"I can't believe you solved it so quickly!" John Watson exclaims, stepping into the warm air of inside. The December air outside entered with him, and he quickly closed the door behind his flatmate to stop the cold.

"I can't believe that they called me in for that," Sherlock Holmes replies. "I would have thought that even the police could think of something as simple as the mistress."

"To be fair, though, the victim did do very well concealing his affair. The wife had no suspicions whatsoever about what he was doing during those business trips."

"The will was so obviously a forgery," Sherlock scoffs.

John nods, conceding the point. "Did you see Anderson's face?" he asks on the way up the stairs.

"I did want to take a photo," the taller man admits before crashing into John, who had frozen.

He closes his mouth, stopping any words as he saw his friend's hand going to the gun.

The door was unlocked, he concludes, seeing John's steady hand on the key. John stepped back to let Sherlock through. After seeing the scratches around the keyhole, he mimes picking locks to John.

"Do come in," a soft voice calls from within the flat. John tenses his grip on the gun. Sherlock stands up and opens the door as John follows him in.

There is a woman sitting on the couch, legs crossed and hands on her lap, palms up. John relaxed a little, seeing that she had no weapons.

"Who are you?" he demands.

She moves her gaze to something behind him, and John follows her gaze to the frozen Sherlock.

Any colour had left the already-pale man's face, leaving him looking slightly strange. A gloved hand rests on his scarf, forgotten, and the other dangles at his side, clenched into a tight fist.

"We thought you were dead," Sherlock says flatly.

"And I told you that I would never leave you."

"There was a fucking body!"

John widens his eyes; Sherlock rarely swore.

"Language," she chides. "I heard you did the same, dear little hypocrite."

Sherlock scowls.

"Don't give me that look. I invented that look."

"What were we supposed to think when you disappear for three year and turn up in the Thames with a cord around your neck?" Sherlock yells.

John only looks between the two like an interesting tennis match.

"You are supposed to think of the times when I was in university and came to see you every year without anyone finding out!" She smiles tightly, yelling back.

"I thought you were dead."

Sherlock turns and strides towards his room. She stands up just as quickly and follows, but he slams the door in her face. She sighs.

"He was always like this, even when he was just a child."

John realises with a start that she is talking to him.

When he doesn't know what to say, she turns around quickly and holds out a hand. "You must be John Watson."

"Yes, I am." Why didn't she introduce herself? He wonders as he shakes the offered limb.

"I read your blog," she says. "It's good to know that Sherlock has someone to watch over him."

He still doesn't know what to say.

"I'm Amy, by the way." She smiles a charming smile that is oddly reminiscent of Sherlock.

"Hello," he blurts out, but mostly because he wanted to say something.

"Yes," she agrees, her cheerfulness vastly elevated from a few moments ago, when she was talking to Sherlock. "Hi." Her smile widens, and John vaguely remembers Sherlock doing something similar to a witness at one particular crime. "So, you're Sherlock's flatmate." He nods cautiously. "Wonderful! So, how do you like it? Living with him, I mean. It must be difficult."

"It… is." He shakes his head to get rid of the layer of charm she threw on him. "I'm sorry, but –"

"Why am I here?" she interrupts. "Mycroft tracked me down and is dragging me to the Christmas dinner (banquet, really), and I decided that, if I have to suffer, so does Sherlock."

"No, and I mean no offence whatsoever by this, but who, exactly, are you?"

"Oh," she states, almost uncertain. "Sherlock never told you about me?" John shakes his head. "Or Mycroft? I remember him telling me that you've met… No? Well, I'm Amethyst Holmes, Sherlock's older sister."

She waited.

He gapes at her. "I didn't know –"

"No, apparently you wouldn't…" she trails off.

"Err… Would you like to sit down?"

"Yes, thank you." She quickly moves to the couch, easily clearing away the owl pellets (Sherlock's new experiment) away.

Now that John knew about the relations, he can clearly see the similarities between the two Holmes's, unlike between Sherlock and Mycroft. Her hair was a deep black with the same curls Sherlock had, and her bone structure was fairly similar, with those same cutting cheekbones and strong jaws. Her chin was slightly pointier, though, and her nose a little smaller, but the eyes that marked Sherlock and Mycroft as siblings showed themselves on her as well.

"So, you're probably quite confused right now." He nodded. She sighed. "Well, err, just– tell me what you've gathered so far."

"Well… I'm guessing that you disappeared for three years and your family found a body in the Thames that looked like you, and Mycroft found out that you were alive recently."

"Yes, but that's the simple part. Come on, I know Sherlock taught you."

"The way he reacted… You were close." She nods, smiling sadly. "He was devastated, so he didn't like to talk about you, so this happened before we met, over two years ago, then." She nodded again. "You still care about him, or you wouldn't bother finding out about me." She smiles genuinely this time. "That would mean that you're older than him, with his reliance on you and your motherly feelings towards him, but you're younger than Mycroft, or he wouldn't be able to 'drag' you to the Christmas dinner." He's on a roll, now, feeling the rush that happens whenever he woks things out so perfectly. Is this what Sherlock feels every time? No wonder he likes doing this. "But why would you disappear? And, most importantly, why would you fake your death?" He paused before continuing, "Sherlock and Mycroft never really mentioned their father, perhaps there was an accident, and you, probably being closer to him (since Mycroft and Sherlock are undeniably Mummy's boys), took it hard…" Her smile looked frozen on her face.

"Good," she choked out. "He taught you well."

"No mistakes?"

"Well… Sherlock is the ultimate Mummy's boy, but Mycroft isn't, not really (he was the perfect heir for Father), and, while I did disappear because of Father's death, I was never close to neither of my parents."

"What she failed to mention," Sherlock said, appearing at his door, "is that Father's death was no accident."

She froze.

"You realised, then?"

"Of course I did!" He paused. "Of course, what happened to your first two husbands did help me along."

John was staring at them again, noting the identical arrogant posture, identical cold eyes, and identical sociopathic air of the two siblings.

For what seemed like a millennia, no one spoke.

"I don't blame you for that, you know. I didn't judge you for anything. I just want –it's just that –just, why did you lie?" John tries to remember that last time he saw such emotion on Sherlock's face.

"Because it's what I always do."

"Why did you lie to me?" Sherlock clarified.

Her face crumbled for a moment before she wiped the expression away. "Why shouldn't I have?" she asks coldly, cruelly.

"Get out."

When she doesn't move, Sherlock repeats the words a bit more forcefully. "Get. Out."

She pauses at the door. "You're coming to the Christmas dinner whether you want to or not, and you're staying until New Year's Eve, at least. Bring your friend, too."

The door closes softly and Sherlock turns, once again, striding to his bedroom. John can't help but feel that he just intruded on something extremely volatile and dangerous.

It's the week before Christmas, and Sherlock had been getting more and more sullen and obnoxious. The day after Amethyst Holmes visited, Sherlock gave John a business card and told him to go for a fitting. When John realised that the suit was for the Christmas dinner, he couldn't help but want to contact this woman to ask for her techniques on getting Sherlock to listen. Sherlock had even gone out sporadically to look for gifts and have come back with perfectly wrapped packages. When John asked for advice in shopping for the Holmes clan, he was waved away with "I have it covered!"

The day before Christmas Eve, John and Sherlock is sitting in the living room, Sherlock on John's computer, and John watching telly. During a pause in the programme, Sherlock suddenly picks up the remote to mute the sound.

When John turns to complain, he holds up a hand. "Ask me," he says. "I know you want to."

John flounders for a second, then realises what Sherlock means. "Fine," he sighs, "what happened between you?"

Sherlock respires. "Wow," whispers his breath, "this is difficult to explain."

John just waits.

"Fine, well, Amy is my sister," he starts haltingly. "She is two years younger than Mycroft and five years older than me."

"She and I were very close when we were younger, since Father didn't particularly notice either of us. Mummy was often away, as well, but when she was home she paid more attention to me than to Amy. Basically, Amy was my friend and mother and everything I had." He expires loudly.

"I idolised her." Sherlock thinks that that phrase sums everything up just fine.

"She taught me everything worth knowing." Like what? The letters float above John momentarily. "She taught me how people think, how they react." Sherlock smiles fondly. "Even at the age of eleven, she knew that she wanted to become a social scientist. Perhaps law or psychology, she would say."

Sherlock's head starts to feel compressed. He adjusts his position so the blood wouldn't rush too quickly to his brain. "She figured out how to create a Mind Palace, you know. She was the one who taught me. Except, she also figured out deleting…"

Flat eyes of silver and dull aquamarine stared into identical features, albeit ones surrounded by faint wrinkles.

"She taught me so much about people…"

Branding pink stained flawless ivory cheeks.

"She taught me how shallow everyone was…"

A pale hand flew up to cover a larger handprint.

"She taught me that cynicism was the only truth in the life of the intelligent…"

Crystal droplets rolled down sharp cheekbones.

"She taught you hate," John interjects, but it only throws Sherlock further into the past.

"Yes," he mutters, drawing out the 'S'.

She was only eleven when Mummy called her a liar. It was after that that Sherlock truly felt hate. Sherlock wasn't there when it happened, but he heard it. He heard Father's leering laugh, the high note of scream that was previously reserved for amusement parks. He hated Mummy for not believing her. He hated Mummy for being so stupid, for causing her to hold onto him later as if he was the last living being on earth and cry.

He wanted to hate her for being weak. He wanted to scoff at her the way she used to scoff at his tears. But there was a difference, this time. Her tears weren't due to spilled blood or purpled skin. Her tears were due to injuries much worse than that, because, though she was never close to Mummy and Father, she still cared about them, and they had betrayed her. That night, he crawled under her covers, not because of a nightmare, but because they had come together through one decision. They had decided that caring wasn't an advantage. Even Mycroft realised, having, like Sherlock, heard the assault, witnessed the confession, seen the slap, and felt the betrayal. That night, the three siblings had, for the first time, bonded. The next morning, Mycroft came into her room and hugged her.

"She taught me truth," he defended. "Because –bitterness, betrayal, pettiness, jealousy, they're all true." Even John, kind, noble John, honourable, idiotic John, couldn't deny that piece of fact.

John stays silent.

"She was eleven when it happened," he starts, the scenes replaying in his head for the second time in just as many minutes. "Father, he assaulted her."

John is frozen, now. "I was there when she told Mummy, hidden behind the bookshelf."

The only light came from the slot of space in front of him, but, through it, he could see everything.

"Mummy didn't believe her."

The sides of the secret passage pressed against him.

"In fact, Mummy slapped her."

His barely muffled gasp was drowned out by the shrill denials.

"That was when we realised that caring isn't an advantage."

John looked horrified.

"It was a one-time occurrence. I think Father was afraid that Mummy would believe her if it happened again." Sherlock stares into the distance, memories flashing across his vision. "But then Amy skipped first form, being as intelligent as I and actually caring about education, unlike me and, to some extent, Mycroft. She also skipped fourth, jumping into A-level classes."

Sherlock pauses, the scene of the tall, dark figure waving goodbye fresh in his mind. "She went into Cambridge at sixteen, one year after Mycroft went to Oxford at seventeen." He closes his eyes to let the images take him away. "She always came back, though, always on my birthday. I was the only person she had contact with in the whole family."

He stops short, as if just realising something. "Well," he amends, "Mycroft must have kept an eye on her, but she never sought him out. I think she resented the fact that he still followed after Father's wishes like the perfect heir he was."

Sherlock opens his eyes. "She followed the Social Science course, but was in a choir." He smiles, remembering playing for her voice. Violin and her high soprano went together perfectly. "She got married straight out of university at nineteen, with neither of my parent's approval, and to some rich French boy." Staring into John's eyes, he smirked. "This French boy was completely obsessed with her, and was the only heir to a huge fortune. Three months after his mother died of stroke, he got killed in a car crash."

John flinched, seeing the implications.

"Now, this was during her second year in Harvard Law School, interning at a rehab facility and a law firm." His smirk widens. "She didn't even mourn, showing up at my sixteenth birthday with a nice smile on her face. Next year, she shows up with and engagement ring from the owner of a law firm that she said to be on the same level of intellect as her… as well as six years older."

He stands up to turn off the telly, John having not even glanced at it in the past fifteen minutes. "She was pregnant at twenty four, giving birth to a daughter. She let me name her."

John almost snorted at the thought of a nineteen-year-old Sherlock in contact with a baby.

"Two years later, his plane crashed. It landed awkwardly, not too far from the airport, and only three people died." Sherlock's smile fades away slightly.

"One year later, she's engaged again, to yet another rich, intelligent man. This time, he was slightly sociopathic. When I graduated from Cambridge, they were married. She got me the internship with Scotland Yard and tried to wean me off of heroin. One year later, I relapsed, and the internship was over. She bribed Mycroft into setting up a consulting certificate for me. Another year passed, and I overdosed and Father heard. She helped me through and went up to the manor to scream at Father and Mummy about cutting my trust fund."

His smile fades into a grim line of lips. "Father goes horse-back riding sometimes. One day, it was quite slippery, and his old horse slipped. Two weeks later, Mummy restarts my trust. That's when she disappeared. Her husband was taking care of little Jasmine (five years old at the time), and she just disappeared. No one knew where she was, not even Mycroft. That's when Mycroft and I had the falling out. Three years later, a body turn up in the Thames and I was called to investigate."

Flat eyes looked just like they were when she was alive, even with all life absent, frozen wide open as if they could blink close at any second.

"Lestrade was ever so surprised when I recognised the body on sight."

The wet cable was tied in a hangman's noose, leaving behind violet bruises, ironically, her favorite shade.

"I believe that it was the only time Sally felt sorry for me after I rejected her advances."

'I don't need your pity!' Words screamed as the coat, the coat she bought for him, swirls around him as he stalks away.

"Her last lesson to me was to care for nobody, not even her."

He didn't tell his leg to move, but they did anyways. Blood rushed from his face and into his brain. He felt dizzy and alert at the same time.

"But now, three year after she 'died', she's back, and I'm more lost than ever."

The car ride to the Holmes Manor is long, even despite Sherlock's manic driving. Throughout the four hours, Sherlock keeps blurting out little details about his family.

It starts off with: "Stay away from Cousin Arianna; she's one year younger than you and everybody's type. She's has had five husbands that died gruesome deaths. I think she took what Amy did a little too far."

John just nods. Ten minutes later, Sherlock speaks again: "Uncle Darrel is prone to dangerous experiments. Practise caution when entering his rooms. They're marked with normally marked by wooden doorknobs."

A few more minutes: "Aunt Elizabeth is a linguist. Try to put your med school vocabulary to use around her. She's the one with the red hair. If she likes you, chances are that Arianna will leave you alone (teenage rebellion never really ended)."

And: "Mummy will tell you to call her Violet –don't; continue to call her Mrs. Holmes. She's hopelessly proper with stuff like that."

Half an hour passes before Sherlock remembers something else of interest: "Cousin Nathaniel will test your deductions, beware… Although with what you did to Amy, you don't need to worry too much."

The previous remark is followed almost immediately by: "Also, Nathan's partner, Jacob, will be there. I believe you said that you didn't have a problem with that? Jacob is a MI6 operative, be careful."

Fifteen minutes pass before: "Mycroft will be there. If you act hostile to him (shouldn't be too hard), Cousin Charlotte won't make your stay overly difficult."

Then: "Charlotte's husband is David. You two should get along just fine; he's on leave from Afghanistan, a sergeant, I believe."

Another hour passes and they're halfway there, and Sherlock speaks again: "Mycroft's wife, Veronica, will be there, along with their twelve-year-old, Greyson. Veronica is a lawyer and very fitting for Mycroft. Greyson is Mycroft's son through and through. Beware of both of them."

"Oh, and Mycroft's blackberry will be there as well."

This time, after a few moments, John responds, "You mean his assistant, Anthea?"

"That what she told you her name was? I've been told Theana, Henata, and Thanea, among others."

The last one before John falls asleep is: "Cousin Michaela will be there with her flat mate, Shannon. They're nice people, very out of place in our family."

John is woken up by an insistent tapping on his shoulder. He blinks open his eyes.

"We're here."

Holmes Manor is an old Victorian structure, sprawling across many acres of land. The stable beside it, which is fairly modern, contains three horses. Sherlock hurries up the path, leaving a trail of footprints in the fresh snow. John shakes the sleep from his head and follows. The chime of a doorbell echoes and, almost immediately, the door opens.

A butler greets them and leads them into the receiving room. A moment later, a regal woman walks in.

"Mummy," Sherlock says.

"Sherlock," she replies, smiling. "How have you been? It's the first time you've come for Christmas in a long while."

"I've been good, busy." Sherlock suddenly turns to John, his charming smile more convincing than usual. "John, this is my mother, Violet Holmes," then to Mrs. Holmes, "Mummy, Doctor John Watson."

"Please, my dear, call me Violet."

John remembers Sherlock's warning. "Oh, no, I couldn't possibly, Mrs. Holmes. It wouldn't be proper."

Her smile becomes more genuine. With a start, John realises that he didn't notice it's falsity before. "I've read your blog, you know, Dr. Watson. Mycroft lead me to it, says that it's the only way to keep up with my son, here. I'm glad Sherlock has brought home such a polite date."

John freezes. "Oh, no, we're not…"

At the same time, Sherlock blushes in a dull pink. "We're just flatmates, Mummy."

She doesn't even blink. "So separate rooms, then?" Without waiting for an answer, she immediately follows with, "Robert will take you there."

The butler leads them up some stairs and to the left, leaving them at two opposing doors. Setting down their pack, Robert turns, nods, and disappears around the corner.

"You'll want to hurry," Sherlock advises, checking his phone, "Lunch is in an hour." With that, he opens the door on the right and drags his pack in with him, leaving John with the room on the left.

At lunch, he meets some of the members of the Holmes family that had already arrived.

Some of them stay year-round, others had arrived earlier, but still more will arrive that evening. 'Uncle Darrel' is an eccentric man, talking heatedly about his various experiments and reminding John of Sherlock on a particularly difficult case. He is outgoing and easily liked by John. Elizabeth was a kind mothering type with a deadly intelligence to her. John notices the approving glance she shoots to Sherlock and rolls his eyes.

Charlotte and her husband, David, is a young couple that had arrived the previous night. Charlotte is detached and polite, but David and he got along perfectly.

A more interesting encounter happens with Arianna, who flounces into the dining room as they sit down for lunch.

"Hello, Mother, Father," she greets immediately, interrupting them in the middle of talking. "Aunt Violet, Charlotte, David," here, her smile turns predatory for a second, her eyes running up and down her brother-in-law. "Sherlock!" she exclaims when she sees him, and the addressed stands up, looking resigned. She tackles him in a hug, "Long time; no see!" She smiles innocently, an expression that would fit a twelve-year-old better, but did go well with her act.

She steps back, and her eyes fall on John. Her posture suddenly shifts, making her loose sweater and jeans look more provocative that the scantiest lingerie. "And who might you be?" A subtle tilt of her head, a widening of eyes to make the light fall in them just so for them to reflect a stolen luminosity, blinking curiously, a slight smirk gracing her lips…

"Doctor John Watson," Sherlock supplies, tight lipped, "my flatmate. John, this is Arianna Holmes, my wonderful cousin." The sarcasm is barely noticeable.

"Why, thank you Sherlock. I'm glad to see that you're as kind as ever." She and John exchange nods. "It's very nice to meet you, Doctor." The word 'very' is overly emphasised.

She glances around, gaze stopping at the clock. "Hmm… I do believe that I should have lunch today. Hope I'm not interrupting."

-Wherein the authoress went back to read through it and saw that Amy was a Mary Sue.-