Young Sherlock AU: Veritas Amat Umbras *
*(Truth loves shadows, Latin)
Author note: read this AU while listening to “Adagio for Strings, Op. 11”, by Samuel Barber, Leonard Bernstein, New York Philharmonic
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He was supposed to marry her there.
In Florence.
In this Church, called Santissima Annunziata.
She chose it, while they were both drunk, after solving another case with Sherlock.
Beatrice chose it for its name: “Santissima”.
Both her and James had nothing ‘saint’ in their blood.
Or lives.
He will always remember picking her up, after she agreed to marry him.
The Church was filled with their laughter.
Their plans of leaving everything, everyone, and just running away.
To build a life of their own.
But now, he was wondering how laughter can die as fast as that.
It took one night.
One moment.
One second.
One shot.
One mistake.
How could Death take her away from him?
How could he not love her?
He knew he did.
He was sure of it.
He did cry for her.
He sobbed for her.
He screamed for her.
And now?
Now he was in that same Church.
Swearing under that same God that gave him that beautiful Persephone.
He swore he would find her.
He swore he would go back to her.
But mostly, he swore he would take revenge for her.
Even if it meant killing the person he loved the most.
Correction: if it meant killing the person that he was scared to love the most.
He knew it was a sin to love another man.
Especially Sherlock Holmes.
That same man who shot a bullet into Beatrice’s heart.
That same man who kept repeating that ‘He didn’t mean to’.
It was all a selfish act.
All to protect his damn self.
Beatrice stole a piece of gold that they all rescued from their Father.
And she wanted to keep it.
She wanted to give some hope to her and James’s future.
Then it happened.
All too fast.
Sherlock thought that Beatrice was about to shoot too, when all she was doing was just holding her gun up, in defensiveness and as a fake act.
James saw Beatrice’s pale body covered in blood.
He didn’t even have time to say his goodbye.
Or to promise her that he would reach her into the Underworld.
But now.
Now he had time to do what was right.
James threw his half-finished cigarette on the Church’s floor, not even caring to turn it off.
For what he had in mind, it might as well start from that.
He got up from the bench and walked out of it, then right ahead.
Then he stopped.
He was right in front of the altar.
In front of the God statue.
He took a deep breath, before grabbing a paper out of his yellow striped pants pocket.
He unfolded it and started to read, half-aloud half-under his breath.
Even though his warm hands started to shake a little, he gripped the paper tightly.
“Dear James,
if I’ll ever be gone, I’ll just need you to remember these simple but important things: one, I love you. I love you, I loved you, and I always will, no matter what happens or wherever we’ll end up. This is a mess, and we both know that- It’s bigger than us. But we’ll always find a way to each other. And here is how. Two, these are the instructions to find me, Moriarty: you’ll have to take the long way down, under cover of night. Lay low and stay out of sight. I’ll be right there, waiting for you, but there is one thing you have to do. Do not look back, when you’ll find me. Stay there with me. Do not go back to the living.
We’ll make the Underworld our new home.
In the end, you always loved calling me ‘Persephone’, didn’t you?
You will be my Hades.
Just do not look back.
Please, my love, come and find me.
With hopes and love,
Your dear Beatrice.”
When he finished reading, James was broken, inside and out.
His tears were staining the paper, but luckily every phrase stood intact.
He wanted to drop to his knees.
He wanted to find the heaviest thing.
He wanted to find some sort of weapon.
He wanted his Persephone back.
He wanted to reach the Underworld and go to her.
“James? Are you there?”
At that voice, James’ demeanour immediately shifted: anger.
Pure, violent rage.
He knew what he had to do, he had planned it for sleepless nights.
He folded the letter and placed it into his yellow striped jacket’s pocket, almost hastily.
His warm hands were already turned into fists, but as he turned around, ready to face the monster itself, he was faced with someone else.
Mycroft.
A scoff left his lips, then a loud, sarcastic, angered laugh escaped him, while he took several steps closer.
“Is your brother being a coward now, Holmes? What, he does not want to face what he has done?” James said in a cruel manner, with his jaw clenched and sliding his warm hands into his pants’s pockets, while his dark brown eyes were shooting venom at him.
Mycroft exhaled at his words, and took off his dark blue hat, in a sign of grief and respect. “She was still-”, he started, but James’s yell immediately cut him off.
“HER NAME IS BEATRICE!”
That scream echoed in the whole Church, as if that was the Underworld itself, and Mycroft had just walked into the Land of the lost souls.
“-Beatrice was still mine and Sherlock’s sister, Moriarty, and we lost her for good now. Sherlock didn’t even speak to me. I didn’t even see him, if that reassures you.”
“Oh, great! He didn’t speak or show himself, that makes me so happy, Mycroft!” James said, clapping his two warm hands, as if they were both witnessing a play - and if they were, this would probably be Hamlet. “You know where I would rather hear? That he was on Beatrice’s pl-”
“Don’t you dare, James.”, Mycroft was the one to interrupt now, with his jaw clenched and a slow shake of his head, “We both know you would not want that. And we both know why: you love him. And not just as a friend.”.
A terrifying, huge, heavy silence filled the Church.
None of them dared to break it.
And James didn’t even dare to admit anything to himself.
“You know what, Mycroft? Maybe I did love him. At the start, when everything was meant to be just ours- When the world itself was meant to kneel down at our feet. But he preferred to follow his Family’s roots. He preferred to remain in shallow waters. So I chose to find my own road to follow.”
“And look how it ended, James.”
Jame shook his head, and turned away from Mycroft, facing God once again, as if checking if He was witnessing and listening to everything.
Then he moved his gaze downwards, wanting to check if his lover was listening too.
“Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo.”
He turned back to face Mycroft, while his right hand held a gun behind his back, which he hid in his pants’s right pocket.
“If I cannot move Heaven, I will raise Hell. The Aeneid, Virgil. And trust me, Holmes, I will make sure that Hades will turn this Earth into the biggest mess you’ve ever seen.”
He showed his weapon, causing Mycroft to stagger back immediately, like a startled deer, while his face paled in an instant: but, to his surprise, Moriarty lifted and pointed the gun up to the ceiling, where a giant, heavy chandelier was staying.
Mycroft realized immediately.
And that scared him more than Death itself.
“James, wait-”
“You were right. You Holmes are always right. I did love Sherlock. And maybe, just maybe, I dreamt of a life that suited us both. You know, solving cases, being two runaways, making our own world. But he killed the only person who understood me first, Mycroft. Beatrice saw me. She understood my rage, my envy, my whole soul. Meanwhile, you two just…needed me! I was there as a helper for your cases! The comic relief, the actor, the player!”
“We can talk about it!”
At Mycroft’s panic, James just showed a sneer, and a chuckle escaped him, while he slowly tilted his head, the gun still pointing to the ceiling, and when he loaded it, he was sure to see Mycroft jumping right there and then.
“Why do you even care so much about me? Mh? It’s not like I am part of your broken family, am I? And you’re not Sherlock.”
“I am not him, I know that, but you are still human, James! You have a heart, blood, a body- A soul! You are someone-”
“I WAS SOMEONE, NOW I’M NO ONE! YOU AND SHERLOCK MADE ME NO ONE!”
His scream was so loud and potent that he was sure that all the Gods and all the Devils could hear him, but he wanted that.
If he had to be a lost soul, might as well be one under their judgemental eyes.
“Stars, hide your fires, let not light see my black and deep desires.*”
*(Shakespeare, Macbeth)
“Moriarty, I beg of you-”
“Oh, trust me, as sweet as that would be, you’re not the Holmes I wish was begging for me. Especially to live.”
Before Mycroft could even speak or utter another word, Moriarty had just pulled the trigger, right to the chandelier’s poor rope, and a loud yell could be heard.
“AETERNUM VALE!” *
*(FAREWELL FOREVER, Latin)
Then a crash.
A very loud, scary one.
The chandelier came crushing down on the Church’s pavement…and on James’s body.
Mycroft was speechless.
Scared.
Panicking.
Instead of running to James, to try and save him, he did what most Holmes do.
He ran.
And it was not surprising: after all, Silas taught him more to be cowards than fighters.
The Church was filled with silence.
Not even the Gods could react to this act of self-ruin.
James fell so deep with Persephone that he had to follow her.
He couldn’t leave his Queen alone…even if it meant losing his dear peasant.
That’s why his body wasn't under that chandelier.
There was one thing that Sherlock always underestimated about him.
James was fast.
It was his greatest strength.
So, when the silence filled the Church, he walked out of a confessional, dressed as a Priest.
Persephone could wait.
He still wanted that peasant to pay for her.
With a full evil smirk on his face, he walked over to a painting, while a dead Priest’s body was lying inside that confessional.
When he reached the painting, he grabbed his cigarette pack, from his black robe pocket, and grabbed one: put the pack back where it was, then he lit the cigarette using one of the candles, and placed it on one of the empty spots.
“Do not worry, my dear Beatrice, I will come to you. But everything at his own time. Let me take revenge, for you, first, my Queen of the Underworld. ‘Fata viam invenient.’*”
*(The Fates will find a way, Latin)
He kissed his finger and touched the cigarette, not caring if it could burn his fingertip, then he turned and started to walk out of the Church, singing a small melody under his breath.
“I am coming to get you, Sherlock”.
