#toned down the ghostliness on lydia because i think she passes very well for human? so no fun opacity tricks here and a dimmed glow

[jamiethebeeart]

Did I kind of lose over seeing @sykloni 's lineart for Lydia and Freakshow? Maybe a little, but loved the chance to color it for @green-with-envy-phandom-event

[stereksecretsanta]

Merry Christmas, @aqua-ref!

Read on AO3

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Give Me To A Ramblin' Fae

In the middle of winter, when the moon is heavy in the sky, dripping with milky light and offering, whole and raw, its' power, the Hale Pack gathers around the Nemeton, they dance and they sing, and they shift into their animal skeins to frolic, to chase each other with yipping howls and laughing barks.

Derek has Laura's throat held gently between his maw, and she whines at him to let go, but rumbles approvingly, because he doesn't often win these games of theirs; it is not a matter of low power, more of the target he chooses. The Alpha's heir will, after all, be more difficult to beat than the others. She nips at his ear playfully, urges him along, and they weave through the barren, wind-beaten trees, their paws soaked with snow-melt, muddying the crunchy ivory-fluff that chills the ground beneath them.

There's an undulating, calling, rejoicing howl from their mother that has them leaving a chestnut hare to its' frightened peace in order to return to her, to the Pack.

Through the branches, they can see the sky, all adorned in twilight, hosting, now, a parade of riders, their pandemonium an awe and a terror. Spectral beings ride black mares and stallions, ominous dogs of bared teeth and frothing spit and hideously haunting eyes are careening, entwining and twisting around toned legs and pristine hooves as the steeds gallop forward, heedless. Blackbucks and stags dash, their riders luminescent smoke and vicious intent. Creatures with starlight-encrusted, stained-glass wings, and horns which they blow to hail their passing, fly gracefully around the nocturnal horde, singing or shrieking, cavorting and cackling.

It's a dreadful, terrific sight, that streaks through the night sky, and when the Pack's howl breaks out, full-force, hopeful and evocative, every wolf lifting their song to the ghastly, ghostly peoples as they pass, some of those dragonfly, stardust folk descend, screaming and giggling, a gaggle of raucous temerity, as they gather the wolves in their airborne festivities, and launch them toward the procession.

The whimsical, urgent needs, and maddening power that surround The Hunt quickly seeps into the Pack, makes them drunk and giddy, all of them running with ancient spirits, wildlings, Fair Folk of every type.

Derek's lungs are stung by the rush, his blood electric with the adrenaline when an ephemeral, fey, svelte-lithe boy with bull's horns, skin like cream sprinkled with cinnamon, and mosaic wings that inspire the feeling of fertile soil and fields of growing, healthy, rain-soaked things, comes to him. His oak-silk curls are plaited with holly and mint, a leather-bound necklace hangs heavy around his long, dainty, breakable neck, a crescent moon-charm at the hollow of his throat, surrounded by crystal orbs and autumn leaf-charms, brass acorns and pine-cones, he wears nothing else, unashamed in his nudity.

"Hello," the boy says, bright and sweet, his voice like the delicate silk-dew mist of a cumulus cloud, and Derek feels himself tilt closer without even meaning to. "You're gorgeous. I wonder what you look like in your human form? Honestly, I wonder what everyone here looks like in their human forms. We all have one, you know?"

Honestly, no, he didn't, he was kind of caught up in the romanticism of it all.

All scents are clouded by the musk of wild, old magick, stained by an odd, dense-soil ecstasy, and a part of him, vivid and, for one, fanatic moment, overwhelming, wants to eviscerate the aroma The Wild Hunt carries, if only so he can learn what this boy might smell like.

"Everyone who sees us thinks we're malevolent or scary, but, honestly, dude, we're just escorting the spirits Grandmother Death didn't have the time or patience to get to to their respective homes. We've all still got day jobs—I mean, you have a day job, pretty wolfling that you are, don't you?"

Numbly, helplessly, and a little more sober, now, Derek nods.

The boy grins at him, crooked and terribly endearing, fire-light eyes sparkling in the dim, mist-fog, shadowed light.

"See?" He says, gesturing, "Even Odin's got one, Odin, the God of knowledge, inspiration, creative and intellectual pursuits, the dead, fucking road rage—that guy, the head honcho, the one at the head of this whole operation. Like, in this economy, where barely anyone has the Sight anymore, and the number of people left who believe are too few and far between, what else are we supposed to do? It's not like causing havoc and stealing things is going to garner us any good-will, man, so here we are, doing the good work, and then tomorrow we'll go home and agonize over our bills just like everybody else." The faerie heaves a sigh, before blinking and seeming to realize himself, his cheeks burn a vivid, enchanting crimson when a harassing, incredulous, exasperated wail sounds from above.

"Oops," he breathes, a nervous giggle edging in, "I am so not supposed to do that, and I've just been rambling at you, and—" the wail comes again, more pressing this time. The boy groans, eyelashes fluttering down in mortification. "Sorry, I'll see you later, maybe?" Fragile, paper-thin wings flutter, and bone-nimble fingers tangle in the fur at Derek's flank to help the faerie wade close enough to press a candied, chaste kiss to his wolven cheek.

He says, "I'm Stiles, by the way," and grins like he isn't aware of how dangerously beautiful that expression is, before he zooms away in a sweeping, upward glide.

Derek gets a small glimpse of another fae, donned in a flowing, powder-blue toga-dress, with moth-like wings and magma curls flowing down to her waist, admonishing Stiles exhaustively, before their speed, much more than the wolves and the steeds and the dogs, has them blurring out of sight, catching up to a cluster of swarming fae up ahead, too far to spy on any longer.

Derek tries to get his thundering heart to calm and wonders why he ever thought love at first sight was a superstitious, optimistic myth, if not an outright lie.

Days later, after all the Dead have been put to their proper rest, a few offerings of milk and cookies meant for 'Santa' were traded for faerie favors, and quite a few more rogue, feral creatures were stolen and re-sewn into ravens or crows or hunting dogs, of the ilk to sleep the whole year away, and only wake when The Wild Hunt, again, takes place—Stiles is trying, valiantly, to focus.

His mind keeps tracing back to eyes like stars winking to tenacious life, to obsidian fur and sinewy muscle, a warbling wolf-song that lilted like a lullaby, all hymn-hope, resounding howl, to the way sharp, ink-fluffy ears kept flickering to him, listening and curious and three shades shy of entranced. He doesn't know why he's so caught up on it, this is the sixth year he's been old enough to participate in The Hunt, and they have wolves with them every time, thousands of Packs from all of the world join them, so why was he so attracted, distracted, by this one?

What was so special about him?

Other than the, you know, sand-escaping-his-fingers, barely tangible, general everything.

Stiles sighs despondently, and Lydia, who's probably been talking about Important College Things, hits him upside the head promptly.

"A—ow!" Stiles rubs the back of his head, glaring balefully at her. Her hand retreats to flick her hair over her shoulder in one fluid, deflecting motion, as if to dissuade anyone who might've noticed her uncouth action from registering it as more than a figment of their imagination, nothing to see here, folks!

He loves her, he does, but some days he wants to strangle her.

Just a little.

"You were sighing again," she points out, lashes grazing her cheeks as she looks down at her book, flips the page flippantly, like studies on how mathematical algorithms affect neurology bore her. "It's starting to get annoying, Stiles."

"Shut up. It's not like I can even do anything about it," he laments, complaining even though he knows it'll only be a study in disappointment and masochism, at this point. "Who is he? where does he live? work? For all I know, I'm infatuated with some Turkish Lord who I won't even have the slightest chance of seeing again until next year."

Lydia snaps her book shut with a sound that manages to be both refined and abrupt enough to startle. "What on earth were you doing galavanting with the lower-tiers, anyway? We aren't supposed to talk to them, Stiles—"

"But, he was—"

"If he had been a ghost instead of a solid, you could've been lost to the spirit-tide, and you know The Hunt doesn't discern when it comes to a close—you could be on the other side of the Veil by now, instead of sitting here, fawning!"

She's heaving by the end of her rant, cheeks flushed, sea-glass eyes glittering angrily, and Stiles knows her fury is borne from worry, from a very real fear. He remembers his mother, how she was all love and sweet-tempered fire, how she gave coins to the more corporeal spirits, gleefully hugged and spun yarns and danced with all the riders, always careful of the spirit-tide, of getting caught in its' undertow, until she got sick, and couldn't remember to be.

Neither Stiles nor Lydia had been old enough to go, yet, and Stiles' dad was human. Lydia's grandmother, they think, tried to stop her, to save her, but ended up just as lost and mourned as she.

He feels guilt curdle in his chest and exhales heavily. "I'm sorry, Lyds, I am. I don't know why I did that, I'll—next year, I'll stay in the upper-tiers, like I'm supposed to," he inclines his head solemnly, reaches across the library table to hold both her hands in his, "I promise."

She squeezes his fingers, sniffs, her voice evaporated misty at the edges, "You damn well better, you idiot."

He offers her a sincere, sorrow-tinged smile, and tries to put the entire thing out of his mind.

It's New Year's Eve, and Stiles is exhausted, between studies and random research stints and trying to keep the Kelpies three doors down from killing and/or getting killed by the vampires that live in the apartment downstairs, he thinks he has every right to be. Still, though, Lydia put at least a quarter of her heart and soul into organizing this party, and if he hadn't come, he's sure she would've had him flayed.

So, here he is, sleep-deprived, delirious, eying the bar and wondering if getting drunk when all he's been living off of for the past three days is coffee, is at all a good idea. It isn't, it really fucking isn't, but...

But he's got nothing else to do, and tomorrow it'll be a new year, right? Might as well live a little.

Derek smiles briskly at the lady with a bird's nest of raven-black hair as he hands her her drink, and purposefully ignores the blonde at the end of the bar who's been whistling and snapping at him imperiously for the past fifteen minutes.

He's half tempted to text Cora and ask her what the hell she was thinking, pulling him behind the counter to fill in for her so she could go after the strawberry-blonde party hostess with a number and a cheap pickup line caught in her too-sharp teeth, because, yeah, he's got enough experience not to flounder (he'd found himself hiding from the rain in a drag bar while he was still in high school, and they let him hang out despite his age because he was a good enough cook that as long as he didn't touch the alcohol, they didn't care, and when you're in that sort of close-knit, street-smart gritty, overprotective Pack-like environment, it's impossible not to learn the tricks of the trade), but his customer service has always been shit.

With someone like Peter as an Uncle, he's capable of plastering on a smile and flirting a pretty lie with the best of them, he just doesn't fucking liketo. In fact, it's something he actively avoids unless lives are in danger.

Then a voice, one he remembers, all whispered silk-cotton dream-thread collecting raindrops in its' seams, starts murmuring a sugary melody in his periphery, and his eyes snap to its' source with a breathless, near frantic urgency.

And there he is.

Like Fate.

Like a fucking miracle.

He looks different, horns and wings gone, still with the wind-swept, earthy curls, though their holly-mint braids are nowhere to be found; dressed in a long-sleeved, charcoal gray shirt that cling to his lithe, agile-built muscles, an unzipped crimson hoodie layered over it, skin-tight jeans and ridiculous, neon-orange vans, but there's that leather-bound charm necklace, heavy around the length of his pretty throat, with a crescent-moon hanging just at the hollow, and it's him.

The rambling faerie he met on The Wild Hunt, absently humming a tune as he messes with his phone, patiently waiting for a bartender to notice him, at a college party on New Year's Eve.

The surreality of this is... not lost on him.

"Hello," Derek greets, sliding into the boy's- Stiles', if he remembers right- space.

"Oh, uh," he looks up from, and pockets, his phone, a little bashful, "I always thought you had to make eye contact to get, like, served, or whatever, but, um, hi?"

Derek tries to bite back a smile.

Fails.

"Hi," he repeats, and the boy blinks at him dumbly for a solid five seconds before just breathing:

"Wow. You're gorgeous."

And Derek can't help it, he barks out a laugh. "You said that last time."

"I did? Wait, I did? When?! I've met you?" he sounds outraged, on his own behalf, scandalized, even. "No," he denies, "no way, I would've remembered meeting someone like you and then doing something as stupid as calling you gorgeous to your face without any sort of filter—and, wow, smooth sailing, me. I am so sorry about that, by the way, color me extremely embarrassed, but. Yeah, no. No way in hell I've committed the same social faux-pas twice with the same person, I refuse to believe it."

Derek smirks, even as something warm and giddy and compelled sets up camp in his heart, with a kind of tenacity that says it'll be staying a long while.

"Well, I wasn't exactly a person at the time," he points out, "but I appreciated the compliment both times, Stiles, so you... really shouldn't worry about it."

"I—you—" Stiles sputters, freezes, mouth agape and molten-caramel doe-eyes very, very wide, before he seems to reboot. "You are kidding me," he says, feelingly, before pitching forward over the counter to grab Derek's face with his hands, searching his eyes intently.

Derek tries to be anything other than amused and endeared.

Fails, again.

"Wolfling," Stiles accuses, awed. "I didn't think I was ever going to see you again."

"Rambling fae," Derek muses, hushed, leaning further into Stiles' space even as he pushes the boy down into a bar-stool, because while he might not take offense, the other on-duty bartender, or, even, the party hostess, might. "Neither did I."

Stiles sucks in a very deep breath, and then spills out any number of tangential, spiraling questions, what's your name? Where do you live? Are you a bartender? can I have your number? I'd really like your number. Are you—

Derek crushes the rest in a kiss that tastes like sunlight and cherry-tart and ozone, Stiles melts into it with a helpless, keening whine, his spine curving up, shoulders opening, head tilting, whole body blooming like a flower, begging to be plucked, held, kept, known.

He answers what his fleeting thoughts will let him, mutters the words into Stiles' warm, slick-wet, receptive mouth, his name, that his Pack lives in town, that he isn't, but his sister is, and he's covering for her. With a drawn-out sigh, he does force himself to pull away, eventually.

Probably not soon enough, honestly.

"Take me out," Stiles says immediately, dazed, lips kiss-bruised enchanting, and then flushes that same, deep, candied, lascivious red as before. "Or. I mean. I want to date you. Can we go on a date? Not right now, obviously, but—"

"Yes," Derek grins, overwhelmed, blood champagne-effervescent, "yeah, I'd really like that."

Stiles exhales heavily, laughs, a little incredulously, shakes his head at himself, and then smiles, soft and marshmallow-fluffy up at him, "Awesome."

Derek begins to think that, maybe, he needs to give Cora a fruit-basket. Or, possibly, Odin, and that's... well.

That may well be the cherry on top of an incredibly strange, unusual, wonderful meeting.

[the-case-book-of-fanfiction]

Human and Broken

A Sherlock Story

Summary: Gwynn receives word that Sherlock had died after Reichenbach and is devastated until he shows up at the family ancestral home in Richmond, VA.

Warnings: crying crying crying, roller coaster ride emotions, swearing

2,879 words

The song Gwynn found herself humming was accompanied by the ghostly echoes of a violin—Sherlock’s playing. 

John had once again not been able to sleep due to nightmares, so Sherlock had gotten out his beloved violin and started playing. Not only had it put John to sleep, but Gwynn as well.

Had she known what was coming, she might not have slept.

It was quiet in the cafe Gwynn had found herself in that day to do some writing, some editing, some world building, some character building, the whole lot of it. After she’d left her readers with a cliffhanger, she wasn’t likely to go longer than a week before the fan mail started pouring in, and she knew how much Sherlock hated the fan mail for both of them.

The clicking of her keys and scratching of her pen was audible above the slight murmur of chatter and the sound of dishes being made in the kitchen, unusual for a cafe. But this wasn’t one Gwynn usually frequented, so it wasn’t as though she should have expected the hustle and bustle of her favorite place.

In the silence, her phone rang, the tone the soft violin music she had requested Sherlock play for her. She’d only wanted something small, a portion of something he liked to play, but he’d gone and composed an entire song for her. Not that she minded—the expression on his face when he’d finished playing and she’d told him it was gorgeous was well worth the wait for him to finish his composition.

She answered the phone. “Gwynn Tern speaking.”

“Gwynn? It’s Molly—”

“Molly! How are you?” A smile started to spread across Gwynn’s face. It had been a couple days since she had last spoken to her friend and she had so many things to talk about, like the flowers Sherlock had left her out of the blue that she’d put in a vase in their bedroom and—

“It’s Sherlock.”

“What? No, you’re definitely Molly—”

“No, no, Gwynn, listen to me.” Molly’s voice was broken. Thick. On the verge of tears. Gwynn’s smile faded.

“Molly? Are you alright?”

“It’s Sherlock, Gwynn, he—” She choked, then started over. “He jumped off St. Bart’s.”

Gwynn’s world stopped.

“He jumped from the roof and hit the pavement hard.”

Her voice stuck in her throat.

“He split his skull open.”

Her ears started to ring.

“He had no pulse by the time John got to him.”

Her heart shattered.

“He’s gone, Gwynn. Sherlock’s gone.”

Everything came rushing back. “Oh my God.” Her voice sounded tinny in her own ears. “Oh my God. Molly. Oh my God!” Sobs peeled from her and her hands rushed around to pack up her things. 

“I-if you wanna c-come, you can come to St. Bart’s to say...say g-goodbye,” Molly sobbed.

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” Gwynn promised. She hung up and packed up the rest of her things.

No, it wasn’t true. It couldn’t be. Sherlock was at 221B. He was at home, working on a case. He was not gone. He couldn’t be gone.

By the time she got to St. Bart’s, Gwynn had convinced herself that it wasn’t real. There was no way he was gone, not her sweet Sherlock. He wouldn’t have done it. He wouldn’t have committed suicide. Not her Sherlocket.

But the body over which John Watson sat beside with a stricken look on his face, his skin as pale as her beloved’s, was undoubtedly Sherlock’s.

Her whole body was shaking as Gwynn approached him. She came around the opposite side of John and looked down, then immediately wished she hadn’t.

His skin was already waxy and pale, his eyes shut as if he were laying in a peaceful sleep, his mouth forming what, in college, Gwynn had jokingly called the Frown of Disappointment, the look he gave her when she tried to copy his deductions.

“Sh-sherl-locket?” Gwynn stuttered, her bottom lip trembling. Her throat was scraped raw, as if she’d been using it to belt opera notes...or screaming.

Molly came up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder. Lestrade brought over a chair. Feeling as though her legs were going to give out any minute now, she sunk into it, sitting with a heavy thud.

Her hand trembling, she held Sherlock’s hand tightly, even as her stomach and heart squirmed over the cold, clammy feel of his hand, the hand that had so often helped her and held her and steadied her. The hand that had grasped hers and laced their fingers together.

Gwynn rested her head on his chest just as the sobs started to come in waves that left her gasping for breath. The only good thing about her near-constant tears was that they distracted her from the absence of a heartbeat in Sherlock’s chest.

“Not you,” she whispered to him. “Not you. Why did it have to be you?” A pitiful whine escaped her. “Why did you do it, Sherlocket? Why jump? What went wrong?”

“He said,” John mumbled, his own voice choked and barely above a whisper, “on the phone wh...when he called me on the r-roof that...that he was a fraud. And to tell everyone.”

Gwynn could only shake her head as she gazed through her tears at the face of the man she’d fallen in love with in sophomore year at Uni. “No. He was not a fraud. Not my Sherlock.”

John put a hand over Gwynn’s other hand where it rested on Sherlock’s stomach. He forced her to meet his gaze. In a voice far steadier than Gwynn could have managed, he said, “I believe in Sherlock Holmes.”

Her lower lip still trembling and her voice wobbly, she repeated. “I believe in Sherlock Holmes.”

“We’ll give you two some time alone,” Lestrade said softly, putting an arm around Mrs. Hudson, who shook with the force of silent tears, and gently steering her away. Molly squeezed Gwynn’s shoulder, then followed them out. If anyone else was present, neither Gwynn nor John were aware of them.

“You can wake up now, Sherlock,” Gwynn whispered. “Please. Please. Just for us. Please wake up.” The body did not move. Gwynn pushed out one last “Please!” but there was no response.

Shaking, she kissed him. To her surprise, his lips were still quite warm, even if the rest of him was not. She would have given anything in that moment for him to part her lips with his, but he didn’t. So she just kissed him softly for several long heartbeats of her own, then pulled away and left her head rest on his chest.

And so they sat, John Watson and Gwynn Tern, holding hands over his stomach, each of them holding tightly to one of the hands of Sherlock Holmes.

/

Only three weeks passed before Gwynn couldn’t take the silence of 221B anymore. She had spent most of her time in the cemetery, sitting beside Sherlock’s grave, trying not to think too hard about him or look at for more than a second the words engraved on the stone.

John visited the grave daily, too. Gwynn left often to give him his time with Sherlock, but she could never bring herself to go back to the flat until it was pitch black and she was shivering, exhausted and ready to pass out on the nearest park bench. More than once, the cabbie had to wake her when he dropped her at 221B Baker Street.

By the time the first month without Sherlock had passed, Gwynn had packed her bags and made arrangements to go live with her brother, his wife, and her parents in the Tern ancestral home.

She said goodbye to John and Mrs. Hudson and Molly and Lestrade with tears and the promise to stay in touch. She gave Anderson and Donovan a verbal lashing that lasted an hour each.

And then she was on the plane to America, headed to a place she hoped she could learn to call home once more, even though her true home was six feet under the ground in a cruelly beautiful casket.

/

Two months passed. Gwynn’s mood had improved on the outside, but she was still just as sorrowful on the inside. She displayed her mourning by wearing a black ribbon tied around her wrist, the silky fabric reminding her painfully of the soft feel of Sherlock’s skin as they walked hand-in-hand down the street or as they stood in the shower together or as they cuddled close when the night air blew cold.

She woke every night with bile in her throat, her body drenched in sweat, which also soaked the sheets, shivering, the cold feeling of Sherlock’s hand in hers, the memory of Molly and Lestrade pulling a sheet over him to keep her from staring at the body hours later after he was pronounced dead.

But she could put on a brave face for Levi and Charlotte and Lydia and Stephen. She could do it because she knew Sherlock would want her to do it. So she let them see her grin, let them hear her laugh.

The absence of music, however, truly clued them in to how desolate and bleak Gwynn’s look on life was. She had always loved music—especially the violin, especially when her dear Sherlock played. But now when she heard a violin, she would get a hopeful look in her eye that was dashed out immediately when she remembered.

Her ring tone remained the song Sherlock had made for her. She didn’t have the heart to change it, to remove that piece of him from her life. That, besides the few items of clothing she’d had the courage to take from his dresser, was all she had left of him. But she never answered her phone calls—she always let the song play through, responding only to texts.

She didn’t wear the clothing that often. Instead, the shirts and scarves remained in her closet until she needed comfort and perhaps the time to cry alone. Then she would take one out, breathe in his scent—which she feared losing, which is why she never wore them except for one she slept in—and let herself remember and imagine he was there with her.

Halfway through the third month, there came a knock at the door. Charlotte called, “I’ll get it, just a minute!” when Levi didn’t move from his spot on the floor with Gwynn, who only walked from the room, likely to hide in her bedroom, as she had been whenever visitors came.

Charlotte opened the door as she cast a worried glance at Levi. “Hi, how can I help...” She’d noticed who was at the door. She stared at him for a very long time. Her eyes grew as wide as tea saucers. “You.”

“Me,” Sherlock Holmes agreed. “I need to speak with Gwynn. Quickly. Before I’m discovered.”

It took Charlotte a moment to get her mouth to work. “Gwynn!” she called. “You might want to come see this!”

Gwynn’s disembodied voice came from the direction of the library. “I don’t want to see any visitors!”

“This one you will want to see, I promise.”

There was a long, pregnant pause. Her voice sounded closer after a few moments as she said, “Is it Molly?” Then her head poked around the corner and she caught sight of Levi and Charlotte.

“No,” Levi said. “Erm, Gwynn, you might want to sit down—”

But Gwynn was already walking to Charlotte, her shoulders hunched and her back bent. Sherlock could clearly see she had been having a terrible time sleeping. His heart clenched. He’d left her like this for two—nearly three—months. Would she even want to see him?

“Mrs. Hudson?”

“No—”

“John?”

“No, but, uh—”

“Then who would want to see me?” Gwynn sounded confused and that confusion grew on her face as Charlotte stepped from the doorway, revealing the identity of the figure. 

Gwynn stumbled back as Sherlock nervously raised his eyes from his feet to her. Confusion was written on her brow—and anger.

“What kind of cruel joke is this?” she whispered. “You would show up here, at my ancestral home, appearing to all the world as my dead boyfriend. Who the hell are you, you cruel bastard?!”

“Gwynn,” Sherlock rasped, “it’s me. It’s me. I promise. I’m here, I’m alive.” He took her hand before she stepped out of reach and gently guided her back to him. “I’m here.”

She observed him. Yes, the scent was his. Yes, height was the same. Yes, that voice was definitely the voice that had read her to sleep. Yes, that hand felt the same. 

Gathering the courage to look at his eyes, Gwynn’s eyes traveled up his body, taking his face.

The chin. The lips. The nose. The cheekbones. Those adorable curls.

She met his eyes.

Glasz eyes, beautiful beyond compare, met hers. Yes, those were her Sherlock’s eyes.

Gwynn lifted a hand to his face and slowly swept her thumb across his cheekbone, wiping away the single tear that had fallen. “Sherlock...” She could say nothing else. Words lodged in her throat.

“Gwynn? Gwynnie? Are you alright?” Sherlock kissed both cheeks, then took her face in his hands. “Talk to me, Gwynn. Tell me what’s going on in your head.”

She didn’t know what was going on in her head. 

No thoughts moved around in there. She wondered if she was dreaming—she always knew what she was thinking, except in a dream.

“Tell me what’s going on in your heart, Gwynnie love.”

She didn’t know what going on in her heart, either. 

It was as if it had stopped. A song of relief, a tattoo of nervousness, a pounding of anger—she’d take anything, any sign that she was still alive.

Alive. He was alive.

“You’re here,” Gwynnie gasped, suddenly clutching him tightly. “You’re alive. You’re alive. You...you’re...” She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t speak, couldn’t smile. She could only stare at him.

“I’m here,” Sherlock promised.

Her ears were ringing. “You were dead. I saw you. I saw you, on a slab, with a sheet over you. I kissed you and you didn’t kiss me back. I held your hand and you didn’t squeeze mine. I rested my head on your chest and you didn’t have a heartbeat.”

“I know, I know,” he murmured, “I know. I had to. To protect you and to protect Mrs. Hudson and to protect John and to protect—”

“Two months. Over that. You have been dead for over two months. But, no, you’re alive. You didn’t tell me for two months.” Words were streaming emotionlessly from her mouth. “If my heart would start working again, maybe I’d find the willpower to be angry and maybe I’d slap you across the face or maybe I’d punch you or maybe I’d kick you in a place I’m sure you don’t want me to kick you in.” 

Sherlock involuntarily squeezed his legs together. Gwynn pretended not to notice.

“But I can’t be angry with you because I have spent two and a half months alone and dreaming over you and waking up panicking because you were dead and now you’re alive and that’s all I’ve wanted for the past two and a half months and Sherlock Holmes, if there is anything better than having you returned to me after I thought you were gone for good and our dreams ruined, I’ll tell you when I find it because I sure as hell haven’t found it yet.”

Sherlock nuzzled his head into her hair and she wound her arms around his back. Behind her, Charlotte and Levi snuck out.

“Can I kiss you?” Sherlock begged, his voice a quiet murmur in Gwynn’s hair.

“Kiss me,” she demanded in answer.

Sherlock kissed her.

/

Sherlock woke to the sound of screams. 

The sound of screams was coming from Gwynn’s room.

He flung himself out of bed, hastily pulled on the clothes Gwynn had reluctantly handed over that afternoon, and skidded through the Tern ancestral home to reach her.

Her mother, Lydia, was already in the room. Levi burst in behind Sherlock, Charlotte behind him.

Explaining to the Terns what had happened and why Sherlock had waited so long to reveal he was alive to Gwynn had taken some time, but already Lydia looked at Sherlock with the same pleased satisfaction that Gwynn had chosen him she had before he’d faked his death.

“She wakes up every night thinking you’re dead,” Lydia said quietly as Gwynn stumbled to the bathroom, a hand over her mouth. “She doesn’t always wake screaming, but she always has to throw up after.”

Sherlock jerked a thumb to the bathroom door. “Can I...?”

“Please do,” Lydia said softly.

Pushing the door open, Sherlock crouched beside Gwynn. He rubbed her back softly, studying her closely. “Every night?” he asked softly.

“It’s been awful since you died,” Gwynn said softly when her retching stopped. “I keep imagining your broken body on the pavement or street and...” She waved at the toilet in front of her as she stood shakily, Sherlock supporting her, to flush her vomit down. “This happens.” She gave him a pleading look. “Sleep with me?”

He nodded. “Of course.” He wrapped his arm around her and they made their way back to her bedroom. Sherlock helped her under the covers and sat beside her.

“I have tea,” Stephen, her father, murmured from the door, carrying in a tray. Lydia handed Gwynn one of the mugs and Gwynn sipped daintily on it.

“I’ll stay with her,” Sherlock promised her family and they relaxed, filing out slowly.

“Take care of her, please,” Stephen requested.

“I will,” Sherlock promised.

Stephen closed the door softly behind him.

“Cuddle?” Gwynn pleaded.

“Always,” Sherlock said with a smile, slipping under the covers with her and pulling her close, holding her by the waist.

From that night on, they rarely slept apart from one another.