Rise of Sirius: VI: Gift
Please note: In the first chapter of Sirius, I set the story in September, but I’ve pushed the date forward into late November/early December. If this were a serial, I would keep going in whatever corner I wrote myself into, but as this is a long novel that I’m posting as I write each chapter, I may occasionally have to go back and make a change somewhere whenever I get a new idea. Is this date shift entirely due to the current holiday season? Probably, but I think it’s fitting at the moment!
This is a long post, so if you don’t see the typical closure of my emails (i.e., thank you for reading, etc.) you might wish to read this post in your browser. Thank you!
Faint holiday tunes wavered over the radio as Sirius shoved the door open against the blustering wind, which had bitten through the blanket wrapped around Clarity, necessitating throwing his coat over her shoulders. Blearily he wondered why Christmas songs were being played so late at night.
Headquarters was quite empty; only a handful of officers remained on duty, passing to and fro, or wearily attending to paperwork. Even Homicide was nowhere to be seen.
Somewhere, a bell was taking note of the fact that it was half-past three, and exhaustion was setting into Sirius’ limbs as he nodded to the men passing him on the great staircase.
Clarity had to be exhausted, too. He had to get her into a safer situation. Virgil, perhaps could be convinced to take the girl home with him for a day or two, until they could find a safe home for her.
Virgil’s office door was already cracked open when Sirius came to it. The low voices from within warned him that Virgil had a visitor. He gave the door a single rap and nudged it open. Virgil swiveled around in his chair, and the man seated on the edge of the desk arose.
Reid stopped short as he recognized the man as his father, Don Hope, a lawyer just as he was; but not a vigilante, as he was.
Don arose, but upon seeing Clarity hiding at Reid’s side, closed his lips before he could greet his son as he might have. Reid looked from one to the other, clicking the door shut behind him.
There was no point, was there? He had spoken to Clarity in his own voice, a voice he had never trained and never used with his enemies. There was no hiding from her unless he never saw her again. Heaven knew she needed something a little familiar to hold onto. He might have to be that, just for a little while. A repeat of Aphrodite, maybe.
He lifted the leather mask from his eyes. Clarity stared, eyes lighting up at the confirmation of her hope, Reid’s father almost smiled, and Virgil did. Homicide gave a happy mew, not that he needed the mask removed for recognition, because he was busy investigating whether Clarity gave good pets. The girl promptly wrapped her arms around the fluffy black cat, much to his pleasure.
“It would seem that Aphrodite has a rival for Homicide’s affections,” Virgil noted lightly.
“Homicide?” Clarity repeated, voice muffled by the cat’s fur, as she began to giggle. “At least tisn’t Bastet.”
“I was worried about you, son,” Don said gently, turning back to Reid. “Virgil called me when the fire was spotted.”
“Thank you, Dad. It’s alright, at least, I hope it is?”
“No one was hurt; no, barely enough damage to destroy the goods,” Virgil responded, rising from his chair. “I’ll remind you though, Reid, that you need to train yourself to see blue, not red.”
Reid blew out his breath sharply. It wasn’t the first time Sirius had moved a little too far. He felt that guilt every time, and yet every time putting a stop to it was like grasping a wisp of smoke.
“I’m sorry.”
“Reid, as a lawyer you ought to know as well as I do that we don’t set fire to private property, much less risk destroying evidence! It’s a lucky thing there was enough of each drug left untouched, or we might not be able to hold that against Cleopatra.”
He ran his fingers through his hair, straightening when he remembered Clarity, who was listening with anxious face.
“Perhaps we’d better discuss that once we decide where you should be, little one.”
“The foster care agency, I suppose, until this is cleared up?” Don murmured, regretfully.
“I told Biasi that she can’t go through this right now. I don’t want her to have to enter an orphanage, Father, she’s been through too much,” Reid urged. He looked hopefully to Virgil, who didn’t respond to the cue.
Clarity waited, eyes agreeing that she didn’t want to go, as she held onto Homicide and Reid’s arm. He sighed a little.
“…Let her come home with us. She can...have Jewel’s room?”
His father caught his breath and gazed at Reid, weighing the traces of anger and sorrow and compassion written there. Don stooped and put his hands on Clarity’s shoulders.
“Do you want to come home with me, dear?”
The girl jumped to answer, then looked around uncertainly at Reid.
“I’ll be coming soon.”
“Yes please,” Clarity whispered, and shyly tucked her hand into Don’s.
“I’ll see you at home, son,” he said, donning his hat and swapping the coat flung over Clarity’s shoulders for his own.
Virgil waited for the door to once again shut before dropping back into his chair with a sigh.
“I’m not going to keep us long, not at this unearthly hour. I don’t know what I’m going to do about that fire. May I remind you, Reid, that Sirius works with and for the police department, and I am, in the end, responsible for your actions? If anyone guessed that you started the fire, I might have to suspend you, and we need your skills.”
“I know,” Reid groaned, finding a cat-less chair to sink into, before realizing that he was apt to fall asleep. He moved to the edge of the desk instead.
“Sirius slips out of my control, sometimes. I can’t seem to keep myself fully present when I find drugs.”
“You might try a psychologist, or a priest. Do something, Reid, because this can’t happen again, and you will run into drugs. We need to pull you out of tragedy.”
Heaven help me, was Reid’s silent reply, because he had no trust that was possible.
“I’ll figure something out,” he exhaled. “I’m relieved the fire did no real harm.”
“Yes. I’m going to let you file your side of the report in the morning-” Virgil stifled a yawn. “Don’t go into the office tomorrow, Reid, you’re liable to lose a case if you go in without sleeping.”
“Three days off in a row? If you insist. I want to ask Clarity some questions about Cleopatra and all, and take another look at the Obelisk again in daylight.”
“Take Biasi.”
“-As you wish. The 35th floor is off-limits,” Reid continued, “and per Clarity’s information, Cleopatra performs some kind of Egyptian ritual up there. I also want to find whether she has any written connections to Bruno, because those drugs belonged to him. I can’t help wondering whether the second drug will prove to be that used to poison Aphrodite. Of course, this is assuming that Cleopatra won’t simply tell us.”
“Cleopatra?” Virgil snorted at that. “From what I heard from Leon and Carl, who escorted her ladyship, she won’t be willing to speak to us anytime soon, unless it’s to order an ostrich-feather fan, one-sided toast, and a feta and fig omelette. Who ever heard of a feta and fig omelette, I ask you?”
“Speaking. . . of her speaking.”
“Mm?”
“She. . . said something that worries me, and Biasi, I could tell. Either it was a poetic bow-out, or she knows who I am.”
Reid turned to see how Virgil took this. The commissioner’s jaw had tightened.
“Exactly what was her choice of words?”
“’Hope is said to shine brighter than stars, even the great Sirius. Though…I suppose even reeds break in a strong gale.’”
Virgil sucked in his breath and contemplated the words for a minute. “Reid, that doesn’t seem possible that she could know. It could be a poetic. . .warning, or something, that she’s not quite finished? I don’t know!” He ran a hand throw his hair. “You’ve always done a good job of covering your tracks.”
“Perhaps I failed by visiting her,” Reid said grimly. “If it wasn’t poetry, how much was planned? Was everything with Aphrodite? William? Bruno’s ring? Even the Obelisk? She knew I was coming, Virgil, she knew she was going to have an ‘unexpected’ guest who hated drugs, and she meant for the artifacts and drugs to be out before I, or ‘he’, arrived, which makes me suspect that the threat to Aphrodite was at least partially a ruse to delay my arrival. It didn’t do much good on that front, but if she knows, who else does? My family could become a target.”
Reid was pacing restlessly, feeling as though he could put his fist through the endlessly, unnecessarily-noisily ticking clock on the bookshelf beneath the window.
Virgil didn’t reply for a time, letting distant sirens on the streets creep up through the window and invade the space between them.
“Let’s think about this matter tomorrow, again. We need clear minds, and I wish I had one. Go on home, Reid, get some sleep, ask Clarity some questions about Cleopatra and Bruno if you can, and come by around. . . I probably won’t wake up before eleven, so make it noon.”
“I’ll do that.” Reid pulled his mask over his eyes again and pushed open the door, letting Homicide pounce out into the hall to resume another night shift. It had been a long night, and as he slid behind the wheel of the Reina again and started for the Observatory, he didn’t know that it was going to be significantly longer than he wanted.
By the time Sirius had been separated from Reid’s countenance and he was trying to let himself in without waking up the house, it was a quarter to five. His namesake star had been shining almost irritatingly bright to his eyes, and now he was wondering why the whole house was painfully lit up at this hour.
“Reid?’ his mother’s voice startled him from the living room as she hastened to embrace him. “Please, go on to bed,” she worried, taking his coat and hat that he’d listlessly been carrying.
“Fine, mom,” he said drowsily, nearly walking into his father as the latter jogged down the stairs.
“Reid!” The sharp tone softened. “Go on to bed, son, goodnight.”
“I’m going. . .” He blinked and turned back. “Is anything wrong, Dad?”
There was the dreaded parent-to-parent glance.
“Reid. . . did you know that they, whoever, put Clarity on ‘amphetamine?’”
Reid’s heart seemed to stop, holding its own metaphorical breath.
With that word, sleep was a concept blown to ashes.
“. . . Clarity?” he nearly shouted up the stairs as he ran up, narrowly missing colliding with his father and the frame of Jewel’s bedroom door. It couldn’t, couldn’t repeat - not Jewel, Clarity in Jewel’s room –
He was praying that it had only been occasional, perhaps medical, and not Cleopatra’s scheming. Was the dosage to a dangerous level? If it wasn’t, why were his parents worried?
Now, the door stood wide, lamplight pouring out with the sound of a nervously animated Tony’s voice, and Reid stopped, glimpsing Tony as he paced, nearly running with one arm draped over Clarity’s shoulder. They glanced up at his step, one face more than troubled, the other tear-stained.
Reid slipped in and sank down in front of Clarity, staring into her tired eyes.
“Clarity, what is this about amphetamine?”
“I am sorry, I didn’t want to take it. My Lady-”
“Don’t call her your lady anymore, she never deserved it.”
“-She made me take it every evening so I would not be tired, and I could sew whatever she needed. Um, she only let me not take it when she was reprimanding me and then I . . . needed it.”
She hugged herself miserably.
Tony tried to say something but forcibly but his tongue, perhaps in ire, or sensing that his brother was feeling and seeing: Jewel’s face flickered in his gaze, overlapping Clarity’s face like a ghost as he tried to blink it away to focus on Clarity long enough to wipe away the tears when she wept that she was tired, so tired, and couldn’t sleep.
“How long, Clarity? How long did she make you take it?”
His mind was flitting forward, to tomorrow night, a night when Clarity’s body would begin to fight to have this drug, and withdrawal might begin to form images of rain-stained bridges, and thunder, and breaking glass. He hadn’t heard his parents come to the doorway, but they were all thinking the same.
“Two years,” Clarity whispered. “I – I’m so tired! I want to sleep, I can’t sleep-” she started crying.
Two years was enough to guarantee a violent withdrawal, risky withdrawal. Amphetamine might have been handed out willy-nilly by doctors, but someone had found out it was a stimulant, and here was Clarity suffering for it.
“Clarity, Clarity, I need you to lie down and try to rest, alright? Come here,” and he drew the heavy violet coverlets over her protests. “Resting will be better than nothing. You’re not going to have to take that drug ever again. We’ll make sure of that.”
Jewel’s face and Clarity’s tears would hurt him while he slept.
He wouldn’t let a replay of Jewel happen. Not on his watch.
No one was up before 9 am the next morning. Even so, Reid was waiting when Clarity and Mother appeared at the top of the stairs. Clarity’s Egyptian-dress had been exchanged for a frilly white dress shudderingly familiar, thirteen years out of fashion.
Her auburn curls, unruly the previous night, seemed to have found their calm and lay bobbed around her shoulders, tied back by a pink ribbon.
If not for the reddish tint of her hair, how could she look so much like a ghost of Jewel?
Jewel, wearing this dress, her birthday dress, bouncing down the stairs to get ready for Morning Mass – her white heels, catching on a ruffle in the then-loosely carpeted stairs -
Father had caught her easily, laughing and fixing the rug. He remembered that. His limbs, though, lunged forward instinctively to the foot of the stairs before his eyes snapped awake. Clarity wasn’t falling, but she smiled shyly to see him.
“Good morning, Clarity.” Already he was searching her face, for the nervousness, the whiteness and trembling that he hadn’t thought to notice enough at the estate, or even in the Obelisk, but which he dreaded to see again. “How are you feeling?”
“I slept longer than I was usually allowed,” Clarity told him with a shy smile. Her posture was stiff, perfectly posed as one of Cleopatra’s statuettes, as she thanked Reid, and Mother for letting her stay the night, who had swiftly reappeared bearing steaming mugs for each, one with coffee, the other with hot chocolate.
“Of course, dear!” Mother fussed, straightening the rose satin bow she had tied in Clarity’s hair. “We want you to rest today, so drink up your hot chocolate. Reid, please try not to turn full investigator, and let her drink her hot cocoa? I’m going to start breakfast, before it’s time for brunch.”
“Oh, please do let me help,” Clarity begged.
“Thank you dear, you sit still for once, without working, that is. Come to me, though, if Reid forgets his manners and interrogates you for too long.” Mother wrinkled her nose at Reid teasingly and headed into the kitchen for her apron, leaving Clarity looking very lost and puzzled as to what to do with herself.
“What - will you do with me now?” Clarity asked carefully, pivoting to Reid, mug clasped in both hands. “And - Mau and Anubis, I must retrieve them wherever they have been put, and take care of them for my la- I mean, Miss Ever-Ruby.”
“Do with you?” Reid repeated taking a few steps backwards to find the sofa. Clarity moved so that she was standing before him. “You’re going to stay with us, Clarity, for a while. I’ll speak with the commissioner about starting to look for a good home for you, and see if we know anyone personally that you might want to be with. But you’re going to stay with us until we know that you’re alright. But I’m afraid we can’t bring Mau and Anubis here. They’re trained to attack, Clarity,” he pointed out kindly, when he saw her frown. “We can’t take the risk of them attacking someone, or one of us, without Cleopatra present.”
“But I raised them since they were babies!” Clarity protested, distraught. “I can take care of them, and my lady, I mean - she commanded me to take care of them-“
“She can’t hold you to that, Clarity! I’m afraid both Mau and Anubis are a little big, besides. Don’t worry. Mau is being taken care of at the zoo, and Anubis-”
“But they’ve never been separated, how are they going to be alright?”
“I’ll talk to the zoo and the kennel, alright? Besides, we have a dog. You won’t feel too lonely.” Reid whistled for Rufus, who came bounding into the room, and stopped, tail wagging. “See? Rufus, you protect Clarity. Now, Clarity, I need to ask you-”
He stopped, puzzled when the girl, even as one hand stroked the collie’s ears, remained stiff.
“Clarity. Clarity, you’re not a servant to Cleopatra anymore. You can relax, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Clarity, don’t give me any titles. I’m only Reid, here, and to you.”
She struggled with that, the name not making it past her lips. It would seem she would need time to practice being anything but handmaiden and seamstress.
“Clarity, I want you to rest today, as Mother says, but I also want to ask you some questions, if you feel up to answering them.”
When she nodded, Reid continued. “Who are you really, Clarity? You clearly had a life before Cleopatra, and weren’t raised on her rituals that you mentioned. How much did Cleopatra lie about you?”
“She really did save me,” the girl answered quickly. “I would have drowned. Although, I believe she mainly did so because she learned of my fashion design abilities. Her collections were failing, I think. The designs she has marketed now are mainly mine. That’s why I sew all night every night, I’m the only one who can know how to make my designs, or Miss Ever-Ruby could be found out if she couldn’t explain how they’re made, so I create all of the haute couture dresses, and she puts together simpler versions of my designs for the ready-to-wear lines.”
“And we have another type of thievery to add to her list of offenses,” Reid said wearily. “But before Cleopatra, Clarity, who were your parents? Do you have any relatives we should take you to?”
Clarity shook her head. “My parents were killed, shortly before Cleopatra saved me. They were Italian. My last name is D’Aquila. I don’t have any . . .good, relatives. The only one nearby is Bruno,” she added, “but please don’t make me go to him!”
Reid looked at her sharply.
“Bruno? What do you know of him?”
“Oh, he’s my uncle,” Clarity stated. “I stay away from him when possible. He had my parents killed, I know he did, because he argued with my father, trying to force him to join the Cosa Nostra, but my father was a good man, and Bruno wasn’t anymore. They drove by our house and shot it full of bullets,” she shuddered. “But I was little and they missed me, and when Bruno found out, he dragged me to the stream where the estate is now, because there was no one close by to witness, and was going to drown me. He didn’t want the Cosa to know, because they don’t like to kill children, I think, but he didn’t like that I look like my mother, his sister. He didn’t want to be reminded, I think. That’s when Cleopatra stopped him. I think she had liked him for a while before that, maybe not after, but they have an exchange where Bruno allows her to keep me and stores his stolen drugs in the Obelisk before dispersing them, and Cleopatra is given protection and assistance in her projects.”
By this time, both Tony and Don were hovering on the outskirts of the room, striving not to interrupt. Tony promptly failed.
“If I ever see that guy, I’m gonna punch him in the nose for you,” he vowed.
“I’ll see him first,” Reid replied. “Clarity, he tried to kill you once. Do you think that you’re in any danger? Where might I find him?”
“I think he will come looking for me, if Miss Ever-Ruby forgets to warn him not to. I do not think he would kill me, not at this point. Miss Ever-Ruby will be angry, besides, if she loses my designs, but I am not sure where you might find him. He won’t return to the Obelisk now. He doesn’t like to be found. But I know he chooses the little places, where you would least expect him, as long as it isn’t a church or a cemetery.”
So much for finding a location, but it was something. Perhaps Cleopatra’s files would do better.
“I have a ring belonging to Bruno. It has an Egyptian name on it. Was he a part of some cult with Cleopatra? You mentioned rituals. And why was she stealing Egyptian artifacts? Do you know?”
Clarity struggled to follow the questions in order and gave up. “I wasn’t permitted to overhear much, as Miss Ever-Ruby caught me trying to escape before, and some SOS attempts when I was first working, so she does not trust me. I do know that the artifacts were periodically shipped on a cargo liner, and that she had shipments leaving France, as well. I don’t know where they were headed. The rituals -”
Here she shuddered a little, and Tony helpfully draped a blanket over her shoulders, clearly being one to forget that he had class that morning.
“Reid,” he whispered aside, “you might put the kibosh on your interrogation for a sec and give her a chance to actually drink her hot chocolate?”
“Forgive me, Clarity. I have a tendency to cross-examine.”
Clarity smiled at him quickly. “Miss Ever-Ruby often made me assist with her rituals, since I am her daughter. I know them too well, now. They are based on the old Ptolemaic mysteries of Isis, but also cults to Osiris, Ra, and Amun. I was mainly the handmaiden, assisting with any objects being handled. There were many persons who attended, some I do not know; most have taken the name, or names, of one or more Egyptian gods or goddesses. I’m certain that all of these are, were, working with or for Cleopatra, and Bruno often came. I don’t - I don’t want to go to any of those again,” she appealed to Reid.
“If she’s in jail, you neither have to nor will be able to, if she can’t act as priestess. I don’t think you need to see her again, unless she drags this into court.”
“She will, I think,” Clarity said uneasily. “She will prove that she was not a villain. She tells me that she will never be convicted, for she believes she is a goddess, as Cleopatra VII did.”
Reid paused. Dragging it into a court would spell even worse trouble, both if he couldn’t pull Clarity out of it, and if Cleopatra dragged his identity in.
“Does Cleopatra know who I am?”
“She never told me, but I thought she was acting odd about you.” She shrugged helplessly.
How much might he have to try and mop up, if Cleopatra did know? The last thing he wanted was to have to ask her directly as Sirius, but he might have to. If she knew - how much danger was he putting his family in? Aphrodite? Clarity? Was he really a protection to any of them?
There was little he could do about his family, little about Aphrodite except to continue widening his distance, but Clarity? How could he both help her through adjusting to a lack of drugs in her system, and put her into a safe home? He wondered if Biasi, who was married, might be able to do both. He shook away the thought.
“What about Aphrodite? Do you know anything of why Cleopatra, or Bruno, was going after her? There was a man who showed up at her home, claiming to be the god Osiris?”
“Yes, there was a man there last night, dressed as Osiris,” Clarity remembered. “He rarely comes, maybe once or twice each year, and he wears a mask, as Cleopatra sometimes does when she acts as Isis. They’re, well, I guess they must be fond of each other, as Isis and Osiris are supposed to be husband and wife. But I don’t know much about Miss Liljedahl. I had heard, once, something about a socialite being trained for the cult, but I don’t know what that means, if it was her or just someone planning to join the cult rituals. I remember Cleopatra following all of the news about the thefts, and following Miss Liljedahl’s fashions, but nothing more directly than that.”
“It’s all such a puzzle, and I feel more than half the pieces are left out,” Reid muttered, studying the carpet. “Whether this is something very little in the end, or something widespread, I can’t really guess. It could all be as simple as thefts and liaisons between criminal rings, or it could be something more sinister, and I wouldn’t put that past her, not now, when we know what she’s been doing to you.”
He stopped again.
“Clarity, your posture. You aren’t a servant here, please sit down.”
She did so, gingerly, but it was no less rigid.
Reid sighed. “Is that even comfortable? You don’t know how to relax, do you?” He pushed her gently back against the back of the sofa and the pillows. “Now, pretend you’re a cat, like Homicide, or Mau.”
Puzzled, Clarity slowly curled up, drawing her legs up onto the cushions and a little sigh of relief escaped her, making Reid smile.
“Well well well, up ‘til now only Aphrodite could pull a smile out of you,” Tony approved. “Mission clearly accomplished, therefore I believe I should be frying bacon.”
Reid crossed his eyes at him. “I believe you’re late for class.”
“I believe I am, so I believe I’ll stay home, eat bacon, and enjoy my new temporary sister, rather than spending forty minutes driving to class to catch two minutes of it.”
“As you will,” Reid shook his head, hesitating. “Clarity, only one more question, and we can be done. Tell me of the drug that Cleopatra kept you on.”
The smile left Clarity’s face and she played absently with the tassel on one of the pillows.
“Amphetamine,” she mumbled. “She would mix it with extracted caffeine, sometimes even a drug called cocaine, to make sure it worked, because my system gets kind of immune to medicines, and I guess it must a little to the drugs, as well. I’m scared.”
At her suddenly small voice, Reid reached over to tuck the blanket around her and put her hot chocolate back in her hands.
“Why are you scared?”
“Because, when she would take it away to punish me, and I wanted it to go away, it felt so awful I was afraid I might look for a bridge.”
The chill came back, running through Reid’s skull.
Not another bridge.
“Clarity, trust me, we’re going to make sure you get through this. That’s why you’re staying. I know someone else who has had a hard time with withdrawal. I’ve asked her to come, so that she can help you.”
Unbeknownst to Clarity was that the door banging in the kitchen a minute before had been Tony bringing Aphrodite inside, the girl having been dropped off by her father on his way to work; she came forward now, hatless, as usual. She looked at Clarity for a moment, who popped upright at once, and immediately hugged her.
“I’m so sorry, Chione. I mean, Clarity, isn’t it? That’s a much prettier name than Chione. I’m so sorry that we didn’t know, when we met you, dear,” Aphrodite whispered. “If you have a hard time, I’ll be here for you, and you can always call me, if you need me. You will be able to make it through this. But,” she tapped her chin thoughtfully. “It can’t be done with this wardrobe! Haven’t you anything out at the Estate which we could pick up?”
“No, unless the Egyptian dresses are alright,” Clarity regretted.
“That is a problem,” Don agreed. “I’m afraid all of Jewel’s things are too far out of fashion for her to wear outside the house.”
“We’ll just need to buy you a new wardrobe,” Aphrodite decided breezily. She glanced quickly at Reid. “I don’t think we can keep you wearing Jewel’s things in the house, either; and you deserve something pretty, don’t you think? Reid?”
“I’ll pay for it,” Reid answered automatically, only half-listening, trying to count on one hand, instead of a dozen, where Bruno might be likely to hide. “I can take whoever is going shopping into the city after breakfast. I have to meet with Virgil and take a second look around the Obelisk, anyway.”
“Perfect! Reid, I hope you’re ready to make the most expensive all-at-once purchase of your entire life.”
“….Alright, how much.”
Aphrodite took a moment, adding up figured under her breath. “Forty-eight dollars?”
“…I knew I should have bought a new car.”
“I do not need to leave the house,” Clarity began, but Aphrodite dropped her hands on her shoulders and guided her towards the kitchen.
“He’s only teasing. I believe the sooner we seat ourselves to eat, the sooner you’ll have new dresses!”
“Miss Liljedahl?”
“Honey! It’s only Aphrodite. You aren’t calling Reid ‘sir,’ I hope, and if he told you to, I’m going to give him a piece of my mind.”
“Aphrodite? Did – you still want – me to make a dress for you?”
Clarity’s lips were trembling as she said it, but bravely, as though she felt it her duty to inquire.
“What? Clarity, no, sweetie, it’s not that I wouldn’t love it, but I can’t and won’t ask you to make a dress when you’ve spent so much of your life doing it against your will.”
“I used to love it,” Clarity whispered, eyes filling with tears. “Mommy and Daddy used to talk of how I would go to school to study it, even though we were never well-off enough, but now – it just hurts, I have lost everything that gave me joy in it, and there’s nothing else I can do-”
“Don’t say that, precious,” Aphrodite soothed her, taking Clarity’s face in her hands and drying the tears with her own lavender-embroidered handkerchief. “We will find other things for you to enjoy doing, and perhaps someday, that joy will come back, when you’ve rested. You just need some time. And, I think, to properly eat!”
Acquiescing to Aphrodite’s urge for her to sit somewhere, Clarity took a seat on one of the stools at the kitchen counter, watching as Mother made French toast, while Tony kept busy frying bacon.
“There’s more coffee, Reid, and Aphrodite, please feel free to help yourself, dear!” Mother called over the sizzling.
“Mm, thank you, I’ll take you up on the offer,” Aphrodite sighed, for the cold morning had bitten her skin, even on the short walk to the car, and was in no hurry to leave.
Soon she had Reid busy trying to keep every glass in the cabinet from crashing to the counter as she rooted around for the pretty pink glasses in the back.
Lightly kicking her heels against the footrest of the stool, Clarity’s eyes found Jewel’s ornaments, the pretty stars and butterflies that flitted around the kitchen window, and experimentally felt the wreath of anemones and ivy which ringed Jewel’s portrait on the counter.
“Who is she?” she wanted to know, as Reid, worn out and more than ready for another cup of coffee, rejoined her.
“My sister, Jewel.”
Clarity brightened at that. “Where is she? I must thank her for being able to borrow her room and dress.”
Mother turned back from the stove, to see if Reid was going to answer before she did; Clarity caught the look.
“Is…she not here anymore?”
“No,” Reid muttered, plucking a browning blossom of anemone and tossing it out before Rufus could try to take it from his hand. “…Jewel suffered from drugs, too, a long time ago. They killed her. Or at least, I can put it that way.”
Growing silent, Clarity slipped down from the stool, scooting closer to him so that she was almost beneath his arm, hesitatingly.
“Did you- she kill herself from them, too? She’s why you are Sirius?”
Reid only nodded, turning to look into the eyes that were holding the same tattered fear, flitting in and out at times, as Jewel had.
“We didn’t know what was wrong. We’re not going to let that happen to you.”
Clarity didn’t know what to do, tensing, when Reid instinctively pulled her into his hug, the child’s hands tucked tightly against her own heart.
“Cleo never gave you hugs, did she.”
Clarity mumbled uncertainly in reply.
“We’ll just add another crime to her list,” Reid said lightly.
It was a role reversal, for the dark-haired head to lie on his shoulder, rather than when he had rested his on Jewel’s. He tightened his hold on Clarity for a moment, before letting her go.
Clarity gingerly touched Jewel’s photograph; Mother had nearly forgotten to flip the toast, if Tony hadn’t acquisitioned the spatula and taken over.
“Jewel is why you were able to rescue me,” Clarity thought out loud. “Could I visit her? So I can thank her?”
“That makes two of us,” Aphrodite noted quietly, when Reid lapsed into confusion. “Please take us, Reid?”
Whatever he meant to reply was interrupted when the doorbell rang and Rufus started barking, ever believing the doorbell presented the necessity of a howling concerto.
“Rufus, hush! I’ll get it! And I’m on my way to the office, late,” Don volunteered, hat and coat already donned. He called back down the hall though, when the door had opened.
“Telegram for you, Reid, it’s on the table by the phone!”
“My morning,” Reid grumbled, “has not been suitably inundated by coffee yet.”
Carefully extricating himself from between the bar, Clarity, and Aphrodite, he found the envelope where his father had left it and tore it open.
Dearest Reid [stop] I expect that you will be willing to be my defendant in my wish to keep custody of Chione [stop] Please remember that my dear daughter must not drink coffee [stop] Caffeine is inappropriate for a child, is it not [stop] Adieu
Cleopatra VIII
“RE-E-ID, toast!” Tony called, popping his head into the corridor. “Don’t look at me like we’re in a jam, what’s the issue now?”
“I’ll tell you who is toast,” Reid smoldered as he feverishly dialed 190 and fired back a message for her ladyship.
Dear Cleo [stop] Would not defend your slave labor habits if you were Queen of Egypt and I was Octavian [stop] Will find proper family for Clarity which does not include your attack dog Bruno nor amphetamine [stop]
Reid Hope
It was on the drive, with Aphrodite seated beside him, and Mother in the back seat with Clarity, taking a rare excursion from her usual day at home, that Reid’s string of thoughts were broken by Aphrodite’s whisper when she nudged his hand.
Clarity was already leaning on Mother’s shoulder, happily listening to every suggestion as to what was needed for her wardrobe; and Aphrodite was equally happy to punctuate the conversation by lists of suitable colors to set off the girl’s hair and eyes, and what brands and designers, and how many pairs of shoes and gloves she ought to have, until Reid quietly reminded them that they had arrived.
Holy Rood Cemetery stretched out from St. Brigid’s church like a great green twisted kite, the headstones wet and white through the thin layer of mist, thickened by a golden snowfall of leaves with every stir of the branches overhead. The grass was brown and sodden underfoot where it poked through its snowy blanket as Reid cautiously rolled the Deusenberg down the narrow lane and parked. The grounds appeared deserted. Jewel was buried a distance from the church, in a row dedicated to St. Michael.
Mother walked with Clarity down the row, straightening wind-blown poinsettias and roses as they went, but Reid found himself rooted to the ground, his back seemingly glued to the car door as he leaned against it. Aphrodite, too, hung back, tugging on the broidered hem of her gloves and shivering.
“You asked Jewel for a gift, didn’t you?” she inquired breathlessly, tucking her hands into the pockets of her crimson wool coat. “It seems to me she sent one!”
“A gift?” he repeated. “Firstly, ‘Ro, it’s not a field day to have to go through this agai-”
“- Reid. She’s a chance to save what you couldn’t save for Jewel. Can it be a coincidence that you rescued her on Jewel’s birthday?”
The pause was punctuated by two ravens cawing from the trees overhead, shaking down a branch-worth of last night’s snow and ice.
“It can’t be,” Reid muttered uncomfortably, brushing the snow from his shoulder. “Not from Jewel. It’s only a coincidence. It won’t change anything, Ro. It won’t change what it’s done to me, it won’t bring Jewel back.”
“Is it?” Aphrodite challenged, gently making him meet her gaze. “No, it won’t bring Jewel back. But Reid, could you send Clarity away?”
The way he jerked around and opened his mouth to refuse answered them both. He closed his mouth.
No, he couldn’t send her away. Even if someone like Biasi took her in - he couldn’t be left wondering, 24/7, if he had failed her. He couldn’t wonder 24/7 whether she was in danger from Bruno. Yes, he might put her in some danger by his alter ego, but wouldn’t it be safer for a little while, at least, than letting her go? At least until she was safe from amphetamine and he knew where Bruno was, and how to put him where he couldn’t touch Clarity.
Reid’s eyes slid to the girl who knelt at the graveside, tucking dainty anemone blooms and forget-me-nots, picked in the Hopes’ garden, around the stone’s base, hesitating as she fingered her necklace - then she took it off and whispered something to the stone, and draped the beads over the stone’s crest.
Reid left Aphrodite standing beside the car and crossed the frosted grass. Clarity looked up as he knelt beside her.
“I thought I should leave it here, since she’s the reason you came to help me,” Clarity explained. “It was a rosary my mother gave me, only, Miss Ever-Ruby didn’t think the crucifix matched my uniform, so she replaced it with this topaz.”
Reid lifted the necklace from the carved roses and put it in the girl’s hand.
“Jewel would want you to keep this, and get a new crucifix,” he whispered. Clarity obediently curled her fingers around the beads.
How could he do this?
How couldn’t he do this?
Aphrodite was right. There were far, far too many similarities for this to be a mere coincidence.
Reid’s throat tightened as he looked at his sister’s name, green with lichen and moss that dripped dew like tears.
“And I think that she would want me to keep you.”
Clarity’s eyes widened. “You mean…as my Daddy?”
Reid couldn’t stop the smile, nor could Mother, when the girl put her arms around his neck and pressed her face into his shoulder, no longer tensed as she had been earlier.
“Well….uh, something like that. Come on, Clarity. We’ll get you a crucifix when we find you some pretty dresses.”
He gave a last look at the stone as they turned back towards the car.
“Thanks, Jewels,” he murmured, and let Clarity slip her hand into his as she pondered half a hundred things she wanted to say.
“Hmmm…Daddy, did you ever have pizza?”
“Excuse me?”
“Pizza, you can’t not know what pizza is! How could you never have heard of pizza? Haven’t you ever been in Little Italy?”
As their voices faded across the lawn, the bells rang the hour, and the breeze ruffled the flower petals, scattering them as though brushed by an unseen hand.
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Interesting stuff
Interesting stuff