Chapter Text
A thing must be loved before it is lovable.
- G. Chesterton
Once upon a time, there lived an angry, bitter wizard in a little blue house that was bigger on the inside. He saw no one, spoke to no one, and grew more bitter and angry with every passing day. Even his best friends had abandoned him to his solitude, for he had failed them long ago. He had lost something of theirs. Something precious. And so the wizard grew old and lonely but it was no less than he felt he deserved – for who could ever love a beast?
Once upon a time, there lived a little girl who grew in the shadow of the evil sorceress Kovarian. The girl slept with the comfort of a knife in her hand and hatred sewn into her heart – hatred for the man who had failed her long before she ever learned his name. And so the girl grew into a woman, the concepts of compassion and kindness as foreign to her as a strange land for she had been taught long ago that none could ever love a beast such as she.
Once upon a time, there lived a lonely old wizard and an unloved little girl. They would not always be alone or unloved – but they did not know it yet.
-
She walks through the snow for miles – Kovarian had refused to give her a horse or a sled, smiling that glimmering, deadly grin as she told River you need to gain his trust. Apparently, looking like a bedraggled, sickly mess and dripping snow all over his doorstep is the only way to go about it. From the stories she has heard about the Doctor since she was a little girl, he’s a hard and ruthless man. He knows nothing of love or kindness. He’s a killer – heartless and cold. River doubts a shivering woman on a miserable night will do much to change that, but it isn’t her job to question Kovarian, only to do what she’s told.
The wind howls in her ears and River shudders as her whole body convulses in the cold, a tremor she feels right down to her bones. She draws her cloak tighter around her and huddles in on herself, forcing herself to pick up her feet and keep stomping through the snow. It’s nearly to her knees and still falling rapidly, flakes of it catching in her curls and the folds of her cloak. She wants for nothing but a warm fire and dry feet, perhaps a cup of tea between her frozen hands.
The sun is beginning its slow descent and though the temperature drops right along with it, her skin feels hot to the touch and she knows if she doesn’t find the Doctor’s hiding place soon, Kovarian is going to have to find someone else to carry out her wishes. River will be too dead to kill anyone.
Comfort, however, has never belonged to River Song. She is a creature of misery, bred in darkness and fear. She wouldn’t know what to do with sunlight, with a soft bed and a restful night’s sleep. A little snow and a bit of a fever isn’t going to stop her. So she turns her face away from the biting wind and keeps walking.
It’s with relief that she finally spots the battered blue house just as the last rays of sunlight cling to the horizon. It sits by itself in the middle of a snow-covered field, surrounded by dead trees on all sides. River breathes a sigh of relief as she approaches it, stopping briefly on the edge of the property to catch her breath and admire her prize.
It’s a lonesome little thing, she muses. But there is something about the house, something that makes her smile. Perhaps it’s the smoke rising from the chimney, the promise of warmth that will soon be hers. Perhaps it’s the way the house seems to carry secrets in its crooked windows and in the chipping paint of its weary front door. In any case, as she steps forward and begins her trek across the field toward the house, she finds herself hoping that the Doctor won’t turn her away – and not only because it will ruin her plan if he does.
The knocker on the door is broken so she raps her knuckles against the aging wood instead, pounding at it until she’s too weak to lift her arm a moment longer. And then she kicks it.
The door finally swings open and a tall, thin man with a scowling mouth appears. He stares at her from beneath bushy eyebrows, gray curls slipping into his piercing blue eyes as they gaze at each other. Her breath catches.
It’s him. The man who had ruined her life. All this time, she’s only heard stories but here he stands – the man of her nightmares. She’d expected someone a little more frightening. Granted, the eyebrows are a bit scary but he’s nothing at all like the monster she’d pictured. He frowns at her. River snaps her mouth shut and forces herself to stop staring at the lines of age around his mouth and eyes, signs of laughter, signs of a life well lived. Perhaps gaining his trust will be easier than she thought.
He slams the door in her face.
River gapes at it in stunned silence.
“Piss off! I don’t want whatever it is you’re selling – I make my own potions and I have every book on spells I could possibly need and then some. And if one more person tries to get me to buy a cat, I’ll cook them both in a nice broth!”
River blinks, frowns at the door, and slaps her hand against it. “I’m not selling anything! I need a place to stay – just for the night.” Kovarian had said it would take longer to gain his trust but River sees no reason to linger if she doesn’t need to. Slitting his throat while he sleeps should be simple enough. “It’s freezing out here!”
“Go home then!”
“I can’t – it’s too far away!”
“And what sort of ninny travels so far from home in this weather? You must be a lunatic and I am totally against lunatics!”
River sighs and leans against the door, shivering as she pushes her cloak away from her shoulders. It’s cold, she knows it’s cold, but her skin feels overheated. Her head is fuzzy and every time she blinks, she has to struggle to open her eyes again. Even her limbs feel tired. She slaps her hand weakly against the door one last time. “And an old man living by himself in the middle of nowhere is the picture of sanity, is it?”
He barks something back at her but she doesn’t hear him, sinking into the snow on his doorstep. Everything suddenly feels very far away and the sound of his voice seems muffled by the seas of silently falling snow. As her eyes begin to drift shut against her will, she hears the cautious creak of the door as it opens once more. The last thing she sees before sleep claims her is his boots as he moves quickly toward her.
-
Her room – if one might call a squat attic space with nothing but a cot and a chamber pot a room – overlooks the grounds of Kovarian’s base and the dark forest that lies beyond, surrounding them on all sides. She stands on her tiptoes and peers between the bars, staring into the mysterious darkness beyond. Kovarian keeps a tight watch and there is always someone to make sure her little charge never wanders. Escaping to explore the forest has never occurred to her.
She only stares and contemplates what might lie within, her little fingers wrapped tight around the bars. She likes to imagine the impenetrable trees around the fortress keep terrible things out. She pretends the trees work night and day to keep her safe from the outside world and the evil Doctor that her mentor speaks of in angry whispers.
When she lies awake at night, bruised from another round of training with Kovarian’s magi and the black magic humming under her skin promising nightmares the moment she closes her eyes, the thought of a whole forest existing to protect her gives River Song a measure of comfort. She huddles beneath her thin, scratchy blanket and shivers. When the bad dreams do come, the trees are always there to chase them away.
It takes only a few years for Kovarian to rip away any need or desire for comfort. She breeds a creature who fears nothing and needs no soothing touch, a soldier without one fanciful notion left. By the time she’s ten years old, River Song stares through the bars of her window and knows in her heart that the dense forest beyond Kovarian’s lair had never existed to protect her.
It was always meant to contain.
-
“You can’t leave.”
She’s barely awake when the words register but River ignores them for the moment, and the gruff Scottish voice who had spoken them. She catalogues her surroundings the way the sorceress had taught her long ago – there are windows to climb out of and an unlocked door to make her escape, a poker stored near the fireplace she could use to dispatch of her companion. And she’s still wearing the underthings she’d arrived in, which means her knife is still where she’d strapped it to her thigh. She’s safe for the time being.
And with that, she allows herself to relax and sink into the soft bed beneath her. She’s warmer than she can ever remember being, but comfortably so. She’s covered in heavy blankets and reclining against plush pillows that smell of musty book pages and burnt potions. There’s a fire roaring in the grate and outside the windows of her room, snow continues to fall in sheets. She must be in the wizard’s home. It’s midday and she has no way of knowing how much time has passed.
Finally allowing herself to address the words that had dragged her back into consciousness, she stretches her limbs and yawns, curling up beneath her blankets. She lifts her gaze to the man standing at her bedside with a scowl and a tray of tea and food, raising an inquisitive eyebrow. “Am I your prisoner now? How naughty.”
He snorts, turning abruptly away from her, but not before she sees the way his eyes lighten in amusement. “Hardly. Once the snow melts in the spring, I want you out.” He settles the tray onto her bedside table with a clatter. “But you can’t leave until then. I haven’t wasted the last few days of my life making sure you didn’t die for you to ruin it by wandering out in the snow again and freezing to death.”
Few days?
She’s been unconscious and under the roof of her greatest enemy for days. Kovarian was going to be furious. She’d been adamant about River sending daily status updates and she’s gone and missed several in a row already. Covering her panic with a smile, she says, “How noble of you. To what do I owe such charity?”
He stares at her like he can’t begin to understand why he would need a reason to take in a complete stranger and River struggles not to glance away at the reproach in his eyes. “What would you have had me do? Leave you out there?”
“Some people might.” The evil sorcerer she has heard about her whole life would have.
“Some people are rubbish.”
The Doctor turns away, busying himself with the kettle over the fire. He lifts it away from the flames and pours the steaming water into the basin resting atop the dressing table. A flutter out of the corner of her eye draws River’s attention away from him and she stares at the raven settling onto the bare tree branch outside her window. Kovarian’s raven. She swallows.
“Got a name then?”
River turns from the window, blinking. “Hmm?”
“You’re going to be here for a while,” he explains impatiently. “I can keep calling you lunatic but -”
“River,” she says. “River Song.”
“Quaint,” he says dryly, setting aside the kettle.
She frowns at his back. “And what’s your name? Mad old man who lives in the woods?”
“That’s my official title. But you can call me the Doctor.” He offers her a blithe, arrogant grin over his shoulder and River clenches her hands beneath the blankets. “You’re welcome, by the way.”
“For what?”
“Saving your life, obviously.”
She stares at the back of his head and wonders if Kovarian would be satisfied if she just dunked him into the scalding water in the basin and drowned him. He may have saved her life but he’d ruined it first. She owes him nothing. She bristles. “I wasn’t dying.”
“No? Just taking a wee nap on my doorstep, then? My mistake.”
River scowls, ignoring him. “I presume that water is for my use?”
He nods. “Unless you’d like to continue smelling homeless.”
With his back still turned to her, River discreetly sniffs her thin slip and grimaces. “I suppose I wouldn’t mind washing up a bit.”
“Fine.” He waves a hand toward the tray on her bedside table. “There’s food if you’re hungry. I’ll be downstairs. Try not to faint again while I’m gone. Oh, sorry, nap.”
River glowers after his retreating back until he’s gone, shutting the door behind him. Of course she would find herself under the care of the grumpiest nursemaid ever. She listens intently, waiting for the sound of his booted footsteps on the stairs before she attempts to venture out of bed. With much reluctance, she slips from the warm nest of blankets and pads barefoot across the cold floor. Her legs feel weak and shaky but she manages to cross to the window without falling over.
The latch is stubborn and she curses under her breath, damning the thing to hell until it finally gives with a mournful creak. River pushes open the window and the immediate slap of biting air outside takes her breath away. She shivers violently, watching Kovarian’s bird spread its black wings and flutter from the tree. It rests at her windowsill and she rushes to unravel the message tied to its leg. It doesn’t leave, apparently instructed to wait for a reply.
She scans the message but it’s exactly what she’d expected – a very irate Kovarian. River sighs, penning a quick reply explaining her delay in communication and relaying her progress in gaining the Doctor’s trust. She ends the letter by asking her mentor if she should carry out her mission that night as the Doctor sleeps. She ties the message to the raven and sends it on its way, latching the window shut again.
Hobbling over to the washbasin filled with still-steaming water, River washes herself quickly and hurries to crawl back under the blankets to warm herself again. Her stomach growls and she reaches for the food on her bedside table. She has no reason to think he’d spent the last several days keeping her alive only to poison her now. She drains the entire bowl of stew, mopping up the last traces with the soft bread on the side of her plate.
She’s warm and full and she’s never been both things at once in her life – can honestly never really remember being either. Unsettled that such comfort has come from such an unlikely source, River is quite ready to curl up and sleep again when the raven returns. It carries a message of only one word: Wait.
-
It’s two more days before her childhood bogeyman and reluctant rescuer deems her well enough to wander the house and gives her a tour. The house is bigger than it had looked when she’d been standing outside of it and as the Doctor leads her through winding corridors, pointing out bedrooms and parlours and studies, River silently takes note of all the secret nooks and crannies that might be to her advantage when the time comes. According to Kovarian, the Doctor is the most powerful sorcerer the age has ever known – River would be disappointed if he didn’t try to fight back. Not that it’ll do him any good.
He leads her out of yet another pointless room in his too-big house when she notices the heavy double doors across the hall. Whatever is on the other side has been shut away with a sturdy padlock. She pauses, feeling her instincts kick into high gear. “What’s in there?”
“Torture chamber.” She turns to blink at him, unsurprised by the answer but rather shocked he would truly admit it. At her calm acceptance, the Doctor frowns at her and says, “Used to be a library but there’s nothing in there. Leaky roof, mold – it’s condemned. Stay out.”
He says it all with a perfunctory air but something in his unwavering blue gaze tells River he’s lying. According to Kovarian, it’s all the Doctor ever does. She only nods and murmurs fine but as he stalks impatiently away, she trails behind him with a vow to get inside that room the moment an opportunity presents itself.
He shows her the kitchen next. It’s small and cozy and smells of fresh spices. River wanders into the room while the Doctor lingers in the doorway, warming her hands by the fire as she glances around. “Small kitchen for such a big house.”
One of the cupboards creaks.
“It’s exactly the right size.”
“Just like a man,” she murmurs, smirking when she hears him grumble. “I’m just saying it’s a little odd.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she sees a cupboard door open and shut noisily by itself. She whirls, staring, and if not for her extensive training and a lifetime of having every fanciful notion ripped violently away, she might have thought she was seeing things.
The Doctor sighs. “See? Now you’ve upset her.”
“Her?” River turns to him. “You’re not trying to convince me you’ve got a ghost, are you?”
He looks at her like she’s even slower than he’d previously suspected and says, “Of course not. It’s the house. She’s sentient.”
River blinks. “Pardon?”
The Doctor waves a careless hand and leans against the doorframe, his temple pressed almost fondly into the aging wood. “Bit of an experiment gone wrong,” he admits. “I never tried to fix it. Liked the company, I suppose.”
Studying the innocuous cupboard, River suddenly understands the strange feeling that has overwhelmed her since the moment she spotted this house in the distance – that someone is watching her. Now she knows why. It should unsettle her but the house doesn’t feel angry. Perhaps a bit cross that she’d besmirched its kitchen but not angry. In fact, if she closes her eyes she can sense fond amusement, a trace of wary protectiveness, and just a dash of sass.
River smiles and opens her eyes. When she does, she finds the Doctor watching her intently. That blue gaze seems to burn and she looks away, forcing aside the pity that wells in her chest for a lonely man with only a tetchy house for company. The Doctor had made his bed. It’s only fair he should lie in it.