Ripper & Rayne - Episode 2: The Serpent's Crown
Whether or not it repeats, history never lets go.
London, 1979
Arthur Meacham had worked the Returned Letters desk in North London for twenty-three years. “Every letter wants a home,” was his mantra, before he slit the top with a brass knife and logged whatever undeliverable postal detritus was washed up.
He read the first line aloud, as he always did…and managed only a few words before black script bloomed beneath his skin and stopped his heart.
“Cutaneous sigils,” Giles muttered, crouching next to the corpse an hour later. “Old magic. Dangerous.”
“Your favorite kind,” Ethan said, lighting a cigarette beneath the NO SMOKING sign. “So what’s the gossip?”
“Unstamped envelopes. Name, no address. They appear overnight.”
“Royal Mail branching out?”
Giles ignored him. On the clerk’s desk were three more unopened letters.
“There’s one for a Mrs T Morton,” said the clerk, still pale with shock. “One for Randall James.”
Giles froze. Randall had been dead for years.
“Well,” Ethan said softly, “someone’s not keeping up with the obituaries.”
The clerk swallowed, holding out the last envelope. “And one for…Rupert Giles.”
“Afraid of a little junk mail, Rupert?”
Giles tore it open. Just four words, written in neat black ink. Do not go to Camden.
Below it was a stamped sigil. A coiled serpent biting its own tail - crowned with three tiny thorns.
“Serpent’s Crown,” Ethan said softly. “So we’re going back a bit to ancient myths, are we? Time devouring itself.”
“I’ve read this before,” snapped Giles. “Before Randall…died. I should have paid more heed.” The memory clawed at him - the smell of candlewax, the blood. They’d been so stupid.
Ethan’s grin was sharp, humorless. “Never was a good listener.”
The Camden house had been derelict even back in ‘75. They vaulted the padlocked gate, knowing the way. Grip slipping on the slick black metal, then boots echoing in long damp corridors that smelled of history left to rot.
“Too many bad memories,” Ethan said.
They found the room by following the smell of fresh ink and paper. A circle chalked on the floor. Dozens of letters fluttered and floated on silver threads, towards an odd, clattering machine. It seemed half typewriter, half heartbeat. And in its center, that same crowned serpent sigil, this time daubed in red ochre.
“That’s a new one,” whispered Giles. “Temporal addressing. Someone’s writing to the past.”
“And is it writing back?”
A figure stepped from the shadows. Tall. Lab coat, wide eyes, trembling voice. “You shouldn’t be here. The letters aren’t for now.”
“Who’s sending them?”
“I am,” the woman said. “The serpent must bite its tail, or London burns.”
“It’s killing people.”
“Necessary sacrifice,” the woman hissed. “Each death prevents a greater one. But you two - you’re distorting the pattern. Especially him.” Her gaze fixed on Ethan. “Wherever he walks, the threads get tangled.”
Ethan gave a half-bow, theatrical. “I do my best.”
Outside, the cobbles were slick with rain. They’d shut down the machine. The woman was on her way to a holding cell - trespassing, for now.
“You’re thinking about the symbol,” Ethan said. “Ouroboros. Eternity and inevitability.”
“I’m thinking someone wants us out the way.”
“Someone always does.”
They stopped under a streetlamp. Huddled close while the rain made halos of light. Too close. A breath apart. The past between them like a live wire they still didn’t quite dare touch.
“Ethan. We were a mistake,” Giles said.
Ethan’s voice was quiet. “And yet we’re still here.”
He leaned in. Giles didn’t move. Their lips hovered, just a heartbeat apart - then a cab roared past, spraying water. Breaking the spell.
“Later,” said Ethan, too casual.
“No. Not later.”
Ethan smiled - the maddening, boyish smile that had undone Giles before. “Then we should make the present count.”
They walked out into the rain, not talking. Silhouetted as the sun rose. Somewhere in the city the serpent kept turning - jaws gnawing at its crown.
Stories from Ripper & Rayne are available in my Alternate Frequencies section.