Faith in the Atmosphere - Part 2 (A Dark Shadows Story)

[lovesrain44]

The Old House was cold and damp, and, except for the single light burning on the console in the front hall as he walked toward it, completely dark. It was obvious from that fact, and that there was no fire, nor any note for him to build one, that Barnabas did not intend to bring Miss Winters up for a visit. Willie stared at the candle, his hands fisting in the air in front of him, feeling the shiver move through his chest. A ripple that came and went, for-ward and back, like waves on a damp ocean shore.

I am not, I will not—

The thought broke off as his feet marched him back to the kitchen, where he stripped off his jacket and flung it on the closest chair. Lit the candles on the mantelpiece. Bent to light the fire in the stove, his hands shaking too hard to hold the match steady, the spark catching on the tinder in spite of him. A small flame grew inside of the stove lid, sending a small curl of smoke that soaked into his lungs and hair before drifting into the cold air beyond the darkness.

He paced into the hall again, striding the length of it, looking at the single candle and the silent hollow of the front room. Still shivering, stomach pattering around inside him like a ferret intent on scratching its way through him. He would build a fire here, build it up high, distract Barnabas with lit candles, and the favor of a setting that would be fit for Miss Winters.

Oh, yeah, like that's going to distract him. Sure.

Idiot.

And Wesley, what about Wesley? He'd looked so white and confused, and Willie knew that it was the drunkenness that had made him fling accusations, at least he hoped it was that. Why else would his friend try to kill him? Surely he couldn't believe a word of what he'd been saying. Willie would no more snitch on Wesley than he would have on—on Jason.

Never mind that now, damnit, Loomis. Barnabas is going to come back and kill you. Now think.

Back to the kitchen he went, his shoulders breaking through the dark of the hallway as if it were a curtain, he could almost feel the velvet weight. Through the doorway and into the small hollow of warmth that was growing around the stove. It soaked into him briefly as he strode through it to open the back door. A thin mist met him there, echoing with the distant beat of the sea and the slow, steady murmur of the woods at the edge of the clearing. His clothes, still soaked, turned icy.

He shut the door and found himself in front of the stove again. Breathing hard, as though he'd been running, and for a moment, he paused. Held his breath and then let it all out in a whoosh. Rubbed his hands over his upper arms where the heat of his body, moving and in motion, had dried the parts of the flannel of his shirt.

Do you now. Do you.

Both Wesley and Barnabas had accused him of something he'd not done and had never contemplated. Wesley of him being a snitch for his wife, Barnabas of him fighting in the streets. Willie'd never snitched for or on anyone. Ever. Not even while doing his stint in prison. Hadn't Wesley believed him when he'd said that Laura would never hear about the drinking from him? And the last time he'd even thought about starting a fight had been with Burke Devlin. He'd lost that one, and had winced and struggled under Jason's pitying looks, hidden though they'd been. Jason had never known him to lose a fight. Not against an unarmed man. Not like that, in a bar, with a crowd looking on. And now, now he felt that he'd for-gotten how to fight at all. Knowing him, knowing him as he must, did Barnabas actually think that Willie would pick a fight that he was sure to lose? Surely Barnabas realized he had more pride than that?

No and no.

And all this time. Working all out, harder than he'd ever worked in his life. Ever. Wood, fire, candles, wax, and ash. Day in and day out. And the renovations on the Old House, good Lord, what would Jason have to say about that now? The armoire he'd redone of his own accord, and the little secretary that Miss Winters now adored. And the floor of Josette's room, damnit, he'd taken up the carpet, moved the furniture and polished the fucking thing by hand. All he'd gotten for that had been a nod and an early night. Not even a little cash bonus, like that time he'd done when he'd gone to the lobster restaurant.

Willie tore his hands away from his arms and brought his fists up to press against his forehead. Wanting to tear his thoughts out of his head and burn them in the stove, to destroy them, to keep them from circling round and round like wild devils in a cage.

I'll tell him. I will fucking tell him—

He threw open the door to the hallway and his feet thudded on the floorboards like hollow drumbeats. Half-way there, he heard the footsteps on the front porch and desperation rose in his throat like bricks as the front door opened and the master walked in.

Don't think of him like that, don't.

"Barnabas, I—"

"I expect you feel that whatever excuse you are about to make will keep you from what's due you."

Mouth open, he watched as Barnabas hung up his coat and cane, and his heart thudded as he realized that he was going to get a whipping, whether he deserved it or not. It was coming, by God, and nothing he did or said was going to make a damn bit of difference.

The vampire turned to look at him, eyes glinting in the candlelight, softened not at all by the darkness all around, and Willie took a breath and swallowed.

"I wasn't fighting," he said, thinking to start with that, start with the facts, and back them up with whatever he could think of.

"I beg your pardon?" Barnabas was entirely calm, thought Willie realized with sudden certainty that for a date with Miss Winters, one looked forward to for several days, Barnabas was home mighty early. It must have shaken her up by seeing the fight in the alley and she’d told Barnabas she wanted to come home, and that was only adding to his anger.

"I said, I wasn't fighting."

"I fail to see what else you would call it. You and your so-called friend were engaged in a friendly sparring match, I suppose?"

"No, we—"

"I can only assume that, although he had the upper hand when I came upon you, you'd somehow engaged him in this altercation."

Willie's jaw dropped open.

"I never laid a hand on him. Never, he—"

"Enough." Barnabas raised his hand, palm chalk white, his gaze flat and hard. "I have heard enough. You were fighting in the streets of Collinsport, which I have expressly forbid."

"But Barnabas—"

"And as for what you were doing in the vicinity of the Blue Whale, I can only imagine."

A fist that felt as big as his heart clenched to a stop inside of him. The day, the rain and the cold, Wesley's sad confused drunken face, and Barnabas' hard certainty that it was all his fault—all of this rushed headlong at him, and his lungs filled with air.

"It isn't fair," he started, almost gasping as he rushed out the words. "I wasn't fighting. I know it looks like I was, but I wasn't. The guy was drunk, an'—"

"This guy, your so-called friend?" Barnabas asked, interrupting him.

"He is my friend," Willie said, his shoulders bunching, and fists coming together in front of him. Only too late he caught Barnabas' glance at them, and realized that his protest was over before it had begun. "He was just upset, an' he'd had too much to drink, an'—"

Willie stalled, seeing the dry boredom in the vampire’s expression, and knowing, above all things, that nothing he said would make a damn bit of difference. "I'm telling you—" he said, the force in his words belying the panic in his chest.

"Drunk for what reason?" Barnabas asked now, tip-ping his head back as if to appraise the truth in his servant's words.

"I dunno, he—"

"Surely you know." Barnabas took a step toward him and then another. The darkness swooped behind him like a cape, engulfing the air so that the vampire and the darkness blended together. Only a single candle illuminated the side of his white face, carved in lines of inky black. "You said he was upset, he must have said some-thing as he tried to drown you."

"No."

"I beg your pardon?"

Willie swallowed, shifting his weight on one foot. "It's none—" His voice broke and he took a small, shallow breath. "It's none of your business." He should have been mad at Wesley, but he wasn't. And he'd be damned before he'd tell any of Wesley's private troubles to anyone, let alone Barnabas.

The vampire came forward with such swiftness that Willie was pinned against the stair railing before he could blink. Barnabas did not lay a hand on him, but came so close that any movement would bring Willie's flesh in contact with the crisp, cold grey wool of Barnabas' suit. Frozen there, jaw clenched tightly back, the hard curve of Barnabas' face only inches from his own, and he with his breath lurching in his chest.

"Oh, but it is my business, Willie. Your life is mine by consequence and therefore anything you do or say is my business."

"But, it's not—" he blurted out, catching a last chuck of air as one of Barnabas' hands snapped out to grip him by the throat. His chin dipped down of its own accord, his thoughts sucked away by the darkness forming behind his eyes, and he spat out the rest of it. "It's not anything to do with you."

"We will see about that," snapped the vampire, his temper surfacing in the grind of his voice. Mien of calm seemingly broken at last, he cast Willie down the hall, toward the kitchen and as Willie stumbled to keep to his feet, gave another shove, sending his full form into the closed door. The dry wood snapped beneath his shoulder and he pushed against it, glancing at the dark form as it advanced toward him from the dim light of the back hall.

The door opened beneath his trembling hands and he almost tumbled into the room, snagging the edge of the sink and hauling himself against it in the almost dark, lit only by the glow of the stove and the single candle over the fireplace. Echoes of the stars in the night sky fluttered through the window. Barnabas came in and closed the door behind him with a snick, locking out what little light could be had from the candle in the hallway. Willie's heart hammered beneath his breastbone, the palms of his hands almost cutting themselves on the edge of the sink. His mouth was bone dry, and he could not keep his thighs from quivering beneath him. They would give out soon, in a minute, Barnabas' timing would be perfect, in a minute he would fall and the vampire would catch him—

Fuck that shit, Loomis.

"It's none of your God damned business," he said, almost shouting, not missing the spark of surprise in Barnabas' eyes. A hard knob, the size of a fist, pushed its way up through his lungs. "It's not any of your business, any of it!" Now a real shout, the lump rising to sear through him as if his throat were on fire.

As the vampire snapped from a standstill, hands reaching to haul him up and throw him across the kitchen table, the breath was knocked out of him, his brain whirling—

Don't touch me, please don't touch me—

While at the same time, his whole body shuddered as his shirt was ripped upwards and his belt removed all in one, slicing motion, tight with desperation and desire as the cold hands were upon him, even if only for an instant, pressing him down against the table. One hand, large, heavy, the fingers splayed, he could feel every single one of them, as if they were a caress, and straying, inexplicably to the soft curve beneath his arm, resting there, his groin tightening, his cock hardening, shoulders shrugging down as he curved his arms around his head.

Oh, yes, please....

No. He cut the thought off just as the wood of the kitchen floor shifted beneath him as Barnabas stepped back, and with a scream building from deep within, he kicked back with his leg and pushed up with his arms.

"You c'n just go to hell, cause I ain't tellin' ya, not for anythin'—"

Hard hands pushed him down, his jaw landing against the planks of wood with a click. One glimpse of the vampire's white face, eyebrows lowered, told him, with the part of his mind that could interpret anything at all, that the vampire was a tad confused at the outburst. Not that it mattered, as a second later the first full whale of the belt landed across the soft part of his hips, shutting off any further outburst he'd been trying to dig up from the most disobedient part of his brain. Hard to find when for so long he'd been yes Barnabas and no Barnabas from sundown till sunup. With the taste of blood on his tongue, he felt Barnabas lean in, breath cold on the back of Willie's neck, the hiss of that voice tensing up his back with a shiver.

"Indeed, you will tell me, Willie. Before too long, I'll wager."

Dangerously close now, the dense muscle of the vampire's chest along his back. One hand resting on a bare shoulder and the press of a thigh against his. The cold, cold weight of his presence like a fine and heavy cloak, easing forward, until Willie's hips were snug against the edge of the table. Hip bones pressed hard by the wood, his desperately hard sex trapped in between. One move by Barnabas and Willie knew he would start screaming. And whether with desperation or desire, he could not let it hap-pen. He'd promised himself, and if he let it continue, he might as well throw himself over Widows Hill in the morning because once it started, it wasn't ever going to stop. Collins' word of honor or no.

"You can just fuck off," he muttered on a half breath. Sweat combed its way through his hair in spite of the chill of the kitchen, and he could feel it start tumbling its way down in front of his ears.

The hand moved with a snap from his shoulder to the back of his neck. "I beg your pardon?" came the snarl. "What did you say to me?"

Fingers pressed down like five pieces if sharpened ice, not allowing him to draw away, or ease the air into his lungs. He swallowed anyway, knowing that Barnabas could feel every pulse of blood beneath his skin.

"I said, you can just fuck off."

The belt hit him again, hard enough to sear the air from his lungs, to rip the strangled howl from him. And then another blow, curling around, hot, branding like fired iron, the tip of the belt popping against the bone of his hip.

Then it was still. Just for a second, and he felt Barnabas lean close, breath a cool whisper in his ear.

"Fighting in the streets, Willie? And profanity? It gives one pause, does it not? And brings me to the very ladened conclusion that you desire this. As you desire what you imagine might follow."

The back of his neck melted, he felt his face flaming, the ringing in his brain shouting for him to agree. Some-thing deep within his body writhing to get out, wanting to be flung upon the brier stirred by vampire hands. But his soul won. He clenched the table with two hard-knuckled fists, nails digging in, biting his mouth around a snarl.

"Fuck you, asshole."

Kicked back with the heel of a foot, a fractious beast of burden, brought to the end of his patience, striking out, at last, against the master. He felt his shoe catch the broad bone of Barnabas' calf, the mud on his shoe slipping across the fine wool of trouser leg. And heard Barnabas actually make a sound of surprise, low and astonished. Saw the shimmer of air as the belt cut through it and his head hit the table with the impact of the blow across his back.

Saved. He was saved from himself, even as he was lost to the cut of leather through bare skin. Sliced by a sensation so sharp that the pain of one blow was not realized until the echo of the next had faded away. Ears ringing with each high whicker of the belt, the thud of muscle compressed against bone, and his own, husked chuff of air against the tabletop. But rather this than those hands, those knowing hands, the arrogant knowing, and the pleasuring. Smug, superior, and soft, so soft.

Please.

Please.

Oh, please.

He was weeping into his hands as the beating ended, and beyond that he could hear Barnabas behind him, breathing hard, a low, almost musically jagged sound. The creak of wood shifting beneath leather-shod feet as Barnabas stepped back, and flung the belt so hard it clunked against the wall to collapse on the floor. The silence.

"Go to your room," the vampire said, low. "And stay there."

As Willie pushed himself up, the darkness ringed his vision. He could not see where Barnabas stood, only sense the push of a form in the shadows and feel the eyes that stared. He made himself walk through it, as if it were a cloud of evil-smelling air that had come up from still, brine water. And made himself keep walking all the way up the stairs, walk instead of run, breathe in and out instead of whimpering, no panic, no panic, no panic.

He made it to his room out of breath, and stripped off his still-wet clothes, shoving them in the corner of his armoire. There was no water in the pitcher to drink or rinse his face with, and he had to content himself with simply crawling under the covers, and lying on his side.

The room settled with dampness around him. He could light a fire, but that would require moving and stretching, not to mention going down to the kitchen for a scuttle of coal. And that he would not do. Could not do. He was sweating anyway, radiating heat as his body eased its way through the scores along his back. Right there along his spine, something hurt extra hard, like a razor was being drawn back and forth, and he imagined that he could smell blood. Could imagine it seeping, slow, like an old spring oozing forth something dark and nasty. Along with the sweat still trickling along behind his ear and down the back of his armpits, he was plenty warm. Soon, maybe in an hour, he would grow cold, and draw the blankets around him like a cloak and pretend to sleep in their hiding folds.

For now though, he pushed the blankets behind him, to block the draft from the window and the chimney flue. The wind was at a humming stage, on the verge of raising the volume and pitch and lowering the temperature. Time enough for that later, when the winds rose across the sea and up the lee edge of Widows Hill. The blankets formed woolen hillocks, and he shifted his leg thinking that there might be a welt alongside his knee, but remembered that Barnabas had not hit him there. Maybe he'd hit his leg against the table, or the stove, he couldn't remember. It certainly ached like he had.

His toes caught in the tag end of a tear in the sheets, and he let them tear it as he pulled his leg back and curved his chin down to his chest. Letting his head almost slip off the pillow, down into the slight valley of the mattress. Bound to give him a neck ache before morning, but for now, it was a cocoon, with the half-moon sweep of the blanket curving behind him. He pushed back against it, thinking of sleep, feeling the warmth of his body echoing back from the wool, and imagining, as he closed his eyes, that it was the hard plane of a thigh, pushing closer. His back edged towards it before he realized he was doing it, sinking into the mound of wool, wanting it to be so. Felt the push of two thighs, hands, a chest rising and falling behind him. Felt the slip of a woolen-clad arm, gently, across his shoulder, and turned his head into the mattress, tucking his face under the flap of pillowcase. Stomach spiring, inward, like a sucking mouth, and then spraying outward with a tumble of electric pinpricks. With a small shiver, he eased his hand down, finding his cock hard with the blood pumping through it. Hot, like an iron in a fire, and weeping from the tip as he brushed his thumb over it. Tight, velvet-skinned, and he shoved his briefs down on one side, in one, fierce, hard move. Elastic catching on the hairs on his thighs, hanging and then pulling, his hand clasping as hard as he could without pain.

Tipping forward into that dark moment, just for a moment, stopping, pressing his nails, fingertips digging, into his cock.

No no no don't want this no.

A fleeting motion, perhaps air across his bare belly, or the agonizing rub of sheet along his knee. The twitch of hard flesh in his hand. Circling his palm around, letting his fingers guide him, closing his eyes against darkness, against the pinpricks, now silver, starting to shoot through his head. And met the bolts of sharp static coming up through his spine.

Please.

The woolen blankets seemed to oblige him, almost pressing him into the mattress, as he slid his hand, slow, slow, up and down. Moisture seeped beneath his palm, slicking the surface, melting the cool air into hot, and simmering. Shimmering, soaking into the air, till his nostrils twitched at it, the thickness of his own, solitary passion.

Stop.

He knew he should, that he was doing this for the wrong reasons, but it was only a distant echo in the back of his brain. His hand, his cock, his thighs, the muscles along his groin, they knew what they were doing, they knew what they wanted. And his back, too, could not ignore the outlines of the form that pressed against it, taller, shoulders broad, cool hands, and steady arms. A dark head bent to press close into his neck, a whisper of air, of breath, along his cheek. Welts aching, skin edging toward a scream, and his hand picked up speed, catching the moisture, spreading the sparks, faster. Faster . . . faster....

Then spreading outward in a sigh of stars, pumping out of him, escaping almost. Exploding. The smell of salt and hot turned to cool as he came in his palm, fingers let-ting it seep into the sheets, into the mattress, forever marking it with something of him. Something Barnabas could not fail to catch the scent of, were he to pay a call before the sun came up. The welts along his back began to itch as his cock melted against his thighs, sticky with semen. His hand, sticky, and he wiped it against the sheets, trying to pretend that he was just rubbing an itch away, or smoothing the sheet. No use. Too late. The hillock behind him was just that now. A hump of lifeless blankets that could not take the blame for his fevered brain that insisted on looking for what was not there. A hand in the dark, a voice saying something important, a breath even. Letting him know he was not alone, that the night would not take him without a fight.

He turned his head fully into the mattress now, feeling the cold, pulling the blankets over him, bare wool to bare skin, the sheet somehow lost in a tussle that he could not remember. Feeling the mattress push against the bone of his nose, ducking his chin to his chest to gasp for air, eyes hot, even as his shoulders were cold, just before he pulled the blankets over his head. Tears spilling down his cheeks to fall into the darkness. The rush of hard, hot anger surging up his spine, and turned and ducked his head into the curve of his elbow. Pressing his eyes, clenching his mouth against the rage. Tears slipping anyway, the dark gurgle from his throat. He knew what he'd done, and the fact that there were no witnesses to it did not matter.

Fuck you, Willie. You looser. You fucking fucking looser.

The wind started to moan through the chinks in the leading, seeping cold through floorboards and chimney flue, no matter how small the space, the wind always knew the way through. Humming, rising in pitch, culling around the corners of his bed, flicking up the edges of his blanket as he clenched himself toward sleep.

***

Faith in the Atmosphere - Part 3
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