Moriarty Brother oneshots

The First Murder

A/N- The first murder William did, why William and Louis are in an orphanage, I know it's not the same but still, it's fan fiction it's finee

Will and Louis sat on the edge of their straw mattress as Will drew on the ground with charcoal. His young hands, inexperienced though they were, delicately outlined the shapes of castles and dragons as he spoke, weaving a tale of majesty and misfortune, of loyalty and betrayal, of good and evil for his little brother.

Louis’ gaze was distant as he listened, eyes gazing past the dingy bedroom into a world of wonder. Instead of the unkempt bed their mother and her boyfriend shared, he saw a valiant knight on a white stallion. Instead of the bare walls, stained with years of spills and water damage from the leaking roof, he saw a brilliant blue sky and rolling fields of emerald, so unlike the cold concrete and smog he knew.

Instead of the screaming match from the room next to them, he heard the battle cries of an army as they charged down one of those rolling hills to meet the attacking trolls in combat. Louis was totally enthralled in the story, his crimson eyes sparkling with awe and excitement as his older brother recounted. 

Will, though, was not lost in the story he told. His words easily knit together a tale for Louis, but his ears were pricked as he listened to the screams of rage and cries of desperation from the next room. They had a small, one bedroom flat in the East End, and his mother and her boyfriend were currently arguing in the main room. He gathered that Donald, their mother’s boyfriend, had found her out walking the streets again.

Why couldn’t he just understand that she was trying to take care of Will and Louis…? He was screaming that he paid for the rent and the food so she shouldn’t need anything else, that she should just depend on him and give up her ‘stupid independence.’ 

He was the stupid one. He didn’t see the way she cried herself to sleep during the days when he was working, the way she talked in her sleep about getting away, about taking the boys… somewhere. Anywhere. And maybe she would, if she knew how he treated them when she was away… But she didn’t. Neither of them knew everything. And now they were fighting again. 

Will’s words continued to paint images of the grand battle before his little brother’s eyes as the screaming match mounted in volume from the next room. Now they were on to the boys- how useless they were. How Will was too quiet and prissy to be a good worker and how Louis was a waste of space if he was too weak to work.

How it wasn’t Donald’s job to provide for some other man’s kids. Mother was defending Louis, of course. It wasn’t his fault that he was ill, and he was a good worker when he managed to help out. Perhaps he would grow out of it, he was only six, after all. But she didn’t mention Will. He didn’t expect her to.

There had always been something just slightly off about how mother acted towards him. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t care. He loved her, and she took good care of him and Louis, even at the risk of her own safety. She was a good mother. 

But Donald thought she was crazy. Crazy for keeping the kids, crazy for not relying on him, crazy for continuing her ‘work’, crazy for this and that and a million other things that he screamed at her as Will quietly recounted the end of the battle to Louis, replacing the shouted obscenities with the roar of triumph and applause as the troll king’s head was lifted into the air victoriously. 

And then, as quickly as the fight began… it ended. Donald yelled something about ‘throwing the brats out in the gutter where they belong,’ footsteps started to storm towards the bedroom, mother screamed something about a cold-hearted bastard, there were some lighter footsteps dashing after the heavier ones, a scuffle, a thud, and then… silence.