House Of Memories

- LXXIII -

Elina was just done with cataloging her day and growing comfortable lying on top of the bed with Mycroft across from her and Lilith in between them when Mycroft got the call. She sat up on the bed same time as he did and pulled Lily onto her lap.

Mycroft's movements were precise and continuous as he held his free hand to Elina's knee, stroking it. "Much obliged in letting me know." Cutting the call short, he looked level eyed to Elina, admiring the view quickly. "Eurus is dead."

"Dead?" She questioned quickly. "Killed herself... She killed herself." Mycroft spoke in a mixture of slowness and quickness as if not entirely believing it himself. "I wasn't expecting her to do so." Elina mumbled mainly to herself. "Neither did I." Mycroft agreed numbly on.

He didn't expect Elina to reach to pat his knee affectionately neither did he expect for her to lean over and kiss his cheek. "None if this is your fault, you hear me. None of it."

"I am partly to blame -"

"Mycroft Holmes, I will slap you if you carry on. You weren't the one who brought her into this world, neither are you the one who encouraged her to be this way. She knew from a young age who she was with or without outer eyes."

Mycroft grew silent to her words but never pulled to look away. He felt vulnerable, it was a handful of times in his life he felt like this. "You did your best to shield her the same way Rudy did -"

"Rudy? You remember Rudy?" Mycroft was quick to pick up on. Elina smiled softly with dimpled cheeks. "I do." She withdrew. "You take after him." Elina decided to say. "If anyone is to blame, it's your ma and pa."

"I agree. From what I recall, they weren't too entirely emotionally invested with us."

"Correction, they weren't emotionally invested in you or Eurus... We know Sherlock is the favourite. I didn't hear them contacting you after you were shot?"

"To be fair, there were more important matters to attend to at the time -"

"Mycroft! Stop defending them!" Elina's patience was running thin. Mycroft held the bridge of his nose for a few minutes with shoulders moving in exaggeration. "I'm not defending them. I'm just expressing that you enduring that miscarriage was more important than myself getting shot."

"I know." Elina spoke softly on. "I don't mean to argue on this but surely you can see my point?" She looked to him expectantly.

Rather than saying anything else on the matter, knowing the pair were beyond such things, Mycroft brought Lily to his chest and the pair made it to her nursery with Anubis trailing behind. Anubis circled the floor close to Lily's cot to finally fall asleep and Mycroft placed his little girl down comfortably whilst kissing the crown of her head and bidding her a goodnight.

The walk back to their bedroom seemed longer than usual. It was as if the corridor was stretching for Mycroft in particular. It was eerily silent as the pair were on opposites sides of the room getting changed but it was as Elina turned back around to clamber into bed that she saw Mycroft's liability.