Razors & Ruin (Rare Horrors #1)

Chapter 13

13

Nellie

M y body is hot and tight, my chest straining my stays. The lamp swings in my hand, shadows dancing over the brick walls as I skitter over the cobbles, my feet sliding on the rain-slick stones.

The park entrance looms, twisted in wrought iron like the mouth of some great whale, the gate creaking as it moves in the wind.

I can make it. If I get there, to the other side, salvation may yet come to me. To us.

There was a time when I was a little girl, a simple, romantic soul like any other. I’d walk through this very park, arm in arm with my mother, and watch the shining couples pass by.

Men with smart coats and hats, women in full skirts and bright bonnets. Maybe a little dog, a child running gaily alongside a kite. He’d buy her a pony; she’d kiss his cheek.

It was a dream I’d have been happy to hold in my heart forever. But I saw the weakness in it: such artifice, such vulnerability.

My parents never struggled to find a fool; they were and are ten a penny. I was damned by intuition and intelligence, just as Sweeney was—it’s true that once ignorance is spoiled, it’s spoiled forever.

And yet he’d take me for his own? I’d be the wife of Sweeney Todd—a man of sinew and malice, sharp as consequence and just as capricious. Something about me moves him inside, but I’m not the only one.

Johanna, too, holding in her sacred heart the only scrap of humanity left to my dear Mr. T.

I’m sure she will be dead. She should be. Why would the world hold a candle for some rootless orphan?

Lives are dashed to the wastes daily in this cold corner of the Earth. Many a sweet child with God’s grace in its eyes will freeze to death this night, unseen and unmourned beneath the arches down by the railway.

Does Sweeney believe he could go to her, the benevolent father, and hold wide his arms? If she lives, she’s blessed or cursed. If her life is good, what possible future could the child have with us?

If cursed, she’s dead or worse, and all he will do is tear inside, the last tight thread inside him forever severed by cold reality.

I must convince him to turn away from her. She represents only loss; for him and for me. He is more at home in the dark nest of his neurotic, hateful heart when I am happy to curl up alongside him and keep him warm.

I cannot return to the light, so there’s no fucking way I will let him try and travel there alone.

Whether her memory or her truth, one thing is clear.

It’s Johanna or me.

The dull thump of my heart is physically painful, and I crash into the gate, forcing air from my lungs as I shove it open. I turn on my heel and see the gloom darkening in the center, chasing along the ground like Death's own shadow.

He is right behind me.

I must let him believe I tried to escape him. He needs to think that a future like any other is still possible. Even as Marianne’s head and hands are lost to the eddies, Mr. T must think his fall is a choice.

I know better, of course. But I don’t have my claws deep enough yet. All I have now are swirling undercurrents of my own.

To save him, I must allow his depravity to drown us both. What other woman would have the courage to do something like that?

Gas lamps light the path through the park, each a shimmering orb atop lamp posts that stand stiff and pale, like leg bones. Sweeney’s breath comes hard and heavy in my wake, and despite myself, I gather speed, putting off the moment his grip closes around my wrist.

“Nellie.” His voice comes on the breeze like a ghoul. “It’s no use. You’re mine, to the marrow of your bones.”

Tears are streaming down my cheeks. Sweet Christ. He’s right, and it’s not a game anymore. What harm did I do to my innocent heart on the day I took my hot, stupid young self to the jail and let—no demand—a murderer defile me?

With that, I’m spent, the weight of who I am, who we are, too much to bear.

Then Sweeney’s arms are around my waist, and he crashes my body to his, sinking his teeth into my neck. The thin fabric of the choker tears, my skin beneath it punctured by his incisors, and I scream.

“I caught you, treacle.” His breath is harsh and too hot in my ear, and he pants like a hound from Hell. “I’m gonna fuck you right here, but there’s something else we have to do first.”

He flips open his waistcoat to reveal a razor, the handle peeking coyly from his inside pocket.

“Remember I said I’d marry you if you only ran enough?” He extracts the razor, revealing its gleaming smile as his other hand firmly holds me to his chest.

“Here’s the thing, love. A marriage can be scrubbed out easily. A judge can do it, or even a man like me; I did it once before, with one swing of my arm. But there’s more than one way to make a mark, don’t you agree?”

My chest won’t expand, and I can’t get enough air. I know what he’s going to do, and it will hurt a lot.

Every time I opened my own skin, the sting was proof I was alive, the blood running hot and thick. He wants it for himself this time, and how can I refuse? Every other time was for him anyway.

“Please be careful,” I say. “Don’t cut too deep, Mr. T. None of this is my fault. I didn’t take Johanna. I didn’t make the monster; I only fed it. Don’t punish me.”

Sweeney takes my shoulders and turns me to face him. He swipes his thumb over the blood running from his bite to my neck.

“I will give you something I can never take back,” he whispers. “Watch.”

I lean against the lamppost, pinioned by fascination as he shrugs off his coat. He unbuttons his cuff and rolls his sleeve, showing me the smooth skin of his forearm. His veins are meaty and thick compared to mine, so vitally alive.

The cutting edge of the razor gouges with artful fineness as he carves. It’s like watching an engraver or artisan; beneath his ministrations, the lines form a word.

NELLIE.

“Mr. T.,” I whisper. “How splendid. How rare!”

“I’ll be dead and rotten before those scars fade, my pet.” He reaches for my hand, the blood running into my palm. “Until then, there’s no return. Now, are you doing yours, or am I?”

I remove my jacket, holding out my arm. “Please.”

He doesn't flinch as he cuts me, but neither do I, and as my cold skin burns, his new name flares red over the faded remains of the old one.

SWEENEY.

“You got one more letter,” I say, my voice shaking in pain. “No fair.”

He catches my weak smile and takes my arm again. “Allow me to redress the balance.”

Beside the last E in my name, perilously close the the artery, he makes an addition: a small heart, spiky and strange, but mine for eternity.

He helps me put my coat on, and we hold hands in the pool of cold light, as though we were indeed in love.

The night belongs only to us; not a soul crosses our path, but it’s not just the late hour and inclement weather.

Our path is unsafe, and no soul should seek it. Blood runs from us, enough to lighten my head, darkening the puddles at our feet.

Sweeney’s gaze, as monolithic as a glacier, suddenly surges, and he bares his teeth again as though some vicious instinct resists the twisted intimacy we’ve found.

His bloodied hand is at my throat, and he pushes me into the lamppost, smashing my head into it. To my surprise, he lets go and points at the dark grass behind me.

“Run, dammit,” he growls. “Fight me for your life, or I swear, I’ll kill you.”