Investigator of the Supernatural, Brewer of Tea (sedulus) wrote in shadowlands_ic, @ 2017-09-27 19:32:00 |
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Entry tags: | bertie eden, gabriel allen |
Who: Gabriel Allen and Bertram Eden
What: Post-coital pillow talk about murder cases. Like you do.
When: 27th September, 1888
Where: Bertie's bedroom
Rating: PG-13 for adult themes
Gabriel rolled onto his back with a self-satisfied groan before stretching up to tousle Bertie’s hair good-naturedly, his grin wide.
“Now that,” he said, more than a little pleased with himself as he shifted so that his head rested against Bertie’s headboard, “is an excellent way to relieve tension if I do say so myself.” He looked over at Bertie fondly. “Better?”
He’d been thinking about stopping by to check up on the young inspector trainee -- he’d been treading water last time Gabriel’d been by, and when he’d opened the door this time around, he’d still had a rather determined and tired look about him that spoke of long hours and terrible food, and the state of his apartment hadn’t been much better -- if anything, the sea of papers had settled into decided drifts.
He’d brought by sandwiches and (upon seeing the set of Bertie’s shoulders) a rather pointed offer for a break in work that could be pleasantly amenable to both parties, and thus far, they’d managed to get a good solid start on the latter. (The sandwiches were still in a box on the kitchen counter.)
Bertie was still unfurling into lassitude, slowly blinking eyes that felt too wide and too heavy at once. He reached over to stroke Gabriel's cheek, distracted by the play of light on his face, fingertips finding the curves and dimples revealed by his unfettered smile.
After a few moments, Bertie realized he hadn't answered the question, and smiled in return, his hair sliding in a gradual waterfall over his eyes as he'd turned his head. It caught in his lashes, and he blinked as if that might clear it.
"I'm sorry," he murmured, his fingertips drifting over to brush Gabriel's lips, "did you expect me to be able to think after that?"
He was, of course, because not even Gabriel could stop Bertie from thinking entirely, but the worries of the past days seemed muted now, farther away than they had been. So long as Bertie kept his head turned on the pillow, so, with hair tangling in his eyelashes and Gabriel's warm skin lit by the bedside candles, he couldn't see the case notes gradually enveloping his rooms. Out of sight, out of mind, so they said.
"And you brought two of my favourite things," Bertie teased, his eyes crinkling with laughter at the corners. "Food, and you."
“I do believe that was the point,” Gabriel replied with a laugh, “so I’m very glad to have succeeded.” He leaned over to kiss Bertie’s nose as his fingers continued to explore Gabriel’s face, and seeing as his lips were right below, leaned down with a pleased sound to kiss them too.
“If you ever find yourself thinking too much for your own good, I’m just a telegram away, you know,” he continued after a minute or two. “All you have to say is ‘bring sandwiches too’ and I’ll be over in a trice.”
"Oh, you shouldn't have said that," Bertie warned. His hands briefly cradled Gabriel's face, drinking him in, before Bertie kissed him in turn, the contact lingering though practically chaste, compared to their earlier activities. He grinned when they broke apart, and bumped his nose against Gabriel's. "We poets are all stomachs."
Bertie sat up in bed, groaned at the sight of his untidy rooms, and promptly rolled over to pillow his chin and arms on Gabriel's chest. "Members of the Night Watch are just as bad, I'm sure. Would you like anything to drink? Did I even offer that before, or did I just tumble you into bed? I'm a terrible host. I'd say I lit these romantic candles for you, to soften the light on your beautiful face, so like Adonis in repose; but the truth is I never remember oil for the lamps and keep the candles burning all over so that I can see to write. And read," he amended, idly tracing words onto Gabriel's skin with one finger. "But mostly write, of late."
Bertie fell silent for a moment, thinking of the concern on Gabriel's face when he'd arrived, the contrived lightness in his greeting. "You're always welcome, you know," he impressed suddenly, into the quiet space they'd created. "If I forget to say it, it's never because you're unwanted. I'm afraid I've been distracted. And not in nearly as pleasant a way as you just demonstrated."
He smiled again, and lifted his head an inch. "Did you want that drink? Or something else?"
“My dear Mr Eden,” Gabriel replied, grinning up at him, and brushing the hair from his eyes (there was something about Bertie’s hair that demanded one’s fingers run through it), “I shall most certainly keep that in mind. And you’re a poet,” he said, simply, running a hand down Bertie’s back. “Absent-mindedness and poor hosting are part of your charm.” He laughed a little. “For heaven’s sake, don’t get up on my account -- I’ve quite enjoyed my amuse bouche and don’t want for anything else at the moment, thank you, but if you’d like to fetch some fortification for yourself, just don’t get too distracted by a stray thought to forget I’m here.”
His hand rested on the small dip at the base of Bertie’s back. “...And of course I know. That’s why I showed up so rudely without an invitation.”
It was still good to hear nonetheless -- and for all his teasing, he was glad to see a return to that steady flow of words that was so fundamentally Bertie. That, and while they’d ended on a good note last time around, it was good to know it was the sort of resolution that had staying power rather than a temporary patch on an insurmountable issue that would crack again with distance.
"I have charm?" Bertie feigned guilelessness, eyes wide but betrayed by his growing smile, which he had to duck his head to hide before admitting defeat. Reminded of Gabriel's explanation on relative energies, he mused, "I hope I'm nutritious at least, if small." He couldn't quite say it without blushing, but he recovered well, darting forward for a kiss before sitting up, with more determination this time.
He retrieved one of the sandwiches from the box Gabriel had brought, and climbed back into bed astride Gabriel, tearing off a corner of it to offer up so that they might share it, in hand-fed tidbits one bite at a time. "I could never forget you were here. Forget everything else, perhaps, in your company, but not you."
Bertie paused for a bite, and offered another to Gabriel after he'd swallowed. "I wrote a new poem, if you'd like to read it," he offered, though he frowned pensively just after. "It's rather dark, though. I don't think I'll publish it. Some works are simply to work through something, are they not? So that what the public sees is the completed transformation, chrysalis into butterfly." A sudden smile bloomed, in his eyes more than on his lips. "You're not public. How have you been? How is your estate proceeding?"
Gabriel ate his own proffered bit of sandwich, his hands resting lightly on Bertie’s hips, and his eyes brightening at mention of poetry. He ran a thumb over Bertie’s hipbone in slow circles. “I should like that very much,” he said, quietly pleased. He tipped his head over to one side, considering, but figured talk of whether said darkness had indeed been worked through entirely was best saved until after the reading.
“On the balance, I’ve been reasonably well,” he added. “This blasted business in Whitechapel is decidedly not good for business, but the girls are all safe thus far, if a little rattled. The judicial system in France continues to be a notorious tangle, but that’s to be expected, my investments are all doing quite robustly despite it, and I most certainly can’t complain about my dance card. You see, there’s this delightfully nutritious poet I know who lets me read his unpublished works…” he laughed, sitting up close enough to kiss Bertie in between bites of sandwich.
“Leah’s well,” he added, knowing such a topic would be a touch awkward, but also knowing Bertie would want to know, would be concerned, because he was Bertie, and that was enough to earn him another light kiss.
"I'm glad," Bertie replied, brightening. "And that she hasn't fallen afoul of my parents. They mean well, but...well, my family have a long way to climb, I suppose. Every generation must do their part. I think my father is hoping that I make Chief Constable or something, and attract a young lady above my station. I'm afraid I'm going to be a disappointment to him on that count, but..." He shrugged, trying to play off unhappiness as fatalism. Bertie wasn't Chief Constable material; there was nothing he could do to help that. No matter how hard he tried to prove himself, he couldn't manage to impress Chief Orwell.
Of course, that might also have something to do with how little Bertie applied himself to his actual assigned work, and how much he spent chasing ghosts - literal and figurative - and following leads that had nothing to do with his cases.
"I know someone working on the Whitechapel case," Bertie admitted. He chewed on his lip pensively. "I keep forgetting about it. What a horrible thing to say." He rubbed his forehead with the hand mostly clean of sandwich crumbs, and sighed. "Not forgetting, exactly, but I haven't been thinking about it. Of course you're worried. And Leah, as well. I'm so sorry. I suppose I just have enough on my mind that I've filed it off as someone else's problem. That's even more horrible, isn't it? I'm meant to be protecting the Queen's Peace, and there are these terrible murders, and I haven't done more than listen to the constables talking and read the papers."
Bertie recalled what he'd been doing, and broke off another bite of the sandwich to offer Gabriel. "Have you heard anything I should pass along? Any hint it might be Night Watch business? I can follow up on anything, if you have any concerns that Scotland Yard hasn't attended to yet. I know they have a full plate."
"My dear," Gabriel said warmly (after taking the proffered sandwich bit), "you aren't responsible for every single case that crosses the Night Watch's desk, and I shouldn't expect you to be. It's not a shortcoming on your part -- heaven knows you're busy enough."
He reached up to brush his fingers against Bertie's cheek. "I haven't yet heard anything definitive that would make me think so," he said, honestly enough, "but if I do, I shall be sure to let you know, so you might pass it along to whoever it is."
That wasn't quite good enough, so he leaned up to kiss Bertie gently. "You have such a wonderful capacity for empathy, Bertie, it's one of the reasons I like you, it's what makes you a good investigator, too, but try not to take too much on those shoulders. It's not all your responsibility, dearest." His fingers wrapped gently around Bertie's jaw. "The only reason anyone could be disappointed in you is if they didn't truly understand your worth. They're caterpillars who see a chrysalis and are confused." He kissed Bertie again.
Bertie set the sandwich aside so that he could focus on Gabriel, who seemed the far more important consideration of the two. There was a pleasant aside of soft kisses which Bertie sank into gratefully; when they parted, he caught Gabriel's hand before it could withdraw and touched his lips to Gabriel's fingers.
"I don't believe I've ever known anyone like you." Gabriel almost acted like a father to him, although of course that wasn't right at all. Gabriel had such faith in Bertie, faith Bertie had never had in himself, and was endlessly encouraging. Bertie smiled at him. "Or at least, no one I've known so well."
He ran his hands over Gabriel's chest; soft touches, not leading anywhere, just marveling at the man in his bed. "Thank you. You really are remarkable. I count myself fortunate to have..." Bertie's smile broke out across the rest of his face. "...stumbled into you, quite literally. Or fallen, is more like it."
Not falling, though. Bertie wondered if he'd feel the same way he had with Mal again, or if that was a dizzy tumble reserved for first loves alone, and all other lovers became a slower rush, no less sweet. He drifted on metaphor for a moment, passion as a waterfall, and the deep love of intimates the currents beneath a river, and then he blinked and remembered they'd been having a conversation.
"I seem to be stumbling into a number of things lately," Bertie murmured, his voice lowered though no one could hear them, and Bertie knew well enough that there were no ghosts in these rooms. He leaned forward to settle against Gabriel again, although his hands were restless, still roaming over bare skin as if he were sculpting and shaping Gabriel from clay, although Gabriel's was a form for marble, not lesser casting.
Bertie had lost the thread again; he reached back to reclaim it, and bit his lip. "Or things are stumbling into me. And I...I don't seem to be able to let them go. Even though perhaps I should."
When Bertie wasn't talking, he was drifting -- he tended to dream while waking, and Gabriel could see that faraway look before he tugged gently on Bertie's hair to bring him back, the younger man's eyes coming back into focus.
"Tell me?" Gabriel replied, with less of a demand and more of a gentle nudge, his hands running smoothly down Bertie's back and sides. "You seem like you've been... dwelling a bit," nesting more like, "...and while I know you've got your Jamie to turn things over with, how is he, by the bye?" He asked, "...I'm not averse to serving as confessor for a bit if it would help."
It was a deliberate reminder of when Bertie'd had the mistaken impression he was a man of the cloth, which was endlessly amusing, but in this case, a little apt.
"And I'm glad you ran into me too," he added, grinning. "Truly."
Bertie was so very human -- brimming with a complicated sea of emotion and passion that could only ever live in those who were both young and artistically bent, and it served to make him far more beautiful than he would be otherwise. Young men were as common as ha'pennys, but a young man with poetry in his soul was something else entirely.
Bertie turned that over slowly, considering how to frame all that he was thinking, and decided to tell it like a story; a narrative of what had happened, without any of the clutter he'd acquired in his thoughts to follow it.
"There are things I can't talk with Jamie about, because of where he is," Bertie began slowly, rewinding even further in the tale. "Officers of the Night Watch can have sharp hearing, and while I shouldn't conceal anything from them...Lord Black is..." He remembered, nearly too late, that Gabriel didn't, and couldn't, know the latest development. Bertie had sworn to keep it confidential. "...personal," he finished truthfully, which Gabriel knew already. "And the Sidhe..."
Bertie shuddered, remembering the ice of her knife blade against his throat, and her hissed threats, her dismissal of him as disposable and unlikely to be missed. "I still don't know who to trust. I've spoken with someone...somewhat outside the Night Watch, who still works cases for us. Not in detail, but I believe he'll help, however he can."
Bertie chewed on his lip again, and then turned his face into Gabriel's warm chest for a moment, pressing a kiss to his skin before he began the other story, the one that had led him nowhere but still plagued his mind.
"I met a ghost," he began again, "who asked if I took care of ghosts' business in the world of the living. He asked if I was 'the one', as if I had a reputation...as if they talked of me, the ghosts, and thought I could help them. He asked me to carry a message to a woman in Kensington Gardens. He knew somehow that she would be there, and he could move...I asked him how, but he didn't know. He didn't know that other ghosts couldn't. He wanted to go to her himself, to relay the message, rather than having me repeat it. I can't blame him, in hindsight...how else could he really be sure that it was delivered?"
Bertie paused, his thoughts trying to divert from their course; he shook off the worries and questions and kept things simple. He closed his eyes as he related the message, trying to recall the exact words when he hadn't been able to write them down. "The message was about the Russians, and their monarchy...that they had none, he claimed, no ruler. But then I think...I think he might have called her one, a queen, although he spoke to her with such disdain and vulgar language, she couldn't have been one. So perhaps it was their own code, and meant something else."
Queen of the company, Bertie thought. What did that make the Russian monarch? The head of another?
"The ghost claimed to have information about plans. He made a bargain with her to trade the information in exchange for security for his family. I think that's why I was there...because it was more than a message he needed to deliver, it was a negotiation. Something to set his spirit at rest. He asked to be buried, in a proper coffin. I don't know...it sounded as though she..." Bertie swallowed, and banished too-vivid imagery born of crime scenes from his mind. "She had his remains, as his former employer. They argued about plans, designs...she'd been drawing engines, and it sounded as though there was foul play at work. The ghost, he said...something about 'the most human thing about her'. I can't remember now. God, it's all gone to pieces."
Bertie sat up again and rubbed his eyes. "He gave her a name. Kamarov? Karamozov? I wrote it down, as soon as I could. And an alias. And then he..." Bertie hesitated. "I might be reading into it, but the ghost seemed to suddenly realize...he mentioned them falling suddenly ill, and then he went pale...I know, even for a ghost. As if he'd realized something then. I fear it's foul play. And then they spoke of something else, she asked...she wanted to know whether, if she'd asked for permission, he would have granted it. And he said...he asked why she couldn't have let it be a man's death."
Bertie shuddered again, suddenly cold, and regretting the loss of Gabriel's body heat. He laid down beside Gabriel on the bed, curling into him, his feet winding into the bedclothes. "I can't find him again," Bertie confessed. "I don't know how. I've asked Miss Bakst...she doesn't know either. I've never...they've never moved, before. And maybe he's moved on. Maybe there's nothing to investigate. But I..." Bertie shook his head, unable to describe the fear in his throat, the prickling of his skin. "The way they were together. Some of the things they said. I haven't been able to put it out of my head."
The best thing Gabriel could do was listen, even though it was disjointed, and only a fraction of a story to start with -- and when Bertie shivered and nestled, he reached for him, pulling him close and planting a kiss on his forehead, swinging a leg over on top of Bertie’s to pin him to the present, to make him feel a touch more grounded.
“I can see why,” he said, quietly. “Even if you weren’t a member of the Night Watch -- it sounds very nearly like a bad dream, and has enough unanswered questions to be difficult to reconcile.” He kissed Bertie again, on the lips this time, a comforting, light touch.
“For what it’s worth,” he continued, “I’m glad you were there to help, and as unfinished as it all feels to you, it does seem as though you were able to provide a measure of resolution to someone who needed it.” He frowned a little, thoughtfully, looking over at the uncertainty writ in a poetic hand all over Bertie’s face. “The second bit, the bit where it raised more questions for you, well.” He reached over to brush the hair out of Bertie’s eyes. “Perhaps the most difficult part isn’t that there’s a further injustice that mandates addressing, but that you’re unsure about whether there was one?”
He shrugged a little. “You entered a conversation midstream, about events that you knew nothing about, and were serving in the capacity of translator. Of course it came across as a muddle -- it’s only natural to be frustrated at not having anything to hang your hat on.”
"He could have been murdered," Bertie pointed out. "Two other men might have been poisoned. There might be an international incident...espionage, even treason. Or it could be nothing, perfectly harmless, a tense discussion I couldn't interpret."
He sighed, finally admitting, perhaps, the initial thorn that had caught in his mind. "And ghosts are telling each other that I'll listen to them and help."
It was a heavier cloak of responsibility than he might have thought, the idea that out there in London, word had spread, at least to some degree, that there was a Night Watchman who could listen, and seek justice for those wronged in life. Ghosts could easily be victims of foul play--and even beyond that, they might know of crimes covered up, clues lost to time...they might be witnesses in their afterlife to even more injustices. The idea of being tasked with that was overwhelming, even without the other worries on Bertie's plate. Fae artifacts that could destroy the city. An American vampire coven seeking a coup. Assassination attempts on the Alpha of Black Park.
"I saw her at Lord Ravensworth's engagement party, on the Thames," Bertie said quietly. "She didn't look happy to see me. I wonder...if it's not nothing, I know names now, titles, circumstances. I wonder if I might already know too much for someone's comfort. Even if..." He winced. "Even if there was nothing to this conversation, but another crime to cover up...part of why I keep quiet about what I can do is to keep the wrong people from thinking they need to remove me in order to cover their tracks. I'm sort of a...track...uncover-er."
Bertie made a face, and when he let out a breath he found he could smile. "Some investigator I am, hmm? All of these notes and leads, and I haven't pursued any of them, not really. I wasn't sure what I'd find."
His hand found Gabriel's cheek again, and stroked his face. "What would you do, in my place?" he asked curiously. "Do you think I should look into it? Or let it go?"
“I can see why you haven’t yet,” Gabriel replied. “It’s not an easy answer either way, is it? They don’t write manuals for this sort of thing.” He sighed. “Let’s take ghosts out of the equation. You… speak fluent Cantonese, and are asked to translate a dispute between a worker and an employer, not because you’re an officer of the law, but have a reputation as a decent sort of helpful fellow, and word has spread that your translation skills are legendary.” He grinned. “You mediate, and overhear some troubling things, but aren’t sure whether they’re worth pursuing further. And the person who’s the potentially wronged party, who’d be able to direct you to evidence doesn’t want to press the matter and promptly vanishes.”
He laughed a little. “I’m not sure if that’d help at all, but perhaps it’d be easier to wrap your brain around?”
He turned his head to kiss at Bertie’s hand a little. “I haven’t taken an oath,” he said, “and I’m cautious by nature, so bear that in mind, but I’d say there’s a difference between keeping an eye on things from a distance and actively poking about -- it seems the former might be warranted… but even then, I’d pick my battles and let this one go,” he ended.
He kissed Bertie on the nose. “I’m also rather highly motivated for you to stay un-removed, thank you.”
Bertie sighed again, and wound a little closer into Gabriel. "Highly motivated. I started out that way, with this." He smiled ruefully. "I was determined to find the truth, to track down the ghost and learn what had truly happened. I visited Miss Bakst for help, even, and she isn't cheap."
Bertie's brief laugh faded as he thought back. "The ghost asked if I was a witch. And on the barge, one of the other officers mentioned that the woman I saw, the one I carried the message to, was a witch. Does your opinion change if there might be supernatural crime involved? It seemed so important, when I sought out Miss Bakst...I suppose I just gave up on it, when she couldn't help me to find the ghost again. It's...the rest I don't really care about, directly, though I should. Selling and stealing plans, dealings with Russians. But I did want to know that he was all right. Taken care of, with justice done, if there was any need for it."
The more he talked, the more it became clear where Bertie's concern really lay: With Benson St. Crane, who had asked him for help. The rest of it was simply smoke obscuring the fire.
Bertie's mouth twisted again, abashed. "I should let this go, shouldn't I? He's made his bargain and found peace. As Miss Bakst said...if he wanted to find me again, surely he could." There are a lot of reasons why he might not, of course, but that was Bertie second-guessing again, with no point to it. He was an investigator; he wanted to investigate. And to help someone who'd needed him. That was all this was.
As silly as the notion of his being a priest was, Gabriel wondered whether Bertie needed permission -- absolution, as it were.
“He could’ve done you the good graces of letting you know he was satisfied,” he replied, running a thumb gently under Bertie’s eye. “An ill mannered spirit, to be sure,” he added, with a small smile, “but he asked your help because he knew you’d give it, and you did. It wasn’t the sort of justice you might want, but, then again…” he shrugged. “Who’s to say what justice looks like for someone like him?”
“You’re a good man, Bertie,” he added. “A better one than most.”
"You're right," Bertie said quietly, before mirroring Gabriel's smile. "Not about me being a good man, but about what justice looks like for someone else. I told him I could follow up with him, to see that the bargain was honored, and he told me it wasn't necessary."
Right before the ghost had asked if Bertie wanted the name of someone who might be able to help Jamie see the sky, and Bertie had declined; too spooked, too worried, too eager to pursue what had felt, at the time, like a conspiracy of intrigue.
"This hasn't played out at all like I'd imagined," Bertie confessed. "I thought I'd be pacing the room, tearing pages from notebooks, discussing wild theories and possible leads. Instead it feels..." He drew in a breath, thought for a moment, and let it out again. "Like it's over."
Bertie laid his hand on Gabriel's chest, over his heart. "I'm turning melancholy. Poetry, or sandwiches?" He tilted his head to nose in for a light, lingering kiss. "Thank you, for listening to me. I sometimes feel all I do is lay out what's troubling me for you to shine a light through the thicket of brambles and show me the path forward."
"Why not both?" Gabriel replied with a pleased smile, winding around Bertie in an embrace, trapping Bertie's hand against his chest. "Both is rather nice. Although they do require your getting up, which is a damn shame."
He nuzzled Bertie a little. "And you give me plenty," he said, quietly. "Besides the obvious, I mean." He paused. "Your enthusiasm is positively contagious. You give me adventures, and poetry. You walk into a brothel and see people there. You learn that I run it, that my daughter works there, and you respond with remarkable understanding, and don't think less of either of us for it." He grinned a short, quick sort of smile, leaning over to kiss him lightly. "...And it's rather nice to be valued for one's advice and intelligence when one is used to being seen as a good lay first and foremost."
Sighing, he stretched a little, pulling Bertie that much closer. "All in all, I'd call that a fairly decent friendship, and one I'm glad to have."
Bertie would have stammered out a denial of Gabriel's compliments, but what came after gave him pause enough to consider his next words with care. "I would call you a gentleman foremost," he said, eyes locking with Gabriel's to show his sincerity. "You rescued me from misfortune when I had need, and have shown steadfast grace in every encounter since, no matter how strange or trying. Second a friend and adviser, with whom I've shared confidences I can't speak aloud to anyone else. You have more honor than most men I know."
Bertie's arms slid around Gabriel's waist, and after a brief moment he added, "I do enjoy having a lover, but I don't need one. Having a loyal friend upon whom I can depend is something I would feel far more the lack of, in your absence."
They were moving no closer to Bertie retrieving poetry or sandwiches, either one. Rather, it seemed, in the opposite direction. Craning his neck to look behind him at the table containing the sandwich box, Bertie cast a sly sideways glance back to Gabriel. "You know, we could make this an effort of partnership. If you hold onto me to keep me from falling out onto the floor," he teased, breaking into a grin even before he finished, "I may not even have to leave the bed."