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Annals of Fear II	By : DeathNoteFangirl Category: Death Note > Yaoi-Male/Male > Mello/Matt Views: 5803 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note and I do not make any money from these writings

Chapter List
- 49
- 50
- 51
Century and Deontic returned, both carrying piles of books.   They had mostly Welsh titles, but a few were in English.   They were largely history books relating to the area, but some were of the folklore, hauntings and legends.    They were placed on the table beside Century, with the origami needing to be brushed aside to accommodate them.   Deontic spoke up, as soon as she entered, "Fenian, I've been speaking with Valerie.   She's really helped me.   Psychological baggage that I didn't even know I was carrying.    I've been in a bad place, since Lamond's death. Valerie's helping me get out of that."

"That's good." Fenian replied, carefully.

"I'm just saying that I recommend her."   Deontic sat, primly, and picked up the sheet of paper that she had been working on. It was a quite intricate shape, but promised to become an origami flower.

Kiana squeezed Fenian, with her arm around him.   "We've noted it."   She caught Deontic's eye, communicating in a look that she'd speak with him.   "We got a little side-tracked, but it was important information.   When I walked into the manor house, even the trackway, it was like fucking Dublin station.   It was packed.   I could barely move for them."   She shuddered. "They are attracted to me. I know I must shine like a beacon in their world.   Their world is a lot foggier, darker than ours, if they're stuck.   If they can't move on.   But the house acts in the same way.   Ghosts are there, which do not belong there. They come because they feel the energy.   But more were there, because they could fucking feel me. I'll not go back."   She glanced around, awaiting dissent. It didn't come. "Then there are the ghosts who belong there."

"Historian, I am."   Century grinned.   Fenian gave him a sharp look.   "Tell me about your ghosts."

Kiana looked pensive.   "There were so many. I was so fucking overwhelmed.   I'm not at all convinced that they all belonged to the house.   They were drawn there, as I've said.   If you were in trouble, in a strange place, you'd go to the police-station or the embassy. They haven't fucking got that.   They follow any light in the darkness."

"So you can't give me anything to research?" Century asked, lightly. Fenian frowned deeply.   "Nothing at all, is it?"

Kiana rallied, "There was a man, who definitely belonged there.   Dark. Fucking evil he was.   But I didn't get a look at him.   There were several monks too, but they were mostly confined to the staircase area.   I did see one in the room where the priest hole was.   They were wearing a kind of grey habit.    A dirty white." She pulled her arms out of the quilt and from behind Fenian.   Demonstrating with gestures how the habits fell.   "There were a lot of people wearing what I'd take to be mediaeval clothing."   Kiana caught Century's half-smile.   "Shall I describe them to you?"

As she did so, and Century took notes, Fenian's mind was drifting.    He was looking at Century.   Fenian was only here because he, Chrissie and Salvo all agreed that Century was heading for a nervous breakdown.   The kid had been to Hell and back just recently.   Century had been worrying Fenian, not just since arriving here, but over messenger in the few weeks preceding this trip.    For 18 years, Century had approached life with nothing much seeming to touch him at all.   Fenian and Salvo had secretly confessed to each other that they had endless respect for Century's outlook.   Stresses and pressures that had them all going slightly insane, would have Century just shrugging it off.    Water off a duck's back.   Except for the gun thing, obviously, but the whole reason that Century's gun phobia was so shocking was that it stood alone.   Nothing else caused so much as a ripple in the still waters of Century's equilibrium.    Laid-back didn't cover it.   As Salvo had once quipped, they were going to have to invent a stronger word, just to cover the Welsh teenager's apparent inability to worry about a thing.

Then this.   For 18 years, that had all been true.   For two months, it was all about as far from a description of Century as it was possible to get.    His panic attacks were becoming hourly.    At least once a day, for the past four weeks, he appeared convinced that he was having another heart attack.   The first six times it had happened, Fenian had rushed to call Wammy's House.   Madeleine from the in-house infirmary had dropped everything to race up to Century's room.   It was always a false alarm.   The potential for Century crying wolf over this was already a strong reality.   At least while he was in Wales, Fenian could see him and evaluate his condition for himself.   It was panic.   It was obviously panic.   But the lad could frighten himself into a heart attack at this rate.   It was all very worrying and Fenian had been determined to entice Century back to Ireland with him.   A few weeks stepping back from the killing wheel would do the teenager the power of good. Fenian wasn't so sure about that, now that there was grief between himself and Kiana to resolve.

But since they had been in this room, since Fenian himself had been so shaken, Century had changed.    It was like shades of his usual self were coming back.   He had entered the room looking terrified and ill.    He still did, but it was hidden.   It was in the shaking of his hand or the look in his eyes.   Century was trying to be brave.   Fenian feared how badly he, himself, seemed for that to be the case.   Deontic was talking about psychologists.   Fenian shifted his attention to the Malaysian woman and was startled to see her staring right back at him.   She was appraising him.   Fenian opened his mouth to reassure her, but then Kiana said something which drenched him again with icy coldness.

"Then there was a girl with marks all over her," Kiana waved her hand over her muzzle, "mouth and chin.   Her lips were blood red. The patches were red and sort of brown.   Her eyes were red. Well, the lids. Like she was wearing red eyeliner and eyeshadow.   She looked like she had a bit of a nose bleed.   Meleri."   Kiana nodded.   "I felt that her name was Meleri."

"I saw her!" Fenian gaped.   "She led me down to the river!   It was all up her neck."   He was aware that they were all staring at him, none more startled than Kiana.   "Mass of it, up her neck.   Scrofula.   She had scrofula.   It was over her face. I saw her!   I swear!"

Deontic blinked. "Last time we were here. I saw an entity rise out of the river."   She bowed her head, thinking.   "Century, could that thing, that night, have been the ghost of a scrofulous woman?   Not the Gwrach..."

"Don't say it." Century interrupted. "Don't want to hear the name.   You're not Welsh."

"I can pronounce it!"   Deontic bristled.

Century shook his head. "Not the point.   Don't want to be tempting Fate, see?"

Deontic reached to pat his arm, but froze at the sounds from outside the window.   They were faint, as a rushing noise.   Century leapt from his seat and span around.   He was practically on Fenian's lap, in his zest to move backwards, regardless of the presence of the table.   It took them several seconds to reconcile what they were hearing with the probable source.   Deontic exhaled loudly, her shoulders sagging.   "They're back."   She rushed to the window to confirm her view.   She reported back, "Hal and Lauren."

Century flushed, feeling foolish.   He moved to regain his seat, but both Fenian and Kiana reached for him.    Fenian to touch his back and Kiana to catch, then squeeze his hand.   Century nodded, then sat back down.   He murmured, "Mello and Matt stayed up there then.   Got the case now, they have."

Fenian nodded.   The notion didn't fill him with as much antagonism as he might have expected. A handful of hours ago, the news would have galvanised him with a competitive fire. He would have been out there, ready to win or die.   The rivalry would have been everything.   But now, he just didn't care.   They could have it.   He just felt numb.   He watched Century, trying to ascertain whether he thought the same.   Kiana breathed out, heavily, through her nose.   Fenian transferred his attention to her. She looked at him.   Fenian only sensed his own defeat now, as a distant emotion, streaking deep inside. "Let them have it."

Century bent even further over his book.    Hair fell in two curtains over his face.   He couldn't be seen.   But his shoulders were set in surrender too.   It had to be hurting him.   They could hear the returning party clattering up the stairs outside now.   Fenian bowed his head, knowing that he should be saying something to the teenager. Knowing that it could make a difference. But he had no words.   His instinct had been pre-empted by events and he had no answer for them.    It was Kiana, who spoke, quietly, "You are still men.   Both of you. Still men."

Deontic opened the door, admitting Hal, then Valerie, flanked by Lauren and Daf.   They carried with them most of the provisions that Deontic had sent up initially; and brought with them a gust of wind that threatened to extinguish every candle-flame in the room.      Hal gasped out, "They've got the motorbike working.    They went down the mountain, then came back up.   I have no idea what they're up to."

The door was closed.   It still felt chill.   Century stared at Fenian.   Fenian tried to work it out, but his mind was mush.   He thought of the lead mine and his suspicion that lead-poisoning was a factor in all of this.   He had no idea why that appeared to be the answer to what Mello and Matt were up to.   It was like his mind was just throwing up random shit.   He thought of the ghost of the girl and the shock of the water's iciness, when he'd walked into a flooded section, in the darkness of a tunnel.   He grabbed Kiana's hand and pulled the quilt closer over his shoulders.   He told Century, "I don't fucking know."

Deontic was calm.   Deontic was icy calm, with an air of brisk, efficient professionalism.   She'd out-ranked Fenian by five places and Century by even more.   Fenian found himself looking to her as the leader and only vaguely wondering why.   "Fenian, this is Mr Dafydd Thomas.   He has been very helpful with his bicycle taxi.   He was the one who brought Kiana back. Everyone else, I believe, knows each other."   She paused, while Daf stepped forward and Fenian pulled his hand out of Kiana's, so he could reach out to shake Daf's.

"Thanks a million."   Fenian muttered.   "Owe you one, man."

"There's cool."   Daf returned.    He seemed as quietly scared as the rest of them.    "Not a problem."   He stepped back, by the doorway.    "Finished now, is it?"

Fenian finally realised what Deontic had been communicating there.   There was someone here who wasn't associated with Watari.   He sought for small-talk.   "What the fuck is that bike?"   He'd seen it from the window, when Kiana had arrived back.

"Have it for festivals and raves.   Since the '90s.   Made it then, I did.   Useful for getting gear to the sites." Daf nodded, uncomfortable.

Deontic frowned for silence.   "Hal, Mr Thomas is owed an honorarium for his services."   She picked up a piece of paper, upon which she had written their agreement, and handed it to Hal.   "May I leave that with you?"   Deontic watched Hal read it.   The American woman's eyebrows rose at the fee. She looked amused, but she nodded.   "Thank you.   Lauren," Deontic turned to face her, "you work for Mello and Matt and therefore have no reason to tell us anything.   However, Mello and Matt aren't in possession of all of the facts.   Kiana feels that they are in grave danger."   Beside Fenian, Kiana started in surprise.    Hal joined Daf near to the door and, in a low voice, negotiated the terms of payment, when this was all over.   "Do you have any idea what they are up to?"

Lauren shook her head. "This isn't confidentiality." She informed her. "I genuinely have no idea what they are planning."

Hal called across the room.   "Are we likely to need Mr Thomas again tonight?"

Deontic considered it.   "I don't know at this stage.   We have much to discuss before a strategy can be formed."

Hal marched a couple of steps further into the room.   "May I make a suggestion then?   How about I go back up there and find out what they're up to?    It would save us guessing."

Deontic shook her head. "If they have a motorbike working, then they could be halfway home by now.   If not, then I trust Mello.   He wants this over as much as we do.   He can obviously come back, so if he hasn't, then he's making his move." She shifted slightly.   "I'm sure it will out-strip anything that we can come up with."

Fenian's anger flared briefly inside, but dropped just as quickly.   He wasn't prepared to take over.   He didn't want to leave this table or this room.   His gaze fixed upon Century's clenched fist, upon the book on his lap.   From the corner of his unfocused vision, he saw Century take the lollipop from his mouth and just lay it on the table.   Fenian looked more fully at him. Century's expression was like he'd been slapped, but he didn't say a word either.   Kiana stroked Fenian's hand with her thumb, under the quilt.   Fenian reached out of their huddle, with his other hand, and took another cigarette.   He lit it, but it didn't help much.

Hal had returned to Daf, in the corner of the room.   Deontic's gaze grazed the area before the kitchenette.   She was looking for something, but she didn't see it.   She said, softly, "You will tell us, if they need rescuing."   She bowed her head.   She seemed to think that none of the others had heard her, but they all had, with the possible exception of Hal and Daf.   Deontic turned again and met Fenian's shaken gaze.   She stepped forward, with a cast-iron confidence. Her voice rose accordingly.   "We need to have all of our cards on the table now.   Everything we know, pooled together.   Everything we've seen; everything we've witnessed; everything that we have theorised or deduced."

Lauren coughed, "I'm not sure that it is Mello who is in control."   They all surveyed her, wearing varying expressions of surprise or blankness.   Only Hal nodded, in agreement.   "I think it's now Matt's show."

Deontic stared at her.   "Then Mello is in crisis."

Century's chair scraped backwards, as he stood up.   "The real fucking wonder is that Mello's allowing it to happen."   He began collecting up books again.   "Oes angen i chi rhuthro i ffwrdd, Daf? Oherwydd, os na, yna gallwn ddefnyddio eich gwybodaeth leol."

Daf jumped, "Rwy'n hapus i helpu."

"Diolch yn fawr."   Century took the few steps towards him and dumped a pile of books into Daf's arms.   "I'm taking Daf into my study.   I'm only next door, if you need anything."   Unspoken was the sentiment that it kept Daf close, whilst allowing the group to speak freely.    "Knock on the wall, I will, if I find anything interesting."

Deontic was standing more stiffly than usual.   "You'll miss the brainstorming."

"Yeah, well."   Century shrugged, reaching for the rest of the literature.    Fenian caught his arm. "What?"

"You're important." Fenian told him.    "Probably the most important mind here."

Century made a visible effort to appear relaxed about this. "Fine, I am. It's ok."   He gave a thin, cold smile, that he must have thought was reassuring, and pulled his arm away.   Soon as he was free, his expression slipped again.   He picked up the rest of his books.   Fenian wanted to say more. He wracked his brain for the words to say.   They weren't coming.   Century was walking away. "I'll be back if I find anything."

Fenian barked out, "Century!"    The teenager turned, that mask of fake levity on his face again. "We'll talk later."   It sounded to his ears that he was doing to Century what Kiana had done to him.   Fenian swallowed, pained.   But Century just smiled, nodded and took Daf out of the room.    "Shit! Fuck! Shit!"

Kiana eased her arm back around him. "He's fine.    He probably needs the peace and quiet to lose himself in his books. He wasn't doing so well trying to read in here."

Deontic sat back down and took out her pad.   "If Matt's running this, then Mello is losing it.   There is no other logical reason for Matt to take over."

Hal and Lauren exchanged looks. Lauren replied, "Mello seemed in good spirits.   He was comforting us.   I think that Mello is fine."

Kiana shook her head, "It's an act.   I saw the true side of him when he was in the back of my Land Rover.   He couldn't stop crying.   He was fucking devastated.    I don't see how anyone can come back from that so quickly."

"Don't under-estimate Mello's reserves of strength." Lauren warned. "I've seen him come back from worse."

Valerie coughed, "I doubt this is my place and it breaks all patient confidentiality, but, to be fair, Matt's not my patient yet." They surveyed her, keenly. "This is speculation.   It can't possibly be a diagnosis without any sessions with him."   She wavered, debating inwardly whether she should be speaking at all about this, especially to these people.

"Tell us."   Fenian prompted.   "If it's about Matt's mind and he's in charge up there, then it's a matter of life and death."

"I've witnessed some tendencies, which could be indicative of a personality disorder.    I'm leaning towards schizotypal or schizoid."

Fenian's eyes widened, "He's fucking schizophrenic?"

"No!" Valerie waved her hands.   "Neither of those are schizophrenia.   They're in the spectrum, yes, but not full blown schizophrenia."   She bit her lip. "And remember that it's not a firm diagnosis.   I may be totally wrong."

"Symptoms?"   Fenian demanded.

Lauren pushed her glasses back up to the bridge of her nose.   "Stop.   I can't allow this.   If he is, then that's between you and him.   It can't be aired like this.   I find it unprofessional of you to have said it."

Valerie blushed crimson.   She spluttered out, "I'm sorry. I just thought..."

Fenian shook his head.   "Ignore her.   She's protecting the money cow.   You're right to tell us and I'm not talking about ammunition here.     We've got shit falling on us from a great height here and if Matt's making moves within it, then we need to know if his thinking is skewed."   He glanced at Deontic for support, sensing that her opinion was what counted in this room at the moment.   "Could he have caused any of the crap up there?"

"Liam." Kiana sighed.

Lauren was animated, "No. No way is this acceptable!    I don't care what the external factors are. It is out of order for a trained psychologist to be expressing her professional opinion on Matt's mental health, in a room full of his peers."

Fenian could feel some of the old resentment rising.   "She's a fucking Watari psychologist!   What the fuck do they do? Write in their little books, give you fucking sleeping pills and tell you to fuck off back to work!"

"I would never do that."   Valerie inserted, squirming.   "I'm here to help."

Lauren rounded on her, "Then stop giving his rival information that could nail him. For crying out loud!"

Deontic raised her hand.   The whole room silenced awaiting her judgement.   "That house can take the sanest mind and twist it. It pulls out fears and paranoia and makes them acute. It can manifest actual hallucinations.   If Matt is, even potentially, more susceptible to that than anyone else, then we need to know.    This is for his own sake, as much as our own."   She raised her hand even higher, as Lauren would have interrupted.   "Your point is well heard, Lauren.   In normal circumstances, I would be in agreement.   Fenian will never use this for his own gain, because that really would be cheating.   It would be beneath him. There are no longer rankings, but inside our heads, there are.   I know that the whole house would automatically shunt him to the bottom of the league.   But he does have a point right now.   Valerie has said that this isn't a fixed diagnosis.   Therefore we factor it in as a possibility, while also accepting that it might be a false diagnosis.   Is that acceptable?"

"No."   Lauren retorted.   "But what does my opinion count for here?   I'm mere fifth generation. L was long dead, before I was even orphaned, so I didn't get the holy seal of approval. I'm a non-person.   Practically a civilian."

"I'm sorry that you feel that way."   Deontic replied, coldly.   She probably meant it, but that was Deontic's way.

Fenian leaned back, his head banging lightly on the wall behind.   "Lauren, we're only going to be fucking looking it up on the internet when we're home.   She might as well tell us the symptoms now, while it fucking matters."

"I've said my piece." Lauren said, icily.

The tension could have been cut with a knife.   Deontic nodded towards Valerie, who looked to Hal for clarification. Hal just shrugged, standing against the wall beside the door.    Valerie continued, her mouth dry, "If he has either of those personality disorders, and I'm not saying that he has, then he could be prone to transient quasi-psychotic episodes.   Losing touch with reality, becoming delusional under stressful conditions.   He could have very real hallucinations, visual and/or audio.   These could be highly paranoid in nature.   This leads to impaired thinking."

Deontic gave a wry smile, "That's all of us, up there."

"In the natural course of events, he would be aloof, anti-social and would find it difficult to relate to others.   However, he could form an obsessional attachment to one or two individuals, feeling actual distress through to physical pain, when separated.   On the other hand, he would find it difficult to engage with this person, in any romantic or friendly sense.   It would often come across like he was rejecting or pushing away the very person it hurt him to be apart from."   She turned as Hal made a noise in the back of her throat.   But the blonde woman didn't elaborate.   "He would suffer from a lack of self-reflection, because he would be so socially withdrawn, that no-one knows him well enough to reflect back to him how he's doing. We all use our peers to establish our awareness of self and our place within our culture.   He might become anxious, with a feeling of not being anchored.   He would certainly be uncomfortable with emotional intimacy." Valerie looked around the room.   They were all watching her.   "He could also be prone to subcultural thinking.    Highly religious or magical thinking, or quick to believe in conspiracy theories.   Living his life according to superstitions."

"That's not Matt." Lauren declared, triumphantly.   "He's a confirmed atheist."

Fenian stubbed out his cigarette, "Who lives in a game."

Deontic nodded, "Thank you for that, Valerie."   She shifted uncomfortably.   "Right, what else have people got to bring to the table?"

Fenian realised that the dread that he'd been feeling was low level now.   If he could rush on, with bullet point conversation, then he might just get his story out without becoming crushed under the terror of it all.   "I found a lead mine.   I have a sample in my pocket.   I found a room with a monolith in it, with another underneath it with another altar.   It had fucking black magic symbols and loads of skeletons in it, plus..." The smell was nearly at his nostrils.   He mentally pushed it away.   Wammy's House disassociation.   He could do this.   He had had years of practice.   "I believe someone or something was recently killed in there. Oh!"   He plunged on with a grim brevity.   "I found the way out quite quickly.   It was pretty much at the foot of that chasm that I climbed down yesterday.   But I saw my parents burning in a car down there, so I went back in."   He forced a smile at their expressions. He hoped it wasn't the rictus grin that he feared it might be.   "So I went the other way and found the lead mine. It's abandoned now, but the lead poisoning would, of course, explain why the occupants of the house were fucking insane bastards."   He sniffed to show that this wasn't touching him.   He wasn't dwelling on the darkness nor the sense of someone walking right beside him.   "I carried on and found a dead end. But then I met the ghostly fucking foreman or whatever and he went into a fucking side-room." Fenian had to recognise that he was no longer so detached from all he was saying.   He was shivering and Kiana was holding his hand really tightly.   He glanced at her.

"You must have been so scared." Kiana whispered.   She knew   She was touching him. She was probably seeing it more clearly than he was.

Fenian brushed the sentiment away.   "I mean, I didn't fucking see him properly, just felt like there was someone there. More a movement. But what the fuck could I do. Dead end that way; fucking parents on action replay down there; or back up to the sacrificial pit and the dead body.   So I went with the fucking ghost.   It was a room, but fuck all in it.   There was a door open up the back though, so I tried in there.   Another fucking tunnel. Hurrah!"   He swallowed, remembering the blackness and the cold, and the sense that something was very close by, watching his every move.   "I had no fucking idea of my direction, because I'm great underground like that." He uttered an ironic snort.

"You usually are." Kiana smiled, her gaze full of pity.    "It fucked with you."

Fenian nodded, emphatically, but it was only to stop thinking and to carry on talking, "The left end way sloped upwards, so I took it. Because this was fucking back in the days when I thought Kiana might still be waiting.   Thought I'd fucking come out at the manor or on the fucking road or fucking something, I don't fucking know."   He exhaled, knowing that he was going under again.   He fumbled for a cigarette and lit it. There was only one left after he had smoked this.   He spoke through the plumes of smoke from his first drag, "So up I fucking went, just thinking that I had to get back to Kiana and this fucking tunnel went on and on.   Uphill all the fucking way."   He didn't linger on how badly his back was hurting at that point.   He didn't mention the sensation, partway up, that a crowd of people were barging past him.   "Kept carrying on up, thinking that it can't be much fucking further.   Thinking I'd fucking kick myself if it turned out that I'd gone fucking back when the exit was just a little further.   Then I came to the end."    He sucked heavily on the cigarette.

Deontic looked up from her pad, when it was clear that he'd stopped talking.   She was writing it all down. She asked, curtly, "Do you know roughly how far you walked?"

Fenian stared at her.   She looked like she was taking a statement.   No empathy, no pity. Like this was Wammy's House and they were being tested on observation.   It brought him out of the potential emotional quagmire and he could have kissed her for it.   "It was fucking miles."

"How many?"

"Two or three. It was really fucking disorientating."   He kissed Kiana's forehead.   "I ended up at the foot of some steps, cut into the fucking rock. So I went up them, thinking I'd finally fucking made it to the surface.   Found a narrow fucking limestone passage and..."   He closed his eyes. He'd thought himself immune.   He thought he could tell it.   His mind fled from it.   "Fuck."

"Liam." Kiana turned his head to face her.   Her beautiful eyes just inches from his own.   She drew him towards her and kissed him, long and hard.   Fenian threw himself into it, trying to cast that memory as far from himself as he could.   He was kissing Kiana.   He was analysing himself kissing Kiana.   He wasn't in the kiss.   She leaned back, just enough to speak.   "It can't hurt you here.   I won't fucking let it."

"It came at me." Fenian roared out.   Kiana nodded, still stroking his face. "Fucking evil! Fucking," he blinked, "it was going to fucking kill me.   Pure, fucking evil.   I just fucking ran."    He heard Deontic shift in her seat.   He knew what she was going to ask. He realised, for the first time, something that hadn't registered before.   "I don't know what it looked like!   I didn't see it.   I..." Confusion wracked his brow.   "Fuck! It came right at me and I didn't see it.   How the fucking shit couldn't I have seen it?   It was right fucking there!   I had my lighter."

"Because it was pure energy without form." Kiana told him, with such confidence that he believed her.

"Practically fucking fell back down those stairs.   Didn't stop running until..." Fenian's narrative died out again.   He'd run then, when he could barely walk now.   He'd run until the agony in his back had made itself known again.   He could have crippled himself for life.   "Fuck."

"You're doing so well." Kiana murmured. Fenian turned away, taking a drag on his cigarette.   He didn't feel like he was doing well.   He felt like he was recounting the biggest failure of his life.    "How did you end up in the river?"

Fenian exhaled, "It wasn't the river.   The tunnel was flooded.   It was dark, I went right into it, up to my chest."   His lighter was drenched.   He had turned around in the water.   He hadn't known which way was back and which was unexplored.   "I saw someone.     A woman.   I thought it was you."   Fenian winced. "She was standing on the edge, I swam, walked, bit of both, to her.   I was out of the fucking water and she was further down the fucking tunnel and," Fenian exhaled, "I don't know how the fuck I could see her! It was black as fucking peat in there.   I wasn't fucking all there at that point.   Fucking lost it.   Went after her and then there were fucking things on my face."

"Things?" Kiana prompted.

"Fucking willow branches.   Grass and shit."   Fenian inhaled another deep drag of nicotine.   "And the scrofula woman was at the river's edge, pointing at a weir. Fucking stepping stones."   His vision blurred.   He blinked.   "I could tell it was so fucking late.   I knew I'd been down there so fucking long. I knew you'd have gone back to the chalets.   Already fucking pissed off with me and..."

"Sssh." Kiana pulled his head down onto her shoulder.   "You followed the river back to safety. Thank you for doing that, Liam. I mean it."   He was aware that she was looking over his shoulder, probably at Deontic.   Fenian didn't care.   He lost himself in her embrace and clung to her.   "I can't get over your fucking bravery.   I see them all the time and I'd have fucking shit myself at that.   Well done. Well fucking done.   I'm really fucking proud of you."

Fenian dared not look up nor respond, because the tears were falling now and they would know.   He hid his face in Kiana's neck and shoulder, aware only enough to keep the cigarette away from the quilt.   Distantly he heard Deontic, "I second that.   Well done."   But Fenian didn't care. He just held onto Kiana and tried to stop crying; and to ensure that none of the others would ever know that he cried.   He would just stay there and trust that she would keep him.

Author's Note: There is a discussion about this story taking place here: http://mrsjeevas.joharrington.co.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=11
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Annals of Fear II