Before Holmes Met Watson (FEATURED)

Day Fifteen: Fall

"You sound like a Jacobin, Mark," Sherlock said. Then with a warning note, he added, "Be careful who you let hear you talk this way."

"I know," Mark said, putting his head in his hands. "I know."

On their last day together, Mark was even more affectionate than usual, constantly touching Sherlock and embracing him. "You're going to want to stop this cold, aren't you? Go back to London and never see me again?" he asked, pressing their bodies together and resting his head on Sherlock's shoulder.

"Don't you think that's best?" Sherlock replied, brushing a kiss across Mark's forehead. Mark smiled and held Sherlock tighter. He was pleased by how much more easily Sherlock accepted, reciprocated and sometimes even initiated their intimacies. "You were right, you know?" Sherlock continued. "About me not being the type to share. With your wife being back... I won't like it."

"She'd like you, you know?" Mark said. "You'd like her too, if you let yourself. And the others... I don't know why, but I need a diversity of sexual partners." Sherlock stiffened, and Mark sighed. "You hear what everyone else does, don't you? That it means you're not enough somehow. Fidelity is only one way to show someone you care about them, Sherlock."

"I know," Sherlock said. "I know it, but..."

"Infidelity would make you feel unwanted."

"I know it's silly," Sherlock began.

"Don't," Mark cut him off. "It's not silly to feel the way you do. It frustrates me, but it's the way most people feel." He kissed Sherlock's cheek and teased, "It's very ordinary thinking."

"You bastard," Sherlock replied, biting Mark's cheek in mock retaliation. "I'll show you ordinary." He picked Mark up and threw him over his shoulder, carrying him to the bedroom and tossing him on the bed. They'd laughed and wrestled for a bit, then Mark's eyes got wet.

"You're so beautiful like that," Mark said. "I don't want you to go." Sherlock kissed him roughly in response. "No," Mark said, pulling away. "Not like this." He touched Sherlock's cheek and his lips and stared at him, not wanting to forget a single detail. "God, your eyes," he said. "I've never seen anything like them." He kissed Sherlock's brow. "Will you let me say goodbye to you properly?"

"All right," Sherlock replied, unsure of what he meant. Mark took his time undressing Sherlock then worshipped every inch of him and was ceaseless in his praise. He'd learned well what Sherlock would respond to and kept him hovering close to the edge for what felt like hours. Sherlock hadn't known it was possible to feel so adored, and he could no longer hold back the tears when Mark took him in his mouth. They streamed down his temples as he tried to arch up into the delicious warmth. But Mark was holding his hips down so forcefully, he knew it would leave bruises. And it was the thought of the marks lingering on his skin that caused his vision to white out and him to shout.

"I might love you a bit," Mark said when they were lying together trying not to count the minutes before Sherlock would leave.

A bit, Sherlock thought bitterly, and it took every ounce of willpower he possessed to quash the petulant response, "Not enough to pick me over her." He'd lost before the game had even begun. In fact, he'd started playing knowing he would lose.

"I'm sorry," Mark whispered. "I don't know what possessed me to say that."

"It's all right," Sherlock replied, adjusting his position so his cheek was pillowed on Mark's stomach. Mark was a bit self-conscious about how he'd begun to soften around the middle, but that slightly squashy paunch was one of the parts of him Sherlock liked best. Mark carded his fingers through Sherlock's thick, dark curls. "Keep doing that," Sherlock whispered. "I like it."

Mark saw Sherlock off at the station. "I know I don't have the right to ask," Mark said. "I can see how much I've hurt you. I don't have the right to ask, but... Please don't do to me what you did to the original Mr Darcy. Don't erase me. Lock me away in a chest for a while if you need to, but please don't erase me." He'd been pleading, and Sherlock wondered why it meant so much to him.

"I won't," Sherlock reassured him. "I promise."

"Thank you," Mark said, sighing in relief and pulling Sherlock into a kiss that was a bit too full-bodied and groping for the platform of a train station. Sherlock boarded his train, and Mark watched until it disappeared.

When Sherlock got back to his flat, he took one look around the sad, untidy, cramped space and thought he might suffocate. He went directly to The Ludus where he fought like a man possessed. It had taken four men to pull him off his last opponent, and they'd tossed him onto the street. He'd almost been barred, but Shinwell intervened on his behalf.

Shinwell was more sensitive than one might presume by looking at his battered face and body. He took full measure of the situation quickly and wasn't unsympathetic. "Whoever it was," he said gently. "I'm not saying forget them. But find someone else to get under or on top of. Go home," he commanded. "You're not yourself."

I'm more myself than I've ever been, Sherlock thought almost laughing aloud. And that was the problem. That week in Sussex with Mark had opened a door inside him that he'd welded shut so long ago, he'd almost forgotten it existed. Inside had lived the small, fragile part of him that wanted to be loved. The steady, unwaveringly fond affection Mark had shown it had made it strong enough to burst out of its prison, and now it was constantly demanding to be fed. The violence of the pits could beat it back for a while, but it was remarkably resilient, just like its unwilling host. All those years locked away in the dark hadn't killed it, hadn't even weakened it, Sherlock realised. It had just been lying dormant, waiting for the faintest glimmer of light to fall upon it and cause it to wake. The depth and strength of his yearning was more than Sherlock could bear.

Mark had been right. He wasn't the one for Sherlock, but he'd made Sherlock wonder if such a person did exist, where they were and what they were doing. How on earth would he ever find them? The odds against him were staggering.

So, he took Shinwell's advice.

No wonder I never cared for it much, he thought as he watched the young man's head bob up and down over his lap. Mark would have made a joke or growled playfully or intertwined their fingers, done something to remind him that two people, not rutting animals, were at it. Sex with no affection. He'd never understood how bleak and positively self-abusive a regular programme of it could be. Mark had been right about that as well, Sherlock thought, grabbing the man's hair roughly and thrusting up into his mouth ruthlessly. I am a romantic.

He'd prepared before he left for the clinic. He didn't want to go to the dispensary. Algernon would know right away, and Mycroft would have gone over his flat with a magnifying glass, so he'd kept the vials with Shinwell. "So, it's like that, then?" Shinwell asked when Sherlock came to claim them.

"Yes," Sherlock replied. "It's like that." He'd promised not to erase Mark, but perhaps he could erase the version of himself that Mark had claimed to love a bit.

#

John awoke in the dark. For a moment he thought he was back in the wood, and, although he was frightened, a part of his heart leapt at the thought that he might see the man with the mother of pearl skin again, that the raven might soar down from the night sky to meet him.

But this place was empty. He could hear it in the way the wind howled. It was too dark for him to see into the distance even when his eyes began to adjust, but he could sense the vast nothingness. It was cold.

"Hello," he said. "Is anyone there?" And the void swallowed his voice.

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