DAGON MANSION

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: THE FIRST MENTAL PATIENT

WARNING: This chapter contains references to sexual abuse of a minor, violence and lesbian sex.

Night pressed against Dagon Mansion like a great, breathing shadow. In her little room, Scarlett clutched Mr. Bear to her chest. The air felt thick — alive with memory.

A vision unfurled.

Ryan was thirteen again: thin, pale, and trembling in a bedroom that smelled of old wood and colder love. The door burst open, and Tybalt Dagon filled the threshold like a storm given flesh — face carved in fury, voice a blade.

"So now you're spreading nonsense," he hissed, "claiming you were raped at school?"

Ryan stood small before him. "It's true," he whispered. "No one helped me."

Tybalt's eyes gleamed with cruelty.

"If it happened, it's because you deserved it. Because you're weak. Because you're—"

The slur struck like a lash.

A hand followed — the crack of palm to skin echoing like gunfire across memory.

Tybalt dragged him by the hair to the maid's chamber. "Watch," he snarled. "This is what men do." The door slammed.

Ryan begged, voice breaking like thin glass. "Please—"

Another blow. Another curse.

Pain, humiliation, shame — all etched deep into the boy who would grow into the man Scarlett adored.

In the vision, Ryan collapsed, breath shaking. And from the shadow of despair came a vow, whispered like an incantation:

"I will rise. I will be stronger than all of you."

Scarlett gasped awake. She did not understand the words, but she felt the agony, the injustice. Tears slid down her cheeks.

"Daddy," she whispered into the darkness, "I'll protect you."

That was when Mia entered, drawn by her daughter's quiet sobs.

"What's wrong, love?" she asked, sitting beside her.

Scarlett wiped her eyes. "I just want to make Dad safe."

"Your father is strong," Mia murmured, brushing the girl's hair. "He survived things most never could."

Her gaze fell to the bear — and her expression hardened with recognition. She lifted it gently but firmly from Scarlett's arms.

"This needs to be purified," she said softly.

"No," Scarlett protested. "You already cleaned him."

"This time, he goes to Rowena," Mia answered.

And though Scarlett resisted, she let go — but her heart clung desperately to the forgotten toy of nightmares and innocence.

Rowena accepted the bear with solemn reverence, eyes shining with old knowledge.

"Psychometry," she murmured. "The child sees history as though it breathes. Dangerous... profound."

Mia's voice trembled. "She saw things. I never knew he suffered so..."

Rowena touched her hand gently. "You love him still."

"How could I not?" Mia whispered. "But Theolinda is her wife now. I can't bear it."

"You know the curse," Rowena reminded her. "Alexandra marked him. Any woman he loves is doomed to madness and ruin."

"Explain it to me."

"Ryan was Alexandra's lover, a female vampire, and the clan leader. When he left her to begin a relationship with Eliza, she went insane and cursed Ryan, saying that any sexual or romantic interaction he had with a woman would cause her to lose her sanity and be destroyed. This curse has already been fulfilled. He doesn't want that for you."

Mia bowed her head. "Then why is Theolinda not destroyed?"

"She is shielded — by a spell carved in bloodline and fate."

Mia swallowed grief and envy like poison.

"Then I will break the curse."

"Only two ways," Rowena said. "Convince Alexandra. Or slay her."

Mia's eyes hardened.

"Then she will die."

A sigh shivered through Rowena. "You threaten an immortal six centuries old."

Mia lifted her chin. "I don't care."

Elsewhere, Brisa and Xena retreated into warmth and skin, escaping worry in a sanctuary of limbs and breath. Candlelight flickered over them; steam curled like spirits in the air. Their intimacy was not crude but sacred — two souls seeking refuge from fate.

"I love you," Brisa whispered, lips brushing wet skin.

"And I you," breathed Xena, clinging like someone afraid to wake from a dream.

Yet even in pleasure, worry tensed Xena's jaw.

"This can't go on. Mia is drowning in this," she murmured later, wrapped in sheets and shadows.

"Then face him," Brisa urged. "Face your father."

Xena shut her eyes. "He is the center of everything — the curse, the power, the danger."

"And still," Brisa whispered, "you must."

At her quiet office, Mia waited — waiting always, for life to begin again.

Knock.

She opened the door. A tall, pale man stood there — blonde hair like winter wheat, eyes carved from ice and sorrow.

"I seek Mia Richardson," he said.

"You have found her."

"I am Holstein Faulks." A pause. "I would like... therapy."

A fragile spark of hope lit Mia's face. Her first client. Her first chance to rebuild something of her own.

"Tomorrow morning?" she asked, smiling.

Holstein tilted his head slightly, as though listening to something only he could hear.

"Night suits me better," he murmured. "Darkness is a clearer hour for confession."

Mia felt the faintest chill. But she nodded.

"Okay, see you tomorrow."

Outside, as the man walked away, the air distorted — as if the night bent to him, recognizing one of its own.