Hutch (shatteredlife) wrote in shadowlands_ic, @ 2017-07-12 21:54:00 |
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Entry tags: | peter foster, zipporah bakst |
Who: Peter and Zipporah
What: Peter needs some medical attention and TLC
When: July 12, 1888 - Night
Where: Zipporah's home
Warning: Violence, blood, disrobing
Sometimes Peter needed to let off steam. Other times he was bored. Tonight was a little bit of both. He’d gone down to the bowels of London, to the secret place that only people with the right ‘pedigree’ knew about. In this secret place men with supernatural talents came together for illegal fight matches. Bet’s were made, men won or lost, and sometimes they died.
Peter was well known in there. Some feared him, others hated him. He fought with nothing held back in each match he ever fought and he always came out on top. He was the one everyone bet on, he was the one everyone respected.
Tonight he had been called out by someone he’d never met, someone who thought he was bigger, tougher and could beat Peter. When the bell had rung, they traded punch for punch, kick for kick, over and over as they danced around the circle. If one fell back into the crowd of men that surrounded them, the men caught them and pushed them back forward. It was a match that would either bring a knockout or death, there was no backing out when you got into the ring with Peter.
Then, somehow, weapons came out. He wasn’t sure how it had happened, but suddenly the guy was holding a silver blade, slicing it through the air at him and in his other hand was a pair of silver plated knuckles. These matches were supposed to be weapons free, only the strength of the supernatural you were was your weapon, but apparently this guy had not listened or he had a score to settle with Peter. Perhaps Peter had hurt someone he cared about. That was generally the case. He roared at people to stay back when men got angry and readied themselves to jump the other man. Maybe this was the day he’d die. “Just remember, men,” he said as he watched his challenger. “Apparently in order to beat me, you have to have a weapon.” And then the fight was on.
Peter took several swipes of the knife across his skin, howling each time the silver cut across his skin. There was a slice across left cheek, his nose was broken and he had a gash from the silver knuckles above his right eye. All along his arms and torso were covered in bruises and cuts, some deeper than others. But Peter continued the fight, not backing down at all. Suddenly, an in came for him and he was able to break the other man's wrist, then his arm. A few more blows, and because this match had become one till the death, Peter got the advantage to break the man’s neck, putting him down for good. The other men roared, and he fell to his knees his right arm crossing over his abdomen and holding a deep wound on his left side. Two men raced to help him to his feet and he murmured for them to take him immediate to an address he repeated twice to them.
A while later the men were holding him up while one of them banged on Zipporah’s door.
Zipporah’d been laying on the couch, reading by lamplight and drinking some tea when the banging on the door made her start.
This wasn’t the first time someone had come calling late at night, but usually it was an expectant father, and when she saw the three men at her door, she started a little, taking in the sight, and gasped when she saw who it was the men were holding up -- barely recognizable under the swollen eye and broken nose. When Zipporah had given Peter her address and told him when her Auntie was out for her poker nights after they’d spent a pleasant hour kissing on a bench in the park, she’d had something entirely different in mind, and the sight of him was a shock indeed.
“Peter, my God, what happened?” She exhaled, nodding for the men to bring him in. “There’s a room, in the back, please, please come.”
Although the two men holding him looked rough, none of them had blood on their own knuckles, meaning they weren’t likely the ones who’d beat him, and the wards (and Ach, calmly sitting in his usual chair without so much as moving a muscle) were clear that none of the party meant harm, so while she was a touch nervous, she figured she was safe enough for the time being.
Peter’s head had come up at Zipporah’s door opening, catching her glancing at the other two men. “They won’t hurt you,” he murmured and then gasped as movement happened, the men carrying him through the house and to the back room that she’d told them to.
“There was a fight, Miss.,” answered one of the men. “Not a fair fight at all,” explained the other. “He had a silver dagger and silver knuckles. Peter won, though,” they nodded in unison. “Barely. He’s a good man, most of the time. Hate to see him die.”
He growled out in pain as the men lifted and arranged him to lay on the bed and then looked at the two men. “I’m not dying,” he snapped out and then gasped in pain. “The money I’m due, go get it. Share it between the two of you. Now go!”
“See, Miss? Good man!” And then without another word the men were doing exactly as Peter had instructed and were heading out of the house.
Peter turned his attention to Zipporah and he tried to smile that turned more into a grimace. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know where else to go.”
“Hush,” Zipporah replied, a look of worry on her face as she brushed a curl from his forehead. “You are here now, and I’m not afraid of a little blood. Let’s get you sorted.” She shook her head. “You are trouble, aren’t you?” She said softly before looking him over.
“Your side first, you are bleeding like a stuck pig all over my mattress,” she said, covering her worry with a roll of her eyes and a clucking of her teeth. “Would stitches work for your kind, or would you prefer bandage? A steel needle, not silver,” she tossed over her shoulder as she fetched supplies, “I know that much.”
Peter hushed when Zipporah hushed him, but then he chuckled when she called him trouble. He nodded, coughed, and grimaced all at once. “Definitely trouble,” he said, his eyes tracking her movements.
“Bandage will work,” he said. “But I think we need to check and see if any silver bits are left behind. Pretty sure the bastard had that blade dipped in silver so it would leave bits behind. Burns like hell and some of these wounds should have already healed up,” he explained. The bruising was starting to fade, but it was slow due to silver maybe being in his system, or he just had too many wounds, he wasn’t sure.
Zipporah nodded. “I know how to draw poisons out from a wound, we shall try that first, then, and I can fetch you a tea for to help your liver. And something for the pain, perhaps.”
She came back to the bed, her arms laden, putting a variety of supplies on the bedside table. “And then we re-set your nose,” she said. “You’re far too pretty to leave it like that.” A smile flashed across her face before she returned to her more serious expression. “Now then,” she said, “let’s roll you on your side. Carefully, now.” She reached for his torso, supporting his stomach and side with a firm hold so that his turning over wouldn’t be too jarring.
The wound was inflamed, and she clucked her tongue again as she looked at it closely. “This may hurt,” she said, frowning. “I have not drawn silver before, only venom and infection, but we shall see, shall we not?”
He’d come to the right person. Peter had hoped she would know what to do, as for going to a regular physician, he’d have only stitched him up with the silver inside him and Peter would have died a slow and agonizing death. “Sounds good, Doc,” he said to her as she carried on what would need to be done. He had faith in her, which was unusual for him, but he did trust her.
When she rolled him, he grabbed the edge of the bed and grunted until his body came to rest. “Pain medication won’t work,” he gasped out, breathing hard from the exertion of moving. “Not unless it’s a high dose, it will burn too quickly through my system. Anything you give me will have to be high dosage, like double or triple what you’d give a regular human,” he said. “I can handle the pain if I have to,” he then nodded. He lifted his head to look at his side, then looked at her. “Just do what you have to do.”
She nodded, and performed the Netilat yadayim to properly cleanse and purify her hands, murmuring the prayer as she first went over to the basin and scrubbed with soap, and then poured the water over each hand in turn three times. Then, after putting aside a small bowl on her lap, she placed a hand over the wound, and rested the other in the bowl, and began to recite Psalm 27, closing her eyes in concentration as she felt her energies gather and focus.
It took a few recitations, with an additional prayer tossed in for strength, and an acrostic of his name woven in for good measure -- this was Peter’s poison, unique to him, after all -- and after a little while, she shuddered and gasped, a few small droplets of silver falling from her fingertips into the bowl.
“There,” she said, relieved, her voice low and strained, the process of drawing never particularly pleasant, and the novel process of drawing metals a uniquely discomfiting experience. She mumbled another quick routine recitation for purification of the wound, and reached for the bandages.
“What sort of fight were you in then?” She asked, putting the bowl aside and placing a pad of cloth over the wound, her other hand resting lightly on an uninjured rib, her palm smoothing the skin there gently. “Lift up an inch,” she commanded as she began to wrap a bandage around his torso, shifting her free hand to the side that was touching the bed to help him.
Peter gritted his teeth, his breathing heavy as Zipporah did her work. Whatever he’d been expecting, he hadn’t really thought magic would be part of it. He would have been in awe if he hadn’t been in so much pain. The moment the silver left his body, he gave an audible sigh and his body relaxed. It was gone, which meant his body could heal a little faster.
“Illegal fighting,” he answered her point blank. “Fighting for money. The guy had it out for me, though. No weapons are allowed, but he got some in. He wanted me dead.” And now the other guy was dead. When she told him to lift up, he did so with a grunt and tried to hold himself still. “I came away lucky, I guess. You were the only person that I knew that might could help me.” Or he might have likely died, anyway.
Zipporah quickly managed a few passes under his raised torso to wrap the bandage, and she nodded. “And down again,” she said, securing the bandage neatly with experienced fingers.
His words gave her pause, and she raised an eyebrow. “You must be hard up for friends,” she said, quietly, her hand reaching up to brush her thumb gently across his unbruised cheek, her fingers wrapping gently under his jaw. If a girl he’d flirted with and kissed in the park for a little while was his best hope, he couldn’t have many places to turn. She sighed, certain her grandmother was throwing a mild fit of frustration beyond the grave at her granddaughter’s life choices. “It is good I could be of help, then,” she added.
Peter had no issue with lowering himself once more when she said to do so. He let out a small breath of air and shifted his body some. Already he was feeling slightly better he thought, though it would take overnight and well into tomorrow afternoon for all the wounds to heal, he was sure.
His eyes looked away when she told him he was hard up for friends, she didn’t know the half of it, but then as her fingers touched his face, his eyes jumped back to hers. “I have plenty of friends,” he used the world loosely. “But none that I trust,” making her the first person he had trusted since leaving the pack eight years ago. “And none nearly as pretty as you,” he gave a small smile and lifted a hand to grasp the wrist of the hand that was holding his jaw. He turned his head and kissed the inside of her palm and then let her go to finish doing whatever was needed in his mending.
She grinned. “Ridiculous man,” she said, with a fond look. “And one who takes far too many risks,” she added with a bit of a scold, tapping his shoulder in a light mockery of a slap. “I’ll fetch the tea for your liver. Would you rather set your own nose, or have me?” She asked. “And is the pain bad? I do have some opium, but we may not have enough on hand.”
Thanks to her new benefactress, she was rather flush at the moment -- they could afford to replace whatever supplies they used, but she hadn’t had time to use some of her new-found money to replenish their supply of rarer and costlier materials that required she go further afield to fetch.
Peter chuckled. “What is life, without risks,” he said. He nodded about her going to get tea for his liver, and then touched his nose with a bit of a scowl, sliding his fingers over it. “I can set it,” he told her. “Don’t worry about the opium, I’m not in a whole lot of pain,” he said. “I’m already starting to heal, see?” He pointed to a couple of cuts that were slowly fixing themselves. “You just go get the tea.” He waited for her to leave and then he sat up on the edge of the bed. With both hands he felt about his nose with fingers and then in a quick, jerk like motion, he reset his nose with a loud popping noise and a huge grunt. “Shit!” He gasped out and then felt along his nose once more, satisfied that it was back where it needed to be. “My life is extremely messed up,” he grunted. Then, on unsteady feet, he moved to the basin of water to splash some on his face and tried his best not to make a horrible mess and realizing he wasn’t sure where a dry cloth was to dry himself.
“Tch,” Zipporah replied, re-entering the room to find him dripping on the floor. She tossed a towel at his head. “Your face is much better,” she added. “And what are you doing standing?” She scolded, slipping under his arm on the side that hadn’t been stabbed to steady him, one hand resting on his back as her other hand held a steaming mug. “Ridiculous,” she huffed. “Sit and drink this. It will taste strange, but it will strengthen your liver, which will help for to cleanse your body of the toxins so that you can heal better.”
“Sorry,” Peter said, but smiled. He grabbed the towel and wiped his face down before he was being grabbed and led back to the bed. “I’m not some human that needs days to recuperate,” he grumbled, but took a seat on the bed and taking the mug of tea she handed before grabbing around her waist to pull her to sit beside him. He took a sip as directed and made a bit of a face. “Sure it won’t kill me?” He asked with a teasing smirk but made himself take another drink and fighting to not make the face again. “Thank you,” he then said with somber expression as he looked at her. “For saving my life.”
“You may not be human,” Zipporah replied stoutly, “but you do need to take better care. Clearly, you have no sense of self-preservation.”
She looked over at him, at the suddenly serious expression on his face, and was all of a sudden deeply aware of the warm weight of his arm around her waist, the distinctly masculine smell of his sweat mingling with the copper tang of blood and the sharp peppermint turmeric scent of the tea in a way that wasn’t entirely unpleasant.
Swallowing a little, and feeling a flush creep into her cheeks, she shook her head. “I am glad you thought to come here,” she said, with a dismissive shrug.
“I have a little bit of self-preservation,” Peter countered. “I came here to live. Though, I may be in bigger trouble soon enough,” he sighed. Lucian would figure it out that he was involved, or Damian would want to get rid of him once Lucian was out of the way. Either way, he knew that even if tonight was tied to nothing, there was going to be a bigger mess to deal with later. “But yes, Doc, I’ll try to take care of myself better...or you can help me do that,” he wagged his brows at her, his normal playfulness back.
The way the flush crept into her cheeks, the way the lighting of the room touched on it just so, had him hurriedly downing the tea, so he wouldn’t have to taste it in small sips, and then setting the mug down just to lift the hand to her face so he could stroke her cheek with his thumb. “I am, too,” he murmured. “I don’t...my life is complicated, I don’t trust many people.”
She’d initially had him pegged as a bit of a rake -- a charmer, with just enough family money to not bother earning a living, drifting and a bit directionless -- and she’d been expecting what would amount to a brief (and possibly pleasant) tumble, perhaps a bit of a fling -- he looked like the sort who would take a certain thrill in slumming it even if he wouldn’t think of introducing the likes of her to his parents, and he was just charming and good-looking enough that she didn’t particularly mind, but this wasn’t what she expected at all; Peter had hidden depths, and a deep sort of hurt that he’d covered with his charm, a hurt that she suspected not many had a chance to see. She’d been allowed to catch a glimpse of just the barest edge of it, and, heaven help her, it made her heart ache a little.
Reaching up to run her hands through his curls, she leaned up to kiss him, gently, careful of his newly set nose. “I am followed around at all times by a walking weapon,” she reminded him. “My house is a fortress,” she added, kissing him again. “I do not trust easily either, and complicated…” she looked up at him. “Complicated I can handle,” she said, quietly.
Peter would have purred if he were a cat. The feeling of her hand through his hair felt that good. When she kissed him, he moved to pull her sideways to sit in his lap and he cupped the back of her head as he returned the kiss. This was what he had wanted to come here for in the first place. To kiss her, to run his hands over her body, so he guessed that it didn’t matter how he got to be here, that what he had originally wanted was happening.
“You might rethink that later,” he said of complications. “When you realize just how complicated things can be with me in your life. I’m not a great man, not even sure if I’m a good one,” he said and then kissed her again with a little more to it, showing her that he wanted more than just a kiss.
As she felt herself pulled onto his lap, she laughed a little, mindful of the bandage under his torn and bloody shirt. “What is life without risks?” She repeated back to him softly, her fingers continuing to run through his hair. “Are you…” she laughed again, kissing him while grinning. “Are you wanting for to make love to me, even though you have just been stabbed?” She asked, biting her lip and shaking her head.
When she leaned up to kiss him again, a little more daringly, the sound that she hummed while their mouths were joined sounded suspiciously like Ridiculous, but her hands plucked at the buttons of his shirt, and as they parted, she looked up at him. “You will take care during,” she said, kissing him on the cheek. “You have already bled enough for one night.”
Peter chuckled at his words being said back to him. Zipporah understood him, was maybe somewhat like him in some areas, and he liked that she wasn’t afraid of a little danger. Or risks. Her question had him smiling with mischief, running hand up her back. “Well, apparently I lack self-preservation, so are you really that surprised?” He chuckled. “Plus, I’m healing nicely.”
The sound she hummed out they kissed once more had him smiling against her lips. He had a feeling that she’d be calling him that a lot in the near future, and he wasn’t sure he cared. He was okay with being ridiculous. “I’ll buy you a new mattress,” he said of the bleeding, though he nodded to her simple demand. “I’ll try to take care,” he stated as one hand started to slide beneath the covers of her skirts and go up her leg.
“Cheeky,” she murmured with a grin as she began to unbutton her blouse, leaning up to kiss him again. “You had better,” she added, attempting to be serious and failing miserably. “I don’t even know your full name,” she said, laughing a little as her blouse dropped to the floor and she shifted against him in a way that was decidedly forward.
The swell of her breasts beneath the shift trapped under the corset caught his attention the moment the blouse was open, barely catching her words of hardly knowing him. He laughed and kissed at her neck. “My full name is Peter Foster,” he told her. “I’m a fairly old werewolf, but not ancient,” he kissed across her collarbone. “I have a twin sister, two younger brothers and a younger sister,” he kissed lower, grazing lips across the swell of her breast as both hands started to undo her corset. “I am apparently ridiculous, have no self-preservation, am complicated, like taking risks, and am definitely trouble,” he got out as her corset gave way. “And I really like you,” he then said as he moved her to stand on her feet in front of him. “And why do you women wear so much damn clothing?” He growled out and pulled her close and started to undo her of her skirts.
Zipporah laughed in reply, her heart racing as she pulled her corset over her head. “I am from a small village in Russia,” she replied, slapping his fingers away lightly and unbuttoning her skirts herself, “my Auntie is my only living relative, and I am stubborn and prideful,” she said, stepping out of her skirts and petticoat and stepping back to him to kiss him fiercely, pulling his unbuttoned shirt off his shoulders, her hands roaming along the muscles of his back, his bruises on his ribs and under his eye already fading. “And I like you too,” she added, breathlessly. “So there.”