance? I would kill for a cup —'

'What are you doing here?' Alfred shut the door behind him, leaning against it and glaring the Englishman down.

Arthur blinked. 'Well, you're not being a very gracious host, are you?' He chuckled nervously, hand combing through his rain soaked hair. 'But I suppose I should get straight on with my point… Let's take a seat, shall we? Forget the tea.'

Arthur made his way to the living room, as if he owned the place. The dogs, perhaps sensing this, followed him without question. Alfred watched from the doorway, and did the same, albeit with a muttered curse.

Arthur lingered around the coffee table, littered with case files and empty mugs. 'Is this whisky I see here?' Arthur smiled, picking up a half-drunken glass and holding it up. He glanced to Alfred. 'If you don't mind, I came a rather long way to get here…' He put the glass to his lips and tipped it over, gulping down its remains. He nearly tossed the glass back onto the table, coughing and spluttering.

'I take it you don't drink often,' Alfred said dryly, planting his feet into the carpet and refusing to take a seat. Arthur shook his head, still coughing as he threw himself onto the couch.

'Oh no, I do…' Arthur said, wringing off his scarf and throwing it to the side. 'I'm just more of a wine man myself.' His green eyes flickered from the couch to Alfred. 'Why aren't you sitting?'

'I don't have time for this.' Alfred shifted his weight to one leg, already tired of the man. 'Just tell me what you came to say.'

'But that's no fun!' Arthur slapped the seat beside him. 'Sit, James! And listen!' Arthur tilted his head, spotting the whisky bottle on the floor. He bent over to pick it up. 'There's more. Lovely…' He unscrewed the cap and took another generous gulp, his gaze lingering over the case files in the meanwhile. He set the bottle down and sighed.

'Who's this?' Arthur picked up a photo, showing it to Alfred. 'I haven't seen his face in the case files before.'

'That's because he's not related to the case.' Alfred grabbed the photo.

'Oh?' Arthur raised a brow.

Alfred set the photo onto a pile of papers. 'He went missing in July. But his missing persons report was retracted a few weeks later. No word of what had happened, or where he had been found. Nothing.'

'And this photo is here because…?' Arthur's eyes bore into Alfred, glimmering with curiosity and intrigue. It was not a welcome sight, an expression that unsettled Alfred. It was a look that searched for answers, relentlessly and with a perception sharp enough to cut through lies effortlessly. Evading these kinds of eyes was a futile task.

'I was convinced it was a lead at one point,' Alfred said, considering the seat on the couch hesitantly. 'He went missing around the same time one of our victims died, would have had to cross through the same area in which the murder took place to get home. But…'

'But what?'

Alfred slumped onto the couch. 'I don't know, just… It's a dead end. We don't even know where he is right now. And don't get me started on the guy who filed the missing persons report. Works at a seedy place called the 'Poisoned Apple'. Every time I go there to ask questions, the guy's always 'visiting family back in Korea'. Convenient, right?'

Alfred turned to Arthur, finding him with the whisky bottle on his lips.

'I'm sorry… what was that?' Arthur hiccupped, a rose flush on his cheeks.

Alfred stared back, feeling his teeth grind slightly as he spoke. 'You're not here about the case, are you?'

'No…' Arthur drawled out, tilting the bottle this way and that as if its contents were fascinating to him. 'There was something on my mind… something important.' Arthur turned to Alfred, a drowsy smile on his lips. 'But I seem to have forgotten it!' He chuckled lazily, tilting his head in such a way that Alfred had to wonder if the man was already drunk when he arrived here.

Alfred sighed and leant back into the couch, shutting his eyes tightly as a migraine began to emerge with a dull ache. He didn't care that Arthur was likely watching, examining him even in his drunken stupor. Alfred only wanted this case to end, for the names to stop piling up and for the blood to stop dripping into the carpets of families. It was in this moment of momentary exasperation that he felt one of his dogs lick his hand, jolting him in his seat.

He snapped to Arthur, finding him chuckling in amusement. The whisky bottle was tipped once again, the very last of it downed by Arthur. He let the bottle fall to floor loosely, half-lidded and drowsy eyes gazing at Alfred. 'You're a very compassionate man, James.'

Alfred frowned at this. 'How's that?'

'You seem to have a knack for collecting strays. Even the nasty looking ones.' Arthur smiled, turning so he sat facing Alfred. 'I wonder… If I were a stray, would you take me in?'

'Depends. Do you bite?'

'Only if you don't feed me.'

'Then maybe I would,' Alfred said, watching curiously as Arthur's demeanour melted before him. Shoulders slackening, words flowing fluidly and without restraint. The sheep costume was being shed, and the wolf was making himself at home.

Arthur exhaled softly, perhaps in amusement. 'Good to know.' He tilted his head so that it rested against the back of the couch, emerald eyes still fixed on Alfred. 'You know, I always used to want a dog when I was a boy.' Arthur turning his head up so that his eyes could wander on the ceiling. 'Never got one, though.'

'Why's that?' Alfred asked.

'Father said 'no',' Arthur drawled out. 'A beastly child can't have his own beast, he said. Simply can't.' A weak laughter rang in the air, Arthur's voice softening as he continued to speak. 'He was always a brute. Terrible with words. Far better with a belt in his hands…' The laughter rang out again, more forced this time as the air fell uncomfortably silent.

'I'm sorry,' Alfred said, although he wasn't sure what he was apologizing for.

'Oh, don't be. It happens. Bad children. Bad parents. Sometimes both.' Arthur waved his hand dismissively. 'Hm. And yet, I never thought either of these was the case for my father. No, he was… special. My father was a kind of his own entirely.' Arthur turned his head to Alfred, expression neutral as if he were merely talking about the weather. 'He wasn't all too different from our boy, James. He rather liked the feel of blood on his hands, too...'

Alfred could only gaze back wordlessly, trying to read the strange expression on Arthur's face, wondering if it was genuine apathy, or well-hidden pain. He wondered if the drunken man was toying with him, or actually confiding in him. Alfred wasn't sure, and so he only stayed quiet and listened.

'I'm not lying, James.' Arthur scooted closer to Alfred, the stench of whisky filling Alfred's nostrils. 'My father really was a bloodthirsty bastard!' Arthur poked him with a sharp, accusatory jab. 'He had a taste for young boys, too, the old bugger…'

Arthur dropped his head onto Alfred's shoulder, leaving Alfred to shift uncomfortably beneath his weight.

'Did…' Alfred started to ask, hesitating with his words. 'What happened to him?'

'They got him in the end, after he'd eaten up two of our neighbour's sons. And I do mean that literally, dear James. The police found a little finger in our trash can. A teeny, tiny, bloody finger…'

Alfred felt his throat close up a little, having perhaps seen too many children's dead bodies' first hand to not visualise what Arthur had just described. He felt Arthur sigh against his shoulder, and felt the need to shrug him off, uneasy with the proximity that Arthur had made himself so comfortable with.

'Fuck, did I really just tell you that?' Arthur shot back in his seat, rubbing his hands over his face tiredly. When his hands slid off his rosy face and fell into his lap, he looked to Alfred. 'I've only told doctors this, you know. People who want to get into my head. Not that I make it easy for them.' Arthur smiled wryly. 'How about you? Will you make it difficult for me?'

'Make what difficult?' Alfred furrowed his brows.

'Tell me about your childhood, James.' Arthur placed his elbow onto the back of the couch, leaning into it. 'I'm curious.'

Alfred blinked. He taken aback by the question, by the glimmer in Arthur's eyes — although it wasn't anything new. 'There's not much to tell.'

'Oh, come on. There must be something worth telling.' Arthur's gaze flickered, lingering in the way they always did when he was examining something, looking for something in Alfred's face. 'Some little memory, a moment you think of when you lock away a terrible beast. What made you you, James? I'd like to know.'

'You don't need to know.'

Arthur's eyes brightened at this, an odd gleam in his eye. 'You want me to work for it, don't you? That, James, I can do.' Arthur stumbled up from the couch, wobbling slightly as he did so. 'Off we go!' Arthur drawled out, finger raised in the air decisively. He wandered towards the bedroom, the dogs following him excitedly and yapping.

'What are you doing?' Alfred got up from his seat, reluctant as sleepiness tugged at him. He was not awake enough to be dealing with Arthur's antics.

'I'm profiling you, James!' Arthur called out from the bedroom. 'Now… what do we have here…?'

Arthur suddenly went quiet, Alfred sighing as he walked into the bedroom. Alfred stopped still in his tracks, by the doorway through which the living room light spilled over his shoulders and into the dim bedroom. Where the light had fallen, Arthur sat on the edge of the bed, a photo frame in his hands. It had been taken out of a drawer, out of a place that should not have been opened.

'Put that down,' Alfred growled, stepping forward to approach Arthur.

Arthur softly traced his hand over the photo. 'She looks so much like you…'

'I said, put it down.' Alfred seethed through his teeth, reaching forward to grab the photo, but Arthur pulled it away quickly from his reach.

'I can presume it's your sister.' Arthur looked up at Alfred, expression laced with sympathy — a kind of look that Alfred was perhaps too used to. Only this time, it was from a man more broken than he was. More pitiful in his demeanour, and it was in this way that perhaps Arthur could understand better than anyone. It was this that unsettled Alfred the most when the question was asked. 'What happened to her?'

Alfred reached once more for the photo, getting ahold of it this time. 'I don't know.' He placed it back into the drawer and shut it gently. 'She just… disappeared. Only thing left of her was her phone. I found it lying in the middle of a road…'

Silence. Arthur only sat there and kept his gaze fixed on Alfred, his face not contorted with smugness or conceit as it usually was. But nothing needed to be said, Alfred knew. He knew what Arthur was thinking at that moment, knew what everyone thought the moment Alfred told them about his sister. What ran through their head but never left their lips. She was dead, perhaps worse.

But Alfred refused to believe it. Because he didn't know, didn't see what had become of her, he could continue on searching. He could continue on, and not crumble. It was this ignorance that kept Alfred from falling, held him up like the strings of a marionette. He could play the part of the detective, of the hero he could never be, because —

(Ignorance is bliss.)

Once again, Alfred saw the man with the flowers in his head, of Arthur as he stalked around it. A predator, spotting invisible tracks with unwavering eyes. A man who could never enjoy ignorance, only feign it.

Alfred felt hands on his shoulders, tentative in the way they touched him.

'I'm… deeply sorry,' Arthur said softly, gaze flickering in the dimly lit room and lingering around Alfred's eyes. 'Not knowing is the most difficult, isn't it?'

Alfred nodded weakly, his chest feeling as if it was about to collapse. 'I…' Alfred choked out, throat closing up as the words struggled to form.

'You don't have to say anything.' Arthur pat his shoulders gently. 'You haven't made this difficult. You haven't made this difficult for me at all, have you, Ja —' Arthur hesitated, pausing to consider his words. 'Can I call you Alfred, James? Or Jones?'

Alfred blinked, swallowing away his grief and nodding. 'Y-Yeah. Call me Alfred.'

'Alfred…' Arthur smiled, hands sliding away from him. 'You can call me Arthur.'

'How about Artie?' Alfred asked, the question meant as a slight banter, but the grave expression stuck on his lips and eyes.

'Don't be ridiculous,' Arthur snapped, striding away to leave the room, nearly bumping into the door frame as he did so. 'I'll be uh… getting my coat, if you don't mind.'

'Sure…' Alfred watched as the Englishman stumbled out into the living room, fumbling for his coat and cane. The man was still pompous as ever, even with too much whisky running in his veins. But something was different about him now, at least to Alfred. Perhaps he was affected by that strange touch of his, of the words that so softly made their way into Alfred's mind and lingered.

Either way, when Alfred went to bed that night and thought of where in the world his sister might be, Arthur's voice rang in his head.

(There must be something worth telling… What do you think of when you lock away a terrible beast?

What do you think of, Alfred?

Tell me…)

Somehow, the answer was one even Alfred was afraid to hear. Afraid to hear it himself, he let the Arthur in his mind listen to it. It was only with this thought in mind that he could finally drift away into sleep.