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[M] - some strong language, someone has just been stabbed...

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Follows on directly from Your Only Hope is Evil

Approx. 5:15pm

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The lift doors slid open with calm efficiency, and the figure that staggered out, stark contrast. Left hand was clasped to his back, trying to stem the bleeding while right hand propped him up against the wall just the other side of the doors. They slipped shut quietly. At once, he realised it was the second floor and not the third and he turned back to the lift in panic, but it refused, the mechanisms inside purring away. Trapped.

Anguished, Johann staggered best he could down the corridor, panting as if there were no air. Every step a jolt through the open wounds on his back and made his head spin. His face continued to bleed, bruises darkening his eye sockets beneath his smeared face. Blood dripped down to the floor, wiped by stumbling feet. Right hand fumbled an ebony wand to open the door to the second floor flat, and left a bloodied knob as it was forced open.

The familiar satchel bag from earlier was discarded in the hallway, ready to grab to return to the third floor flat once he'd finished meeting Ira, to go home. Instead, Johann headed left in the dark to the first door. Light from the electric street lamp outside the frosted window was the only source of light. In the gloom the bathroom suite was cold and seemingly sterile for the lack of regular human presence for the past month.

Johann gingerly shouldered off his suit jacket, letting out a yelp as he let it flop into the bath. It was heavy and even in the low light he could see the inner lining sodden with his blood. Turning as best he could to the mirror above the sink, he caught sight of his broken face. It was a haphazard contortion to try and see what had become of the back of him after Ira's assault. The white shirt was torn to pieces and without a hand to compress it, fresh red blood oozed to the surface. Seeing it made it hurt all the more and he staggered forwards, seizing the edge of the bath with both hands, gasping.

There was blood everywhere. Alone, between the sight in the mirror, his hands bracing the porcelain and the saturated jacket in the belly of the bath, he was acutely and suddenly aware. This wasn't something he'd ever experienced. How the hell was he going to heal the wound? He could barely heal his hand when he cut it open - this was beyond his capabilities. He was trapped - Almasy's fucking lift! Think! Think! … Clean it? Water!

There was the rattle of the front door bouncing on the latch as it did when he got in with hands full and had to put things down before he could shut it properly. The noise seized his attention. There was a footstep - a presence beyond the dark doorway back into the flat's hallway. Forgetting his wounds a moment, he brandished his wand out in front of him, cowering  at the end of the bath, fully expecting Layton there to finish the job his employer had begun. It wasn't Layton's silhouette, but Balfour's - or more likely Ira in his stolen face.
"No, no, oh Merlin, no ...!" He begged, knees dropping him into a crouch, wand pointed right at the approaching figure.

When the elevator doors had slid open, Balfour wasn't expecting anything more than the usual myriad of expressions from the reflections in it. They were fickle on Friday evenings, a last taunt before the long and lazy weekend at home. He'd nearly stopped short of entering upon seeing the smears. Glossy crimson against polished mirrors, alarmingly suited rather than incongruous - yet it wasn't that, was it? His mirrored doppelgängers were incredibly still. Statuesque, vacant countenance. The doors slid shut behind him and he felt pressure jolt from knee to sole as the lift careened upwards impatiently. Shit.

They were barely open when the wizard stepped out on to the second floor, not once questioning the destination. Johann. Johann. No. It was safe in these walls. It wasn't him. Someone else, someone Johann knew in trouble. But why here, why not upstairs?

Balfour grabbed a hold of the doorknob and shoved urgently, wincing as it caught on the latch with resistance. Not one to be discouraged, he tried another shove; it gave way, the chain too lax to offer the right resistance. Blood left a glaring trail in the dark of the flat even, fresh spills of ichor that slid slickly beneath his worn boots.

"Johann?" he called out in a low, pressing voice. Wand out. The lights came on as he followed the blood to the bathroom door - they flared brightly - burning with a desperation he felt - as the gored man by the tub raised his own wand. Balfour immediately threw his hands up into the air, gesture of surrender as he stared.

Red, red, red. All that red trickling, oozing,  dribbling across brilliant white tiles: unnatural in every sense of the word except for the person from whom it bled.

"It's me!" Balfour breathed, heart hammering, forcing himself not to move even as every instinct growled to run to Johann's aid. "Christ, Johann! It's me, Balfour, it's me." And he knew it was his lover underneath the confusion of blood and broken bone in the face, the... oh gods, that gash. "Wand, down. Let me help you." No. Gashes. Multiple wounds.

He wanted to believe him, he honestly did. It sounded like Balfour more than Ira had sounded as she'd shifted her face. Deep in his subconscious the tenor registered as Balfour, but the events of the last twenty minutes or however long it now had been rattled and made him second guess.

"Wand, down. Let me help you." The command led to the automatic dip of the tip of Johann's outstretched wand. Obedient to the tone used, enough games and nights spent switching between the two voices mixed with pleasure. Here, in the panic, he wanted to obey and relinquish control but he couldn't trust.

"No!" Johann exclaimed, his voice oddly muffled for the fact his nose was still filled with blood and he was short of breath as blood seeped both down his face and into the back of his throat within. "I don't know it's you - ugh - " he shook his head gingerly, trying to clear his thoughts.

"What did we - what did we take from the kitchen at Christmas?" He demanded Balfour. It was the most ridiculous question in the situation. "Just us, without anyone seeing." His wand shook, and thought briefly crossed his mind that if it were not the wizard he loved, he would be able to put up little to no resistance either way. His gaze did not leave Balfour's face as he asked, every inch of him willing the correct answer, to be able to drop his wand and fall into the arms. For help to be home.

Balfour's jaw nearly dropped - not so much at the refusal to accept help but at the question he asked, of all things to say under circumstances such as this! Christmas was not so long ago, however, and perhaps neither could be blamed if the first of recollections in a mortal moment was the press of an eager tongue against sweet, naked skin. Somewhere in the distant isles, a god of Mischief surely cackled. But here there was no room for laughter and he forced himself past the pleasantness of the shared memory at the Spectre estate, only to plunge it straight into their savage reality.

"Brandy," he spluttered anxiously. "Brandy cream. Top right cupboard with the liquors."

The reaction was almost instantaneous, Johann dropping his wand and finally folding on to the floor to join the puddle of blood that had been gathering there for gods knew how long now. Balfour was with him in an instant, falling to his knees as he grabbed Johann's shoulder to prop him up clear of the wounds.

It was common knowledge that the human eye discerned more shades of green than it did any other colour. He wondered if red came after, at the rate at which this race continued to maim one another.

"Staima," Balfour immediately levelled his wand to stop the bleeding, bowing his head to get a clear view of the marred flesh; and another charm to clear the blood obscuring it. He breathed in sharply - nearly chocking all of a sudden.

That perfume.

Once, he'd caught it in a whiff of Amortentia. Fragrance of lush flowers somehow still fresh in their distilled embodiment, a garden in the Sergiyev Posad too many years ago. Ira Almasy. The scar in his own side. Balfour growled, grip tightening on his wand as he readied the first healing spell in mind.

"That bitch!" he touched the tip to the deepest of the gashes, casting Sano with the acute understanding that it was only a temporary fix. Snatches of the flesh were burned off, stung, and his gaze flickered from waist to Johann's face - he could fix the nose easily enough.

But they needed real help. Professional help. His jaw drew taut.

"What happened? What did she do to you?" he calmed the anger building in his chest, hot like a kettle come to boil. "It's going to be alright. I can fix this for now." Well. He could certainly try.

He was limp at the relief and fell to the floor, his ebony wand clattering up against the foot of the sink pedestal. His hands pressed flat to the cold tiled floor. The moment Balfour came close he instinctively tried to hide his face and then realised it was covered in blood.

Despite Johann leaving a generous smear of fresh nasal blood on his left shoulder, Balfour rearranged Johann effortlessly with strong arms. Johann's right shoulder propped against the side of the bath, head nodding forwards over the edge, allowing his nose to drizzle into it. In the bright light he got a view of his blood-soaked suit jacket in the bottom of the bath and felt sick. On the bathroom floor, his legs had folded loosely under him. There was a humming of his flesh as Balfour's spells met it, the sensation altogether more pleasant than what had come before.

Beneath it all he was attempting to cry but the sobs were uneven and pathetic. Somehow, Balfour knew - or at least knew it was a woman. Had he met Ira already in the lift? Had she crowed? Was that how he'd found him so quickly? Had he known it was going to happen? Was it all planned? Was this a trap for them both? Johann's head spun with circular, panicked questions.

"She threatened you, implied she'd hurt you already." Johann managed to explain as Balfour's wand touched several more times to the wound on his left before his bright, concerned eyes turned to Johann's bruise face, reaching up to lift his chin to inspect his nose. "You're not hurt are you?" He asked anxiously, a hand reaching out, smearing yet more blood on Balfour's clothes without realising.

"I … tried to threaten her." He explained, feeling incredibly stupid in hindsight, and gestured loosely with both hands at his state. Voila.

Balfour's right hand gripped his chin firmly to hold him still, and his left hand flicked his wand efficiently at the bridge of Johann's nose. There was a crack just as before but the pressure and the ache in his face released a little, though his eyes streamed at the shift.

"Augh." He vocalised in relief, wishing he could breathe through his nose, but figuring it would come soon now his nose was no longer broken. "Merlin. Thank you." A hand reached to tenderly feel his swollen nose. Everything was sore but that was easily solved. The movement induced an involuntary hiss as the wounds on his back stung again.

"We can't go to St Mungo's," He told Balfour, inhaling sharply through his teeth. He was able to think a little more clearly now his blood pressure had dropped and his heart was no longer thudding in his throat.

"Can't trust -" His face snapped to Balfour's, a plan firming in his mind, "Hannah, Hannah she'll know how to sort it. We can trust her. Wounds are her thing. Hiraeth Gardens…" He blinked hard, recalling the address, "Same floor as Dietrich!" He gripped Balfour's arms with both hands, continuing to bloody him in the process. "We have to escape."

He could have laughed in relief, at Johann asking if he had been hurt. And the explanation. It was good that they maintained a sense of humour in times like this. An odd feeling in his gut told him they were going to need it to survive the year.

Balfour's wool jacket and white shirtsleeves did not take well to being stained, blood glaringly obvious as his lover touched him while he worked; tender, reassuring grazes. Each set off a reverberation... a soothing, soporific sensation struggling to keep pace with the irritation building inside. He was going to claw her fucking face off. Peel it away, scrape slowly to the high cheekbones underneath and rupture every vein in that indelibly unnerving head.

She would deserve it all.

The thoughts bubbled in the background, attention foremost with Johann as he double-checked the wounds - not bleeding anymore, safe for movement - and pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket. It was laced with a dried tincture for headaches, mild pains; the calming scents of lavender and valerian. Mrs L had him carry it when he left for the sanctuaries all day. He held it to the face, pressed it gently and instructed to keep it there.

"I've always thought you brave but never brave enough to threaten Ira Almasy..." he muttered with a dry, half smile while he carefully stripped off Johann's shirt and shed his own jacket to give the other wizard. "She did. Hurt me. It was long ago," Balfour hesitated and then got to his feet awkwardly. "We were more than friends, back then. I'll explain some other time."

It never seemed important enough to say so before. He had never told anyone about him and Ira. But then again she'd never gone out of her way to stab the man he loved...

He allowed Johann to grab a hold of his forearms, and helped him up on to his feet. Hannah Bombay. Odd. They'd bumped into one another just the other day, hadn't they? Balfour felt a sense of deja vu, slipping an arm around Johann's waist to support him on the unharmed side. Merlin. Hopefully there would never be a third time lucky!

Balfour did not think they would be pursued. Precedence was being broken, yes, but she would never have allowed the elevator to send him up here if she didn't want them both to get out of this alive. He didn't say as much, focused on getting down to the foyer so that they could finally apparate to Hiraeth and see properly to the injuries.

Johann, first. And then he would see to the witch.