Dead Beauty AU (Chapter 5)
Yeah I just wanna post it here too.
Oh and Maeve and Malvina are Flower's, @tiredflowercrown
When Harry exits the Hell Hall his feet are too heavy and his mind is swimming in all the wrong directions: Ivy’s fault, naturally. The mix of alcohol and whatever poison she gave him.
He swallows heavily and bangs his hook to the metal gate, just because he fucking can. He hopes that bitch is suffering as much as he is.
And holy hell, is he suffering: the metal clang just about threatens to split his skull open.
He just hopes dear Ivy heard it too.
On completely unrelated note, he really would like to know how she got Claudine fucking Frollo, please and thank you. That girl has problems, alright, and he’s the one saying it.
Y’know, maybe she decided if she’s going to hell, she might as well go with a blast, and Harry can approve of that.
If he had his flask, he’d drink to that sentiment, even.
More importantly, he still wants his haircut.
Alas, he just starts walking towards the Tremaines – hey, it’s closer, and he doesn’t exactly fancy arguing with his older sister about his methods of delivering demands, thank you. Besides, Harriet is just a fucking hypocrite.
He’s pretty sure she slept with Diego the last time she was vaguely in the vicinity of Hell Hall.
Harry smirks at that.
He drags his feet as he sneers into the shadows, twists his wrist around to stretch it – the light twirls on his hook – cranes his neck around to stretch it too.
Curiously, that seems to send a street rat or two running.
This is fine.
It shouldn’t be too long to the Tremaines now, but he could just swear the bloody streets keep stretching under his feet. He kicks on something at the ground, mutters curses under his breath. And if he loses his balance for just a moment after that, well, who cares?
Two children run by him and he sneers at them to mind their way; his vision goes blank for a moment.
Tremaines’ is right there.
He collapses at the nearest chair.
He breaks open the door, swatting his hook at the irritating decoration above it. He doesn’t manage to tear it down. Shame.
It is an eyesore.
He’d say he hopes Anthony went out already, but frankly, he doesn’t care enough.
„Dulcia, darling!“ he calls out, „You promised me the haircut?“
„Oh, I don’t care,“ he lifts his hand to make a dismissive gesture and lets it fall when he discovers how heavy it is, „Just do your worst. I want Harriet to know I’ve been there.“
She appears behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder and sighing: „Whatever is wrong with you, Hook – my dear cousin is right there, and his mood didn’t get any better.“
She tugs at his hair rather harshly, which he registers mostly because he’s looking in the mirror.
„Also, what the hell do you want me to do with this?“
Dulcia laughs: „Why, that almost sounds like a dare–“
Harry discovers his lips are too numb to form an answer; he barely manages a crooked smirk, twisted more by the cracked mirror. His face feels weird.
Dulcia tugs at his hair again, turning his head from side to side to examine her canvas, and his whole body locks in a horrible spasm. He can’t jerk away or even breathe– his chest starts to hurt.
He watches his lips turn blue – watches Dulcia notice his stiffness and his expression – and curses Ivy. She wasn’t stingy with the dose, that’s for sure–
He manages to draw in a breath, his muscles relax a bit.
„What the hell was that?!“ asks Dulcia.
„So you’re faking choking to death for fun?“
„Quiet!“
She is simply too loud, her voice too high – Harry remembers his manners again and says: „Oh, nothing to worry about.“
„Oh no, that’d be the poison Ivy gave me.“
„Oh, you moron,“ Dulcia’s voice turns soft, placating, „You played Russian Roulette with her?“
Harry hums in response.
„Did you win or lose?“
„…Yes.“
This is starting to get majorly annoying, thank you for asking.
Dulcia deals him a gentle slap over the back of his head.
„Fucker,“ she says, and his body spasms again.
Oh, and it seems the ruckus finally dragged Lord Tremaine over. How lovely.
„What’s he doing there?“ Tremaine asks, as if it wasn’t clear – he came for the haircut. Duh. He told him already.
„Dulcia, why is he choking to death in our salon?“
„Choking to death, obviously,“ answers Dulcia, sounding insultingly uninterested.
Harry would argue, but, y’know. He still can’t breathe.
Well… Why not?
It’s not like Ivy would share the antidote or anything.
Choking is fine, but that humiliation would probably kill him.
Harry watches Dulcia shrug her shoulders delicately, and, yeah. He’s reasonably sure that if he dies in there, she plans to use his head as a training dummy for the little ones.
Which is absolutely unacceptable, by the way.
He breathes in again – fucking finally – and immediately spits at Anthony: „None of your fucking business, Tremaine!“
„My salon, my business,“ he answers, voice stone-cold.
„Dulcia, take this moron to the Mims right now,“ says Anthony, „If he dies at our salon, Harriet will never speak with me again.“
„My life, my business,“ mocks Harry back, turning around to look at the marginally more agreeable cousin, „Dulcia, about the ha–“
The movement makes his muscles lock up painfully again, which is starting to get really fucking repetitive.
„That’d be a pity for sure,“ agrees Dulcia in her overly sweet voice.
Harry manages to catch his breath again: „My sister’s too good for you anyway,“ he says. He just smirks when Anthony attempts to kill him with a glare.
Really, it’s almost admirable how much contempt Tremaine packs up into one word. Just a shame Harry isn’t exactly in the shape to break his nose, right now.
„Dulcia, to the Mims, now. Before I can think the better of it. You are also welcome to just dumb him behind the corner though,“ Anthony raises his voice, which makes Harry snarl at him. What is it with the Tremaines and yelling all over today?
„Angelica, Desdemona, Deborah, go help Dulcia with him!“
„I can take care of myself, thank you,“ he says instead, pushing himself off the seat, and almost immediately collapsing forward into his reflection. Well, fuck.
„Well, good fucking luck with that,“ says Harry, letting the Tremaine harpies drag him away.
„Clearly, you can’t,“ drawls Anthony, and Dulcia grabs Harry’s shoulder, drawing her sharp, carefully manicured nails deep into his skin.
„Now go. I do not wish to deal with your sister in a worse mood than she is now.“
As he passes under the door, he finally manages to tear down the horrid glockenspiel, to his satisfaction and indigent cry of one of the girls, which doesn’t seem like his problem.
Like, at all. That thing has been causing him headaches for months.
Now, Maddy being her usual bitchy self?
That does seem like his problem.
„Absolutely not–“ the demon-witch-whatever cries out, pointing at the list of rules scribbled on the wall with something that’s probably human blood, „You know the rules! No first aid! Your overdoses are not my problem! Your relationships problems should stay your relationships problems!“
Harry sways in the place as the younger Tremaine girls back away from darling Maddy, and Dulcia steps forward a single step, once again speaking in that placating voice of hers: „C’mon, Maddy, who said what about first aid? Just give him the antidote.“
„That’s what first aid is–“ grumbles Maddy.
„I don’t need an antidote,“ chimes up Harry, catching his balance on a nearby shelf, which makes Maddy look like she wants to bite his arm off. Sweet. Maybe he’d finally get actual hook like that.
„I want my hair done, Dulcia.“
…Yeah, no. Maybe, just maybe, he’s not so fine, Harry thinks as he painfully struggles for breath.
„See?“ Maddy gestures at him; he slowly slides to the ground, as his muscles refuse to cooperate again.
„He’s fine. Now get him out of my apothecary.“
„Maddy, be a dear. Just give me the antidote against strychnine. He’s got shit ton of gold on him, you can take it as a payment before he comes to himself.“
Harry would really love to protest that. She can’t take his gold just for a stupid antidote!
However, Maddy looks like she’s considering this: „…How do you know it’s strychnine?“ she asks with some suspition.
„Ivy always uses strychnine.“
That is not a concerning statement at all.
And Maddy doesn’t look too convinced.
Dulcia shoots Harry a look that can’t mean anything else than „You’re so gonna owe me for this,“ and then tells Maddy: „If he dies, Harriet will be out of it and then Ginny will be upset too.“
„I… Suppose I can spare some antidote,“ decides Maddy finally. He didn’t know she cared for Harriet’s witch all that much, but then again, Gothel can make herself likable like nobody’s business. And she is high most of the time, she has to get the stuff somewhere. He supposes it makes sense.
After that, the Tremaine girls leave, and Maddy quickly gets tired of staring at him, instead alternating absentmindedly playing with one of her dolls, yelling at one of her cousins in a language that makes the hair at the back of Harry’s neck stand, and preventing some mangy kid from randomly tasting the shit on the shelves.
He doesn’t fight Maddy when she forces a pill into his mouth in a pause in between spasms, and doesn’t swat away Dulcia’s hand when she offers him water with it.
That should count towards his debt to her, by the way.
The kid keeps singing in the same language.
Harry tries to ignore that and just focus on his breathing and, more importantly, about ways to get back at Ivy. Might that bitch be slowly dissolved in acid while listening to this crazy little Mim kid singing the demons to sleep or whatever.
Said mangy little Mim kid comes over and pokes at his ribs.
„Is he dead yet, Maddy?“
„Don’t know, don’t care. You know how to check.“
Harry does not wish to know how the Mims check if their customers are still breathing or not.
„I’m still alive, kid,“ he tells her, „Shut it.“
„Shame,“ the kid sighs, „Maeve said I get to dissect the next moron that overdoses.“
„Maeve also said you’re not supposed to talk like that in front of the customers, Malvina.“
Harry snaps his teeth at Malvina as she tries to poke at his ribs again.
„If that’s all, ladies,“ he grits in between his teeth as he pushes himself up, „I’ll be on my way.“
Malvina steps away from his as he struggles to regain his balance – he almost falls down as the doors to the Apothecary fly open and CJ greets the shop with a bright smile: „Hiii!“ she says and turns to him, „Freddie said you’d be there, Ettie’s getting snappy again– ooh, can we get some of that candy?“ She points to a shelf of brightly coloured expired candy.
„You lot are not allowed weed,“ notes Maddy dryly.
„Why not?“ asks the little Mim kid; Harry seethes at the sentence.
„Pleeease?“ whines CJ, making big eyes at Maddy and slipping her one of her gold bracelets over the counter. Harry barks out a laugh.
„This never happened,“ says Maddy as tears open one package, stabs her nail through some gummy bears, and gives the mutilated candy to CJ, „And if it gets into your head wrong, don’t fucking come back here.“
„Don’t worry, Maddy,“ answers Harry, grabbing his younger sister’s arm before she gets any more bright ideas, „I’ve had enough of this place for quite some time.“
He leads CJ outside.
„How stabby is Harriet?“ he asks.
CJ swallows one of her gummy bears as she thinks of an answer, carefully storing the other pieces in a napkin in her pocket: „Hmm… Not as much as when I bleached her hair. Kinda about when Frollo wouldn’t stop ringing the bells cos of some celebration or whatever.“
Harriet spent most of that time too drunk to form a coherent sentence, and honestly, Harry doesn’t blame her.
„No, wait! Like when the Hearts twins got the jewelry she wanted at the market the other time!“
„Well, then,“ Harry smiles at his younger sister,„How do you feel about a new haircut, then?“
„Yes!“ she jumps in her place, „Yes! Harriet’s gonna be so pissed!“
Anthony, too, and it’s not like anything interesting is happening at the port now: He seriously doubts Ivy managed to forward their demands to her youngest cousin yet.
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