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seanfalco · 4 years

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Blood in the Water - Part I

Fandom: The Witcher Pairing: Mafia!Jaskier x f!Reader Word Count: 2295 Rating: E Warning(s): Violence, Blood, Car Sex a/n: This is a modern mafia! au loosely based on a dream I had. Also props to Kat who helped me decide on the pub name lol I hope you enjoy! Taglist: @ficsandcatsandficsandcats, @nevadawolfe, @witchernonsense, @magic-multicolored-miracle, @witcherwritings (I hope its okay to tag you as well!) - If you’d like to be added to my taglist, please let me know!

It was a Friday night and the Dandy Lion pub was filled nearly to capacity. Your shift was only half over and already you were ready for the night to end. It seemed like every time you turned around to mix a drink the amount of patrons vying for your attention doubled. Luckily you had experience with this type of rush, something not many other bartenders could say. Working for one of the busiest pubs in the city did that for you however.

It was one of those unspoken secrets that The Dandy Lion was owned by the infamous Pankratz family and while the thought that any one of your customers might be a member of the mob made you, understandably, a little nervous, you tried not to focus on the blood on their hands and only the sizable tips they gave you.

Finally, during a lull in the drink orders, you leaned forward against the worn bar, taking some of the weight off your feet with a sigh. Fridays were open mic night, and already there’d been a slew of new faces performing, as well as a few familiar ones. Scanning the crowd you searched for the one face in particular you wanted to see the most -- he never failed to turn up before the end of the night to play every Friday, like clockwork, swiftly becoming a fan favourite.

You didn’t know his real name, just the one he introduced himself with, which was obviously a stage name, but that didn’t really bother you. The way it tasted on your tongue when you were moaning it under him was pretty amazing.

Finally you spotted him as he took the stage, ornate acoustic guitar hanging from the strap at his shoulder.

Jaskier.

He bowed to the gathered crowd, a broad grin lighting up his cherubic face --that face that could go from puppy dog eyes to fuck me eyes in zero seconds flat. As he straightened, his clear blue eyed gaze settled straight on you and he winked cheekily before launching into his first song. Able to watch his set nearly completely uninterrupted you found yourself singing snatches of his songs under your breath as you wiped down the bar, to at least appear a little busy; the rush of people ordering drinks dwindling as they settled in to watch Jaskier.

Half the time he sang to the crowd, but the other half it was obvious he was singing to you. And this was exactly how he’d managed to charm you into his bed that first time.

As soon as he finished, Jaskier made a b-line for the bar, pulling up the stool directly in front of where you stood. Greeting him with a grin you poured him a glass of his preferred bourbon and set it before him.

“What would you do if I said I wanted something different today?” he asked teasingly, cocking an eyebrow as he gingerly lifted the tumbler and swirled the amber liquid around.

Raising your brows in return, you fought to bite back a grin. “I’d say, drink it or I will.”

Jaskier chuckled in response, holding your gaze as he downed the bourbon in one go; your eyes following the laguid movement of his adam’s apple with interest.

“What did you think of the set tonight?” he asked casually, holding his glass out for a refill. Shaking your head ruefully, you poured him another splash of bourbon.

Despite his nonchalant phish for praise, you knew he genuinely cared what you thought and that thought stirred up the swarm of butterflies in your stomach. Besides, you had a hunch Jaskier wasn’t as completely self-assured as he let on.

“It was amazing, as always,” you replied, leaning forward against the bar. “Was that last song the one you were working on earlier this week when I was over?”

“Ah, caught that, did you?” he asked with a sly grin, clearly pleased that you’d been paying attention.

“Of course,” you said with a shrug, “I love your songs.”

Setting the empty glass down on the bar, Jaskier leaned forward as well, beckoning you closer with his eyes. “Sooooo,” he prompted, his hand sliding over your’s, fingers brushing skin maddeningly, “when’s your shift end, love? I hope you get off soon.”

-----

“Ohh fuck Jaskier!”

Your gasp was quickly swallowed as his lips found yours, bruising and insistent and hungry. His tongue eagerly exploring your mouth tasted of bourbon and you shuddered as he squeezed your bare ass, pulling you forward roughly to grind against him, his cock already buried deep inside you.

Though the back of your car wasn’t spacious by any means, it was large enough for you to straddle him, and he’d been so kind as to already help divest you of your skirt and stockings. The heat of your passions had swiftly fogged the car windows until the dark brick of the alley around you was no longer even visible.

“Gods [Y/N], you feel amazing,” Jaskier groaned, burying his face in the crook of your neck as you began to ride him in earnest. The pent up, mindless desperation that fuelled you drove all other thought from your mind except the overwhelming pleasure that coursed through you.

Jaskier’s hands on your hips guided you as he moved with you, his hips bucking as much as he could in the cramped space. Thinking perhaps you should have at least cracked a window, sweat rolled down your back and gathered on your brow. With a frustrated grunt you tilted your head and swept your hair out of your face.

Taking advantage of your now exposed neck Jaskier’s lips traveled across your feverish skin, tasting you anywhere he could reach as your bodies moved together.

“Don’t you dare leave any marks where people can see this time Jask,” you growled, thinking back to the other week when you had to cover three hickeys with concealer and even then you still got comments on them from strangers.

“Oh, no promises darling,” Jaskier merely laughed against your throat. “I seem to remember you enjoying it at the time.”

“Jaskier!” you exclaimed, a note of annoyance in your voice, nearly stopping until he tilted his head back to look you in the eye; his chestnut hair falling over his brow.

“Alright, alright, I’ll be good.”

You seriously doubted that.

“Can I mark you where only I can see?” he asked instead, but the only response you could formulate was a drawn out moan as he pulled aside your blouse and his lips found the slope of your breast just above your bra.

“I’m so close,” you gasped minutes later, after he’d thoroughly marked your chest. Your muscles were beginning to burn, your body beginning to tire though you had no intention of stopping; the tight coil of pleasure in your belly screaming for release.

“Come for me,” Jaskier purred, his breath laboured; his teeth dragging across your skin, leaving goosebumps in their wake.

Just a little more --

With a strangled cry your muscles tensed as your climax gripped you and you clutched tighter at him, who muffled his own sounds of ecstasy by seeking your lips, his arms holding you flush against him as he arched up into you even deeper.

Chest heaving against his, you curled around him, past caring about how your sweat slicked blouse clung to your body and relishing the feel of his arms around you.

“Gods, I wish I could go home with you,” Jaskier murmured, pressing his damp forehead to yours. Smiling softly you opened your eyes and sat back.

“I know.” With a peck to his swollen lips you rolled off him to sit next to him in the back seat, searching for your discarded panties and skirt. “What do you have to wake up so early for anyway?” you asked.

The heavy sigh that left Jaskier’s lungs in a rush made it clear whatever it was he was not looking forward to it. “I’m having brunch with my father,” he explained, his voice grim.

This was the first time Jaskier had mentioned his family to you, and the more you thought about it, you realized you’d never seen any photos of them in his apartment either. Though it was apparent they weren’t close and curious as you were, you decided not to pry -- if Jaskier wanted to tell you, he would.

“That sounds fun,” you remarked with a touch of sarcasm and he snorted as he buttoned up his jeans.

“Oh, loads,” he scoffed. “He’s probably going to pester me again about why I’m wasting my time on my music instead of taking more initiative with the family business.”

“I’m sorry,” you offered, placing a hand on his arm.

Your touch seemed to pull him from his thoughts and he smiled. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to spoil the mood with my dour complaints.”

“Hey, complain away, I really don’t mind,” you said earnestly; your hand on his arm squeezing lightly. “I’m here for you.”

You hadn’t meant to let that slip, but the way Jaskier’s face brightened had your stomach somersaulting.

“[Y/N], how are you so sweet?” he murmured, leaning in for a kiss, his hand resting against your cheek as if he wanted to pull you in for more. Sighing as he pulled away however, his eyes flicked from your lips to your eyes. “You’ll call me tomorrow?” he asked hopefully.

“Of course,” you answered without hesitation.

“Good.” Jaskier opened the car door and stood. “Because I miss you already.”

Snorting a soft laugh, you couldn’t quite wipe the smile from your face as you scooted to the edge of the seat and took Jaskier’s outstretched hand. As soon as he pulled you to your feet you realized your phone wasn’t in your pocket and swearing under your breath, you glanced back into the car, frowning.

“Damn, I think I left my cellphone in the bar,” you muttered, squeezing your eyes shut in frustration. “You go on Jask, I’ll just let myself back in and grab it quick.”

“You sure? I can come with you,” Jaskier offered, but you shook your head

“It’s fine. Besides you need your beauty rest before facing your dad,” you said, shooting him a smarmy grin.

“I’ll have you know I need very little sleep to look this beautiful,” Jaskier replied, pulling you in for one more quick kiss.

“Uh huh,” you answered skeptically, cocking an eyebrow at him as you leaned into his chest.

“It’s quite true, and you should know this. You’ve kept me up all night more times than I can count --”

“Shhhh!” you exclaimed, laughing as you pressed your hand over Jaskier’s mouth, muffling his words til he was shaking with silent laughter and you pulled your hand away.

“Goodnight [Y/N]. Text me when you get home,” he said softly, stepping back.

Nodding that you would, you waved at him as you parted ways, glancing over your shoulder to watch him as he walked to his car and you fumbled with the keys to the bar’s back door, letting yourself in.

Humming one of Jaskier’s songs under your breath, your mind still in the backseat of your car, you maneuvered the dark hallway back to the barroom. One quick sweep of the bar later, you found your phone tucked away under the shelf where you’d been talking with Jaskier earlier. With a contented sigh you turned to head back to your car, thinking fond thoughts about your bed waiting at home when a faint sound caught your attention.

Frowning, you turned, straining your ears. Hearing it again, slightly louder this time, you followed it toward the kitchen. Through the small window of the swing door you could see light coming from inside and you raised up on the balls of your feet to peer inside.

Several dark shapes obscured the single light, casting distorted shadows against clean counters and tidy shelves. You squinted, barely daring to breathe when one of the shapes, a large man wearing a dark jacket moved out of the way and you gasped, clapping your hand over your mouth at what you saw.

Tied to a chair amidst of the group of men surrounding him, lit up by the lone lamplight was a man -- his eyes clearly swollen shut; dark blood, a mass of bruises, and duct tape obscured his features, and you breathed in sharply around your hand, your eyes growing wide as the man in the dark jacket pulled back his fist to swing again.

Even through the door you could hear the dull thwack on the man’s knuckles connecting with the bound man’s temple and bile filled your throat at the weak muffled sobs that followed. As he raised his hand again you caught a metallic glint and bit your lip, squeezing your eyes shut for the blow. When you opened them again the man’s head hung down to his chest, unmoving.

Ice cold fear choked you, holding you frozen to the spot. You were not supposed to see this.

These men were mobsters. If any of them saw you, knew you were there, you would be in serious trouble. Perhaps even ending up like the man in the chair.

Forcing yourself to breathe you took a shaky step back from the door. Wanting to get out of there as quickly as possible you had to fight the urge to turn and run. Instead you crept away, taking care to make as little noise as possible until you were out the door and in your car.

-------

“Hey boss, we may have a bit of a problem. Yeah, a witness. One of the bartenders. Mhmm, we’ll pay her a visit in the morning and you can talk to her yourself.”

#jaskier x reader #jaskier imagines #jaskier smut #the witcher fic #mafia!au #mafia!jaskier #fic: blood in the water #whewwww i was working on this all week and i really hope it turned out alright #comments and feedback are appreciateddd #my writing #jaskier #julian alfred pankratz #dandelion

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the-odd-job · 4 years

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Ashes of Icarus chapter 19 - All the Things He Said

Warnings: Chose Not to Use Category: Other Fandom: Transformers Characters: Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, Optimus, Cliffjumper Relationships: Megatron/Sunstreaker, Sideswipe & Sunstreaker Additional Tags: Dubcon, Unplanned Pregnancy, Mechpreg, Sticky Words: 1937

( Previous )

Every day grew more tense as the sand in the hourglass slipped away. His time was running out. Sooner and sooner Ratchet would access the spec ops records, and then it would be all over him, wouldn’t it? Jazz, Optimus, Prowl, Ironhide, Red Alert would have questions that Ratchet would have to answer.

They would all find out, and then what?

Then what?

No doubt Red Alert would demand the greatest punishment, although Sunstreaker wasn’t at all sure what that might be. Was it possible they’d straight up execute him? He wouldn’t have put that past them.

Exiling him would’ve been well preferable to that. Incarcerate him?

What would they do to the sparkling? While it was still in his frame, and after it had separated?

Did he want to stay to find answers to those questions, or should he leave before they could make him face the consequences of his actions?

Where would he go? To Megatron? Or somewhere else?

Where else?

Where could he go? And would Megatron even let him go, after he had made it clear he wanted his hands on the sparkling?

Or would he simply be hunted down and dragged to the Decepticons?

He was likely safe from that fate if he stayed with the Autobots, but was what the Autobots would do to him any better?

Megatron, at least, had stopped harassing him after their one mid-battle conversation. Apparently he’d gotten to discuss what he had wanted to discuss—probably mainly the reminder of what he had promised to do if Sunstreaker didn’t.

Tell the Autobots.

But so far, there had been no word from the tyrant.

It was quiet on all fronts, for now, but he could sense Ratchet’s mounting concern. Sunstreaker, personally, thought that Ratchet didn’t want to find out answers in a way that would break his precious medical confidentiality, but what was he doing except forcing the medic’s hand with his refusal to tell who the sire was?

With his refusal to admit it was Megatron?

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“Sunstreaker, Sideswipe,” Optimus greeted them in the rec room. They were sitting in their corner table as usual, and if Sunstreaker’s presence didn’t just create a lovely bubble around them that no one dared to cross the threshold of.

No one except the Prime.

Optimus spoke quietly enough that snooping ears couldn’t hear him, which was enough to make Sunstreaker tense from helm to pede. Now what?

He glared.

“Wazzup?” Sideswipe asked with an easy smile, leaning back in his seat.

“Could I speak with you two in private?” the Prime asked. Sideswipe cocked an optical ridge at him.

Sunstreaker growled. “If it’s not something we can talk about in public, then we’re not talking about it.”

Optimus gave him a look, but that was nothing new. Happened practically every time they talked, really. Sunstreaker didn’t lose his glare any more than Sideswipe lost his smile even as he sipped from his cube.

If Optimus wasn’t as kind and forgiving as he was… Well, Sunstreaker wasn’t sure he’d even be an Autobot at this point, after everything he’d done and all the disrespect he’d shown.

And soon enough he might just use up all of Optimus’ goodwill, and then what? The million dollar question. He highly doubted even the Prime could forgive relations with Megatron.

“Very well,” Optimus said, surprisingly, and took a seat opposite from them. Even Sideswipe frowned at this point, setting his cube down.

“Seriously, Prime, what’s this about?” his brother asked, and wasn’t that what they were both curious over.

“Ratchet has been very concerned over you,” Optimus rumbled, glancing between them. His voice was low and quiet, just enough to travel across the table to them, and no further.

Sunstreaker’s optics narrowed. “What’s he said?”

“Just that he’s worried. You know Ratchet would never speak of anything confidential.” Everyone knew that. As bad as Ratchet’s bedside manner was, as grouchy as he could be, one thing he was, was reliable. Optimus may have been his leader, and if Sunstreaker hazarded, his friend too, but that wouldn’t be enough for Ratchet to speak of things that were between him and his patients.

Beyond saying he was worried about them it looked like, anyway.

“Did he ask you to talk with us?” Sideswipe asked, a little disbelieving. Optimus for sure tried to be everyone’s buddy despite being the leader of the whole damn faction, but it couldn’t exactly be said he and the brothers had ever been too close. They had too many issues with authority figures, especially as maddeningly soft ones like Optimus, to really appreciate the Prime to any measure.

Not a great foundation for anything more than barely passable relations, as much as Optimus never held it against them. He still tried.

As he tried now too. “No, he didn’t ask me to. I wanted to ask you myself. Is everything alright?”

What the frag made him think they’d tell him even if something wasn’t? Sunstreaker frowned harder, and next to him, Sideswipe mirrored the expression.

“Yeeeaaahhh?” his brother almost asked, because you know, why wouldn’t everything be just dandy? “Everything’s fine? I’m not sure what Ratchet’s worried over.”

Sideswipe paused for a thoughtful effect before he continued. “Well, unless it’s about Sunny’s glitch. That’s been acting up.”

“I remember,” Optimus sighed, his optics resting on Sunstreaker. “But you have had quite a bit of luck keeping it under control since, have you not?”

“Thanks to Sides,” Sunstreaker grunted.

The Prime frowned at the suggestion behind those words. “What has caused it to act up like this?” Damn, wasn’t he just so concerned. For who, though? For Sunstreaker and his mental health on a downward spiral, or for the rest of the Autobots he’d become an instant threat to if he lost control of himself?

Probably a bit of both. Optimus was just so… Altruistic.

“Haven’t you noticed Megatron’s given me an uncomfortable amount of attention lately?” Sunstreaker asked, raising one of his optical ridges for good measure. “If that’s not stressful, I don’t know what is.”

Look, he wasn’t even lying.

“I have noticed,” Optimus said carefully, like the whole situation was a powder keg ready to explode.

With Sunstreaker on the scene, that may as well be true. “Do you know why he’s given you that amount of attention?” Optimus continued, looking at him with concern.

But that was probably fair enough when your worst enemy was gunning for one of your soldiers.

Sideswipe cracked his knuckles mentally. Time to fabricate some falsehoods.

“You remember that one time Megatron and Soundwave ran into me and Sides?” Sunstreaker asked, and continued after Optimus had nodded at him. “He said something about remembering me, that time. We have some… Unfinished business, that he didn’t manage to finish that time either.

“I think he’s trying to finish it now.”

Optimus frowned and considered his words for a moment—and the implications behind them. “What kind of ‘unfinished business’, if that isn’t too much prying?”

Aw, wasn’t he just so polite.

Sunstreaker stayed quiet just long enough to make it look like he was considering how much and how he would tell about this—for reasons that should become obvious when he finally spoke up. “There was a deathmatch,” he said, a bit cautiously. See, their past was a bit of a sore topic, wasn’t it? So violent and filled with death even before the war that most Autobots were just uncomfortable when it came up.

They didn’t want to hear about everything they had been through. It was just too disturbing for their fragile little sensibilities. “It ended before either of us died, which is… Not supposed to happen. Ever.” He gave Optimus a meaningful look, the kind that said ‘you wouldn’t understand, but just take my word for it’.

Optimus nodded again, more slowly this time as he started to catch onto what Sunstreaker was getting to.

Sunstreaker said it out loud anyway, just so there was no confusion. “I think he’s trying to grudge kill me now, now that he remembers me.”

“Don’t worry, we’re not about to let that happen,” Sideswipe piped in with a fierce grin. The Prime frowned at him in disapproval, to which Sideswipe merely shrugged. So they were a little bloodthirsty, and too fearless for their own good. Sue them.

“Is there anything you would like me to do about that?” Optimus asked kindly.

Sunstreaker snorted. “Kill him, maybe? Would solve a lot of problems.”

The Prime had a pause before he sighed. “Yes, that is the goal, isn’t it?” he said quietly enough that Sunstreaker wasn’t sure if it was even aimed at them at all.

They said nothing. Optimus eventually cycled another ventilation, and nodded at them. “Thank you for your candor, twins.”

Candor. Right.

Sunstreaker nodded back, as did Sideswipe.

Optimus took his leave, and alone they were again—but not for long, because someone whose intelligence was as lacking as their height decided to come their way after the Prime had left the room.

‘Cause you know, Optimus wouldn’t have particularly approved of Cliffjumper antagonizing them, but that was all Cliffjumper knew how to do.

What did they ever do to him? Were activated in the wrong city? Had the wrong frame type? A past he didn’t approve of? A little too shaky loyalties?

“Everyone’s starting to notice something’s up,” Cliffjumper said as he came closer, stopping outside of grabbing distance and placing his hands on his hips.

“And what is up, exactly?” Sunstreaker asked, narrowing his optics at the minibot.

Cliffjumper leaned towards them. “You and Megatron are what’s up. You’ve been eyeing each other for months. So what’s going on there, huh?“

Was it just Cliffjumper looking for any excuses to blame them for unbecoming behavior?

Or had their comrades actually noticed the change?

Sunstreaker snorted. “He wants to kill me is what’s going on there?”

Sideswipe laughed. “You’re reaching even harder than usual, CJ!”

The minibot wasn’t discouraged. “Am I really? What’s with him not trying to fragging ‘kill you’ this hard before, tell me that.”

Easy. “Because he didn’t remember me before,” Sunstreaker said with a good, big roll of his optics. “Now he does and wants to finish what he started way back when.”

“That’s what we figure, anyway,” Sideswipe shrugged, “Not a hell of a lot of other potential explanations.”

Cliffjumper growled at them, but he had no solid proof, did he? So he’d noticed their looks, the lowkey drama between them—noticed something was going on.

But he had no way to prove it was anything more than what the twins suggested it was. He didn’t know about the sparklet steadily growing next to his spark.

But he would soon. Everyone would know soon, once its signature strengthened enough to become noticeable on top of that of its carrier.

And then… He could only imagine what Cliffjumper would accuse him of then.

He might even hit home.

“Say what you say,” Cliffjumper huffed at them, his arms coming up to cross across his slagging mini chassis. “You won’t be able to hide the fragging truth forever. Did you jump on that spike already? ‘Cause I think you did.”

This time Sunstreaker laughed and Sideswipe snorted. “Riiiight, he fragged Megatron,” Sideswipe said in full mockery. “And lived to tell the tale?

“Frag off, Cliff, seriously.”

“Why don’t you do what your name suggests and go jump off a real high cliff?” Sunstreaker smirked, hiding his expression behind his cube.

Cliffjumper growled at them again, but turned to leave. “We’ll see who laughs last, fraggers.”

Yeah—and it probably wouldn’t be him and his brother.

( Next )

#transformers #maccadams #optimus prime #sunstreaker #sideswipe #cliffjumper #fic #2020 #ashes of icarus #ashes

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ziskandra · 7 years

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PRIORITY OPS: REPOPULATING HELEUS (Ch. 6)

‘reapers’. sara has dismissed that claim (for now). ao3 link. 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 |

6. Til the Cows Come

There was no note this time and Liam was tired of wearing a hole in the floor. He'd done his best to give Sara the breathing room she needed, but the fact of the matter remained: he hadn't heard from her all day, she’d completely blew off their early dinner plans, and he was utterly unable to determine her whereabouts. He wanted nothing more than to be able to trust her. And yet, trust had given way to fear. What if something’s happened to her? What if she’s cross with me?

There was one way, a straightforward way, of gathering more intel on where Sara might be, but it still didn’t make him feel any less rubbish for pursuing it. Liam pulled up his omnitool and scrolled through his contacts until he reached the person he was looking for. Bingo.

Liam: Have you seen Sara lately?

Scott: You know what? I have an idea of where she might be. Meet me in the atrium? Truth be told, Liam had expected a bit more back-and-forth. Scott tended to make a big song and dance of how he didn’t like to interfere with his sister’s business, and often commented on how people tried to curry favour with him as though it might help them get a direct line of contact with the Pathfinder. Not that Liam needed Sara in any official capacity. He just wanted her.

The fact that Scott didn't ask for further clarification made Liam's heart sink. His legs felt like lead as he headed out towards his prearranged meeting place with Scott. Sara’s twin gave him a jaunty wave as he spotted Liam from a distance, but when he grew closer he couldn’t help but notice that Scott’s eyes were rather red and puffy. Like he’d been crying.

Liam clapped an automatic hand to Scott’s shoulder in greeting. “You all right?” he asked, the part of him that worried it wasn’t his place to ask overwhelmed by concern for the other man.

Scott let out a long, whittling exhale, toying with one of the straps on his trousers. “Yeah. Yeah. All things considered.” He shrugged. “I’m fine.”

It wasn’t quite the answer Liam had been hoping for, but he did his best to push down his sense of developing dread. He dropped his hand. “Right,” he answered, with just the right amount of disbelief. He wasn’t going to push it. For now. He’d learnt his lesson when it came Ryders and emotions. “So what’s this about Sara?”

Not quite looking at Liam as he answered, Scott said, “I know where she is. And look, I don’t want to interfere and all that, but…” He trailed off, finally making eye contact with Liam.

Liam raised an eyebrow. “But?”

“I think we should probably check on her.”

“Are you going to tell me why?” Liam asked, as if his mind wasn’t running through all the possible situations in his head. Some people might call it catastrophising, but Liam just called it preparation. Easier to deal with things as they came up if you could consider the possible outcomes. Didn’t stop him from hoping for the best in most situations, anyway, but it was hard, even for him, to think of a good reason for Sara to have disappeared again, especially in such a way that would cause Scott to be so concerned.

Scott stalled, rocking back on his heels. “Look, if she doesn’t fill you in herself, I will. Promise.” Another deep breath. “I’d like to give her the chance to explain, but…this affects us both. And you’re a friend, Liam. Future family.” He smiled, then, although the expression was strained on his features. Scott’s eyes still looked more-or-less morose. “Well, this will be one hell of an introduction.” Running a hand through his hair, he asked, “You ready?”

Adrenaline flooded Liam’s veins as he gave Scott a curt nod. “Yeah. Let’s do this.” As Scott led the way, Liam followed.

***

Only one corridor separated them from Alec Ryder's old quarters, and as they made their way down the hall, something crashed, loud and heavy, in the distance. Liam's legs, already walking at a brisk pace, broke out into an instinctive all-out run. He barely registered Scott's yelp of surprise, all but sprinting towards the door. It was locked, because of course it still was, and Liam slammed it furiously with his wrist as though percussive maintenance with his omnitool might magically spring it open,

Then there was a sharp, sudden shove against his chest. He hadn't realised Scott had caught up to him, but it was hard to ignore now that Sara's brother had him pinned against the wall with one arm. Part of him, the part of him that still made him feel like a little kid at war with the world, make a quick assessment of Scott: given the other man's condition, Liam could probably take him in a fight. The other part, the part that had been tempered with time, built bit-by-bit by all the people who had ever told him to think before he acted, realised that Sara would never forgive him if he decided to try and wipe the floor with her brother. His relationship with Sara aside, it still wouldn't be a nice thing to do. The right thing to do.

But why did he still want to do it? He glowered, bristling against the unwanted contact, but did not move. Yet. "If Sara's in there--" he started, desperately fighting to keep the anger out of his voice. He wasn't entirely sure he succeeded.

Scott just looked at him, his gaze maddeningly calm. "She is. But you, running in there like this? It won’t fucking help."

“And what will?” Liam growled, finally pushing back against the arm across his chest. “Are you going to tell me what the hell’s going on, or are you planning to keep me in the dark forever?”

For what it was worth, Scott stood his ground, barely moving even in the face of Liam’s resistance. The corners of his lips curved downwards. At this proximity, it was easy to see the family resemblance, not only between Scott and his sister, but between Scott and their father. It was an expression Liam had seen plain and clear on Alec Ryder’s face before: one of exasperated disappointment.

Liam had a hunch that, for some reason, Scott wouldn’t appreciate the comparison. For once, he mercifully managed to keep his mouth shut. “We received some upsetting news regarding our father earlier,” Scott started with as much diplomacy as he could muster.

It was with those words that the pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place. The memory. He knew Sara had been dreading it, had worried about the secrets her father had been keeping, and yet, somehow, Liam hadn’t predicted this outcome. Maybe because from what little he knew of Alec Ryder, he couldn’t imagine him having demons of this magnitude, but mostly because he couldn’t imagine his own father ever keeping anything serious from him. He’d always had a very open relationship with his parents, and it was sobering, sometimes, to be reminded that other people didn’t. “She was worried about it,” Liam added, anger rushing out from him like he was a punctured balloon.

Scott mirrored his body language, dropping his shoulders and taking a step back. Liam was grateful for the breathing room. “Yeah. And I don’t think either of us were ready for the truth.”

With those words, Liam felt the crushing weight against his chest again, but Scott hadn’t even moved. He found himself fumbling, echoing his earlier words. “You all right?”

Scott smiled ruefully. “All things considered. Feeling better?”

Taking a deep breath to keep himself calm, Liam answered, “Yeah. I am. Thanks.”

“Any time,” Scott answered, turning away from Liam and pulling out his omnitool. “Now, this room is supposed to be sealed for anyone other than the Pathfinder, but I was holed up here for a few days, so I’ve still got access.” He waved his arm. “And we’re in.”

The door slid open with a mechanical hiss, and Liam steeled himself for whatever they might discover. The room was not dissimilar to those found in any number of prefabs across the galaxy, a cozy living space. He only barely registered the model ships, the guns on display on a far wall, before noticing the figure sat slumped against one of the low walls of the kitchenette.

Sara.

It was all he could do to stop himself from crying out in pain. Out of the corner of his eye, he swore he could see Scott’s face tremble. They approached her cautiously with slow, soft footsteps, even though it went against every fibre of Liam’s building. Sara’s hair had fallen out of its usual ponytail and she flicked the hair-tie against her wrist as she looked up at them.

If Liam had suspected Scott had been crying, there was no question about it when it came to Sara. She hadn’t bothered to wipe her face, and the tear tracks were still prominent on her cheeks. “Hey, guys,” she said softly, looking between them almost as though she couldn't believe they were real. “What are you doing here?"

“We were worried about you—" Liam started as Scott simultaneously answered.

“You missed your dinner date.”

Liam frowned. “How did you know about—?”

“I told him,” Sara interrupted, slowly putting her hair back up into a messy bun. She bit her lip. “I just figured, if I had someone wondering where I was… I didn’t mean it like this, I swear,” she assured them with a shaky laugh, and Liam squatted down beside her on the floor, frowning as he fought to avoid the shards of something at his feet.

“I know you didn’t, love,” he said, hovering by her side with just enough space between them for her to close the distance if she so desired. She did.

Head leaning against his chest, she closed her eyes and whispered, “I didn’t think it would be like this.”

Liam pressed a kiss to her hair. “I know. I know.”

Somewhere above them, Scott cleared his throat. Liam, who had half-forgotten about Sara’s brother, glanced up guiltily. Some of Scott’s old humour was back in his eyes, and he reached out for Sara with one hand. “Let’s get you cleaned up, okay?”

Scrambling to his feet, Liam held onto Sara’s other arm as she nodded, and together, the two of them hoisted her upright, until she was standing somewhat steadily on her feet. “Come on. Up and at them,” he said, steering her towards the bed. Scott let go of his sister, mumbling something about gathering up the mess.

They sat down together, side-by-side, and Liam instinctively wrapped an arm around Sara, who leaned back against him in return. “How you feeling?” he asked, because he barely knew where to begin, but had to start somewhere.

“Better,” Sara admitted, inclining her head slightly at Liam’s disbelieving look. If this was better, Liam could barely imagine what she had been like before. His heart ached for her, and he wished there was something he could do that would make things even more better. Betterer. That wasn’t a word. But still. He barely knew what had happened and he felt like crying. He blinked back the tears. Sara didn’t need him falling apart right now. “I’ve cried it all out. Acted it out.” She canted her head back to where Scott was gesturing angrily at one of the vacuum cleaners with one hand and grappling with the garbage disposal with the other.

“What was that?” Liam asked, brow furrowed.

Sara smiled, surprisingly triumphant. “Dad’s coffee machine.”

Now, that wasn’t the answer he’d been expecting. “Do you want to talk about it?” He would always ask, he determined, so that she’d be able to say yes when she really needed to. Just like their conversation late last night, he almost thought she would refuse. Her eyes skittered over his shoulder, and he followed her gaze. When his gaze met Scott’s, the other man quickly busied himself with his clean-up once more, but the gesture was enough to make Scott’s words ring loudly in Liam’s ears. If she doesn’t fill you in, I will.

He took one of her hands in his own, gently running his thumb over her skin.

“Not really,” Sara started, eyes crinkling, “but I should. Just…” She took a deep, shuddering breath before she continued. “Remember how I said that it sounded like Dad had done something terrible? It’s… it’s Mom.” Before Liam’s mind could draw further dramatic conclusions, Sara thankfully continued, but not before rubbing at her eyes. “She’s alive. God, that feels weird to say.”

The gears turned in Liam’s head, but he struggled to parse what Sara had just said. “What do you mean, she’s alive?” Sara didn’t talk about her mother much, but he still knew the basics. Everyone did. Alec Ryder’s wife had passed away before the final push towards Andromeda, and the man hadn’t quite been the same since.

“I know, it sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? I mean, I — we — went to her funeral.” Liam spotted Scott busying himself again in his peripheral vision. “We really thought she was gone. But, nope!” Sara’s mouth thinned as she made an exaggerated motion with both hands. Surprise! “Turns out dear old Dad popped her into cryo at the eleventh hour, and she’s here with us in Andromeda. Alive.”

Scott chose that moment to wander back over, dusting off his hands as he did so, decidedly done with the pretence of not listening in. “But we can’t wake her up unless we find a cure for her disease. And even with SAM’s help? That’s going to be a toughie.”

“Hm,” Sara said, a non-committal noise.

“You’re thinking of doing it, aren’t you?” Scott accused. “God, Sara, it’s not your responsibility.”

“And what’s the alternative? Just leave her in there, let fate take its course?” Sara steadied her shoulders, glaring at Scott as he settled down on her other side.

“Well, it’s an alternative,” Scott grumbled, fingers fidgeting on his lap, as though his thoughts had physical manifestations which he could grapple.

“Not a good one,” Sara persisted. “I won’t allow it. I can’t.”

Liam listened quietly to their back-and-forth, not sure of where to interject, or even if he should. He felt uselessly out of place, out of his depth. This will be one hell of an introduction. As it turned out? Scott hadn’t been kidding. Alec Ryder had faked his wife’s death to his own kids? He could scarcely believe it.

Liam didn’t know what he could do, how he could help, and it haunted him. For now, he settled for holding Sara.

He hoped it would be enough.

“You’ve already done so much,” Scott complained. “ You saved everyone you could. It’s alright, you know, to just let this one thing happen as it should. It’s not your responsibility.” Liam frowned. The one thing just happened to be the livelihood of their own mother. But he couldn’t pretend to know what he would think if he was in Scott’s shoes. And if the way Sara twisted in his arms was any indication, she didn’t exactly agree with her twin.

Sara’s chin jutted out in stubborn determination as she lifted her head to look at Scott. “But it is. All of it. Dad decided that, when he named me Pathfinder. He wanted me to save her. Those were his last words, remember? Everyone else was just a bonus.” Although she smiled, it stretched thin, and Liam could feel her shoulders shake underneath him. He held her tighter. “It is my responsibility. Every single bit of it.”

A sudden flash of anger crept into Scott’s eyes as he snapped, “Dad never really cared about us.”

Sara frowned, shoving at Scott with one shoulder, pulling Liam along for the movement. “Don’t say that,” she scolded.

“Did you hear what you said? You were dying—"

“I don’t want to fight about this,” Sara said quietly, looking down at her hands. “He brought us here so we could be a family. A family, Scott.”

Scott snorted, dissatisfied, but let the matter drop. His hands were balled into fists atop his legs, and Liam found himself wishing he could hug him too. Would have offered, too, if he thought it would help any. Liam’s leg jittered where he sat, nervous energy building under the layer of tension that permeated the room.

“Liam?” Sara ventured tentatively into the silence. Liam jolted, as though he’d forgotten he was in the room.

“Yeah?” he asked, hyper-aware of Scott’s eyes boring a hole in the side of his skull.

“What do you think I should do?”

It was the question he’d been afraid of. Truth be told, he didn’t have the resources for dealing with a situation like this. Crisis response, he mused, hadn’t exactly trained him for these sort of problems. He didn’t even have the words to console her, and he hated that. It’s fucked up was about all he could say in regards to the situation. Only managed to stop himself because he wasn’t sure if it would just make things worse. He tried to run the sentiment through his mental filters. He’d never experienced anything like this — never would — but he could do his best to be empathetic.

“It’s not up to me,” he started gently, fingers running assuringly over Sara’s leg, just above her knee.

“But if it was?” Sara persisted.

“I’d like the closure,” Liam admitted. “But whatever you decide, just know that I’m behind you. One hundred percent.”

Sara winced, which wasn’t the reaction Liam had been quite expecting, but he went with it anyway. “That goes for you, too,” Liam said, with a nod in Scott’s direction. “This wasn’t what I had in mind when I thought about getting to know each other better, but it’s what we have. We have each other.”

Scott’s shoulders drooped as he exhaled loudly. “I let my temper get the better of me,” he started.

“It happens,” Liam said with a shrug, because he’d be a hypocrite if he didn’t understand, just a little, how Scott was feeling in that moment. Remembered just who it was who had talked him down from his own frustration earlier.

“Still. I’m sorry and I mean it. You’re a good man, Kosta,” he said before getting to his feet.

“Try to be,” Liam answered, still wondering if it would be enough. Sara reached for his hand and squeezed it reassuringly.

“No matter what happens,” Scott said, shifting his weight from foot to foot, “we’re already a family. Remember that, Sare. I’m glad I could be here with you. Both of you.”

Liam found himself overwhelmed by the unexpected acceptance, and his brain, so often unable to shut up, was almost bereft of a response. But only almost. “You really are Sara’s brother,” he exclaimed, half-awed.

“Liam,” Sara said, swatting at his thigh. She was blushing.

Scott busied himself with his omnitool, as though trying to give them their privacy. Yet, the smallest of smiles played upon his lips. “Well, then. I think I’ll leave you two to it. Now, do you reckon Gil will still be awake?”

Sara frowned. Liam took the moment to answer. “He never sleeps, so probably?”

“Excellent.” Scott said, clapping his hands together. “Take care of each other, all right?”

“Will do,” Sara assured him with a soft smile.

They both watched as Scott departed, a little spring in his step as his fingers flew, answering a returned message.

“So, that’s a thing?” Sara asked, bemusement evident on her features.

“I don’t…probably?” Liam said as Sara lay back on the bed, nestling her head against the pillows. He stretched out beside her, carefully crossing their limbs only in the places that she preferred, enthralled, as always, by just how magnificent and beautiful and strong she was, inside and out. He still wished he could do more, but for now? This would have to suffice.

“You are,” Sara said abruptly, words skittering across the shell of his ear as he laid his head besides her.

“I’m what?”

“A good man,” Sara told him. “I still don’t know what I’m going to do, but your support? It still makes me feel like anything’s possible.”

The words caused warmth to bloom in Liam’s chest.

He was enough.

#rydam #liam kosta #ryder #mass effect #mass effect andromeda #me:a spoilers #asha fic #nat fic: repopulating heleus #aka in which liam is properly introduced to the ryder family mess #what the hell alec

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calamitysshatteredson · 7 years

Note

So sack managed to tick off the brownies and now *something* unpleasant happens any time he comes by

Despite jokes to the contrary, Zack was not naturally all that clumsy. He had his moments, sure, but the longer he was a SOLDIER, the more exposure to mako and more general training he had, the more downright graceful he managed to become.

It was a surprise, then, when Sephiroth returned from an extended mission to find a list in his apartment in a familiar ever so slightly messy script:

Seph, I swear they were all accidents. I owe you:

> 2 end tables> 1 rug> I don’t even know what that was but it was in your kitchen so you probably won’t ever know it’s gone.> you never actually used that chair anyway, right?

That was mildly concerning. The list, the fact that he’d never sat in that wing-back chair a single time, and the fact that Zack was quite right. He’d never have noticed anything askew in the kitchen unless either his refrigerator or microwave had vanished.

Later that evening, Sephiroth began to understand a little more about what was happening. Zack had stopped by to say hello, probably to maddeningly slip in another joke (or several) about watering plants the older SOLDIER didn’t have. Stepping aside, Sephiroth welcomed him past the threshold–

And the perfectly stable air conditioning vent cover from above came crashing down on Zack’s head. “I’m fine, I’m fine. It’ll go with all the other dents.” He insisted regardless of groaning, not putting up much of a fight when he was lead over to the couch for a customary inspection. “I’m fine. I just feel like I’m cursed or something.”

All at once, Sephiroth made a realization as he pulled back a bit. “Zack… did you do anything that you shouldn’t have done in my apartment?”

The younger man pointed an accusing finger. “If you’re implying–”

“I’m not implying anything. I am asking directly.” Sephiroth cut off all attempts to divert the subject.

Which was, more or less, how Zack knew the guy meant business. “I may have borrowed a cookie.”

“I’d rather you not return it.” Sephiroth quipped. “Off of the plate I keep on the coffee table?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, they’re just there…” He gestured vaguely.

Giving a nod, the general stated in no uncertain terms, “You’ll need to replace it. And apologize.”

“Look, I’m sorr–”

“Not… to me.” And actually saying that out loud made Sephiroth feel like as much an idiot as he had while initially researching the subject of brownies to begin with.

The wide, blue-eyed stare was long and uncomfortable. “Now I know Lazard hasn’t moved in–”

“Zack.”

“So I’m apologizing to… who, exactly?”

And that was a fair question. Perhaps the most fair question that Zack had ever asked (and mentally Sephiroth murdered the pun that was just too close to the edge of his tongue). To speak of them was sometimes looked down upon, he knew that. He really didn’t want to offend them, or draw their ire. “There are… wonders in this world, Zack, that are difficult to define. And some of those things seem to quite like desserts and rearranging my drawer of materia accessories.”

The stare continued, somewhat blankly, for an uncomfortable stretch of seconds before a sudden blink. “Oh. Oh!” He leaned in to whisper. “The little people.”

Which had Sephiroth blinking in return. “The… what?”

“Fair folk.” Zack continued whispering, taking on a slight expression of an over-excited child. “Fae. Yeah?”

It wasn’t that Zack never surprised him. There were simply countless times; but that one in particular was unexpected. “How do you–”

“I’m from Gongaga, Seph.”

As if that explained anything. “Then you know… what to do?”

“Yeah!” Zack stood–then required a bit of a hand to remain standing with sudden dizziness. “I swear I’m fine. I’m gonna go see if I can’t sweet talk a couple of sweet rolls out of a closing bakery. Wanna come?”

Actually, he sort of did. Though, given the hour and the fact he’d just returned to his apartment… “I may have to pass for tonight. I just got in, and it seems that I should be replacing a few items.” There was only a little amused satisfaction in seeing the guilty expression on Zack’s face. “Don’t be too concerned, all of it came with the apartment anyway. See if there’s anything chocolate as well, hm?”

“Will do!” The younger SOLDIER made a mock salute and took one step before stopping abruptly. “Um… try to talk me up a little while I’m gone, huh?”

“I’ll see what seems possible.” Sephiroth promised vaguely, snorting to himself at Zack’s theatrical frown.

#drabble #Anonymous #CC!Seph #((I hope... this is remotely what you had in mind Anon))#((it's one thing I managed to do today!))

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honestgrins · 7 years

Text

A Familiar Face

Klaroline Infinity Day 7 - Ideal Endgame Scene

A year, a century, what was time to an immortal? For Caroline, forty years meant love, laughter, fear and grief. With her daughters grown, she's ready to stop playing it safe and to go looking for the adventures the world once promised.

She had forgotten how lonely it could be, the fate of a vampire. At home, the girls knew exactly who she was and what that meant - but they couldn't possibly understand the weight of outliving such a phase in her life. Humans went through a handful of these complete shifts, but Caroline was realizing she would have to do this over and over again until she met the wrong end of a pointy stick.

Having buried both Stefan and Alaric years before and signed the Bennett School over to Josie and Lizzie, Caroline decided to take a well deserved retirement trip around the world for her sixty-fifth birthday. She had left a week earlier, kissing the girls at the airport. "I love you, call me every day."

"Every week," Josie promised sternly, onlookers probably confused to see a young woman asking her mother to call every day.

Because Caroline didn't look her nearly sixty-five years; she didn't look a day over seventeen, and she never would. It was a realization that came in waves, one that hit her again as she flew over the Atlantic to South Africa. The list of postcards and souvenirs she had planned to buy was much too short for someone of her age, but everyone had died or moved on with their very human lives.

The girls, obviously, would receive the brunt of her gifts. Matt never cared for her messages, and Elena didn't even know who Caroline was anymore. Some of the school's students kept in touch, but it wasn't the same.

She was always missing the people she loved, and she wanted someone to miss her.

Shaking her head, Caroline glanced around the plane to distract herself from the morose thoughts. Brass curls caught her attention, but she turned to her book before she could let herself wonder why.

His lips were so pink.

Caroline wasn't drunk enough to get lost in such an observation; still, she couldn't help staring at the guy trying to talk her up. It was probably her fault for grabbing a drink in the hotel bar, where most people were just trying to get laid. She wasn't looking for companionship, though, merely some human interaction to mask her loneliness.

The guy was cute enough, just not to Caroline's taste. But those lips. She found herself frowning as she tried to figure out why she felt so strangely attracted to a man's mouth and nothing else.

"Anyway," he said in his Australian accent, shoving his hands into his pockets as he gauged her reaction. "Want to get out of here?"

That finally jerked Caroline back to awareness, unable to hide the mean laugh that bubbled out of her mouth. "No," she answered more politely. "I'm good here, thanks."

Grumbling, he left her alone at the bar once more.

Caroline swiped her tongue across her lips, wondering just what she wanted to get from this trip. While she would have never given the slick smooth-talker a chance, was she even looking for that kind of adventure? So focused on the school and Josie's kids, she'd hardly given consideration to the fact she had a long eternity to go. Picking up a guy in the hotel bar didn't scream 'spend the rest of your life with me,' but it didn't have to be forever.

It had been so long since she had even thought about dating. Stefan wanted her to be happy, and Lizzie had tried to get her on a dating website. Though Caroline had automatically disregarded the idea, she knew better than to shut off the possibility of meeting someone new.

Taking another shot of tequila, she only had one thing to say about that. "Not tonight," she muttered to herself.

The plan for South Africa was a conservation excursion with local scientists, and Caroline was armed with her fancy camera to take excellent photos of the animals for her grandkids. Josie was the green thumb of the family, so she also wanted to get plenty of information on the vegetation and how it was cultivated - education had become a vital part of the Forbes-Saltzman vacation experience.

Her excursion guide had an unfortunately dull voice, but Caroline was too enthralled with the scenery to care much. She snapped photos left and right the whole time; it wasn't until the guide accidentally crossed her camera's path that she paused to check the display. Whatever the good doctor had been laughing at, Caroline didn't know, but she grinned so widely that dimples cut deep into her cheeks.

For some reason, Caroline was struck by the sight.

The moment passed quickly as a dazzle of zebras galloped past their Humvee. Gasping at their powerful leaps, she brought her camera up to document the moment.

"Would you like to come to a party with us?" The older couple had been kind to her throughout the week's excursions, their cultured personalities something like a fascination for Caroline to soak up. They'd taken a shine to her genuine enthusiasm and witty observations, and she loved how much they made her laugh. This was that she had pictured on a world tour, picking up fashionable friends and making pleasant relationships with interesting people. The wife, Sita, watched her excitedly as she considered the invitation.

Rolling her eyes, Caroline smiled. "What party?"

"I have a business associate in the area," Abram explained, his hand affectionately toying with Sita's ponytail. "He's hosting a small fundraiser for his daughter's school. I assure you, Sita already wrote a check three times larger than necessary, so you wouldn't have to give a thing."

"Don't mind him, he's just angry my stock portfolio had better returns this month," Sita teased. "But really, you must come."

Caroline fidgeted under their earnest gazes. "I don't want to be a burden," she admitted, "but I organized a number of school fundraisers in my day and would love to donate."

Laughing, Sita nudged her playfully. "In your day… You're making us old folk feel even older, Caroline."

As Caroline's smile fell at the unsubtle dig at her apparent age, she knew Sita didn't mean anything by it. She had no idea that Caroline was much older than she looked. It was harmless fun.

Harmless, though she found herself brushing away a tear when Abram distracted his wife with another information packet he seemed to enjoy collecting. Friends were important, even if they would never know the real her; Caroline would just have to enjoy the time she had with them.

She hoped one day she could hope for something more lasting.

The gorgeous villa was larger than Caroline had expected, and she just stared in awe as their cab drew closer. "What kind of business is this associate in? Because they must be loaded to afford all this."

Abram chuckled. "He's a bit of a mystery, I'm afraid, though I know he has diverse interests all over the world," he explained, opening the door to let himself out and the women followed suit. "South Africa was a new venture for him, but he seems to have set himself up nicely in the last year or so."

"And he's handsome," Sita added with a suggestive arch of her eyebrows. "A catch for any single girl."

"Oh, I'm m-" Once again, Caroline felt the aching realization that she was a single girl. And despite her promise to remain open to opportunities, she wasn't prepared for one to come so soon. "I'm not really in the market right now."

"Talking real estate already, Abram?" A new and maddeningly familiar voice joined them in the driveway, and Caroline turned to find Klaus Mikaelson striding toward them. "And I see you've brought a guest."

Smirking, Klaus slid to a stop before her and reached for her hand. He brought it to his lips with that infuriating glint of triumph in his eyes. "Hello, Caroline."

Struck silent by the shock of his presence, Caroline was jostled by Sita's enthusiastic greeting. "What a small world, Klaus. How do you know our Caroline?"

With a too charming smile, Klaus held Sita and Abram's shoulders still so he could maintain intense eye contact. "Go inside and join the party, Caroline will find you if she pleases," he compelled.

As the couple obediently entered the villa, Caroline crossed her arms in irritation and very nearly stomped her foot. "What the hell, Klaus?"

"Yes, sweetheart, it's lovely to see you, too." His smirk melted into that bashful smile she hadn't seen in decades. "Are you enjoying your visit?"

Something in his tone hit Caroline's ear oddly; he seemed too prepared to see her. Lizzie was the one to suggest South Africa, and Josie organized the excursion as an early birthday present, but surely… "What," she hissed, "did you do?"

"Come in," he said, unconcerned. "I'll pour some champagne, only the best for your birthday party."

"Klaus-"

"Please." Klaus held out his arm, eyes much too innocent for the man himself. "I just...missed you. I thought it was about time to meet again."

Sighing, Caroline could actually feel her resolve crumbling. She reluctantly placed her hand in the crook of his arm, allowing him to lead in her inside. Damn, if his soft spot for birthdays wasn't adorable.

"So, did you trick my daughters into getting me here, or were they complicit in this little setup?"

Klaus just shrugged as they walked toward the refreshment bar, couples dancing and chatting in the next room. "Josie and Lizzie were none the wiser, they just wanted to give their mother a good birthday present," he promised. "Hope, however, was indeed complicit in sharing the details of said gift and your itinerary."

"I knew I shouldn't have hired a Mikaelson, even if she is the only normal one in the bunch," Caroline muttered.

Staffing a magic school required delicate inquiries, and it was her own fault that she reached out to Klaus for witchy contacts she and Alaric didn't have when they first reopened the Armory as the Bennett School. Though Hope was never a student, she joined their teaching roster as soon as she could. Caroline tried not to bond with her, really, but it was just impossible.

The only condition was that she couldn't bring her father's grudges to the school; children were not collateral damage. For twenty years, Hope had easily complied.

It seemed that Caroline's luck had run out.

Klaus popped a fancy bottle of champagne, smiling when she automatically reached for her glass. "Hope is exceptional," he corrected, "but I digress. Presumptuous as I know you're dying to call me, I didn't want you to spend the day alone."

"It's not my birthday," she burst out, incredulous that this was really happening. Her shout drew a few glances, so she sipped mulishly at her drink. "Not until Saturday."

Chuckling to himself, Klaus looked down to his toes. "I couldn't wait," he admitted.

Her challenging glare lessened as Caroline noted the familiar curls of his brass hair, the pink of his lips, and the deep dimples daring her to be angry. "You are presumptuous," she pointed out, though she also grabbed his hand and pulled him toward the dancers. "What happened to waiting, 'however long it takes?'"

They were swept up into the grand waltz playing, and Caroline felt lighter than air. She wasn't sure if it was the bubbles or the hybrid, but she didn't hate it.

Even better, the warm presence of his hand reminded her that she didn't have to feel it alone. This friend, or whatever he was, this one she could keep.

Forever.

#klarolineinfinity #klaroline drabbles #klaroline #my writing #round and round

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readbookywooks · 7 years

Text

Seen and Unforseen

Luna said vaguely that she did not know how soon Rita's interview with Harry would appear in The Quibbler, that her father was expecting a lovely long article on recent sightings of Crumple-Horned Snorkacks, '--and of course, that'll be a very important story, so Harry's might have to wait for the following issue,' said Luna. Harry had not found it an easy experience to talk about the night when Voldemort had returned. Rita had pressed him for every little detail and he had given her everything he could remember, knowing that this was his one big opportunity to tell the world the truth. He wondered how people would react to the story. He guessed that it would confirm a lot of people in the view that he was completely insane, not least because his story would be appearing alongside utter rubbish about Crumple-Horned Snorkacks. But the breakout of Bellatrix Lestrange and her fellow Death Eaters had given Harry a burning desire to do something, whether or not it worked ... 'Can't wait to see what Umbridge thinks of you going public,' said Dean, sounding awestruck at dinner on Monday night. Seamus was shovelling down large amounts of chicken and ham pie on Dean's other side, but Harry knew he was listening. 'It's the right thing to do, Harry,' said Neville, who was sitting opposite him. He was rather pale, but went on in a low voice, 'It must have been ... tough ... talking about it ... was it?' 'Yeah,' mumbled Harry, 'but people have got to know what Voldemort's capable of, haven't they?' 'That's right,' said Neville, nodding, 'and his Death Eaters, too ... people should know ...' Neville left his sentence hanging and returned to his baked potato. Seamus looked up, but when he caught Harry's eye he looked quickly back at his plate again. After a while, Dean, Seamus and Neville departed for the common room, leaving Harry and Hermione at the table waiting for Ron, who had not yet had dinner because of Quidditch practice. Cho Chang walked into the Hall with her friend Marietta. Harry's stomach gave an unpleasant lurch, but she did not look over at the Gryffindor table, and sat down with her back to him. 'Oh, I forgot to ask you,' said Hermione brightly, glancing over at the Ravenclaw table, 'what happened on your date with Cho? How come you were back so early?' 'Er ... well, it was ...' said Harry, pulling a dish of rhubarb crumble towards him and helping himself to seconds, 'a complete fiasco, now you mention it.' And he told her what had happened in Madam Puddifoot's teashop. '... so then,' he finished several minutes later, as the final bit of crumble disappeared, 'she jumps up, right, and says, "I'll see you around, Harry," and runs out of the place!' He put down his spoon and looked at Hermione. 'I mean, what was all that about? What was going on?' Hermione glanced over at the back of Cho's head and sighed. 'Oh, Harry,' she said sadly. 'Well, I'm sorry but you were a bit tactless.' 'Me, tactless?' said Harry, outraged. 'One minute we were getting on fine, next minute she was telling me that Roger Davies asked her out and how she used to go and snog Cedric in that stupid teashop--how was I supposed to feel about that?' 'Well, you see,' said Hermione, with the patient air of someone explaining that one plus one equals two to an over-emotional toddler, 'you shouldn't have told her that you wanted to meet me halfway through your date.' 'But, but,' spluttered Harry, 'but--you told me to meet you at twelve and to bring her along, how was I supposed to do that without telling her?' 'You should have told her differently,' said Hermione, still with that maddeningly patient air. 'You should have said it was really annoying, but I'd made you promise to come along to the Three Broomsticks, and you really didn't want to go, you'd much rather spend the whole day with her, but unfortunately you thought you really ought to meet me and would she please, please come along with you and hopefully you'd be able to get away more quickly. And it might have been a good idea to mention how ugly you think I am, too,' Hermione added as an afterthought. 'But I don't think you're ugly,' said Harry, bemused. Hermione laughed. 'Harry, you're worse than Ron ... well, no, you're not,' she sighed, as Ron himself came stumping into the Hall splattered with mud and looking grumpy. 'Look--you upset Cho when you said you were going to meet me, so she tried to make you jealous. It was her way of trying to find out how much you liked her.' 'Is that what she was doing?' said Harry, as Ron dropped onto the bench opposite them and pulled every dish within reach towards him. 'Well, wouldn't it have been easier if she'd just asked me whether I liked her better than you?' 'Girls don't often ask questions like that,' said Hermione. 'Well, they should!' said Harry forcefully. 'Then I could've just told her I fancy her, and she wouldn't have had to get herself all worked up again about Cedric dying!' 'I'm not saying what she did was sensible,' said Hermione, as Ginny joined them, just as muddy as Ron and looking equally disgruntled. 'I'm just trying to make you see how she was feeling at the time.' 'You should write a book,' Ron told Hermione as he cut up his potatoes, 'translating mad things girls do so boys can understand them.' 'Yeah,' said Harry fervently, looking over at the Ravenclaw table. Cho had just got up, and, still not looking at him, she left the Great Hall. Feeling rather depressed, he looked back at Ron and Ginny. 'So, how was Quidditch practice?' 'It was a nightmare,' said Ron in a surly voice. 'Oh come on,' said Hermione, looking at Ginny, 'I'm sure it wasn't that--' 'Yes, it was,' said Ginny. 'It was appalling. Angelina was nearly in tears by the end of it.' Ron and Ginny went off for baths after dinner; Harry and Hermione returned to the busy Gryffindor common room and their usual pile of homework. Harry had been struggling with a new star-chart for Astronomy for half an hour when Fred and George turned up. 'Ron and Ginny not here?' asked Fred, looking around as he pulled up a chair, and when Harry shook his head, he said, 'Good. We were watching their practice. They're going to be slaughtered. They're complete rubbish without us.' 'Come on, Ginny's not bad,' said George fairly, sitting down next to Fred. 'Actually, I dunno how she got so good, seeing how we never let her play with us.' 'She's been breaking into your broom shed in the garden since the age of six and taking each of your brooms out in turn when you weren't looking,' said Hermione from behind her tottering pile of Ancient Rune books. 'Oh,' said George, looking mildly impressed. 'Well--that'd explain it.' 'Has Ron saved a goal yet?' asked Hermione, peering over the top of Magical Hieroglyphs and Logograms. 'Well, he can do it if he doesn't think anyone's watching him,' said Fred, rolling his eyes. 'So all we have to do is ask the crowd to turn their backs and talk among themselves every time the Quaffle goes up his end on Saturday.' He got up again and moved restlessly to the window, staring out across the dark grounds. 'You know, Quidditch was about the only thing in this place worth staying for.' Hermione cast him a stern look. 'You've got exams coming!' 'Told you already, we're not fussed about NEWTs,' said Fred. 'The Snackboxes are ready to roll, we found out how to get rid of those boils, just a couple of drops of Murtlap essence sorts them, Lee put us on to it.' George yawned widely and looked out disconsolately at the cloudy night sky. 'I dunno if I even want to watch this match. If Zacharias Smith beats us I might have to kill myself.' 'Kill him, more like,' said Fred firmly. 'That's the trouble with Quidditch,' said Hermione absent-mindedly, once again bent over her Runes translation, 'it creates all this bad feeling and tension between the houses.' She looked up to find her copy of Spellman's Syllabary, and caught Fred, George and Harry all staring at her with expressions of mingled disgust and incredulity on their faces. 'Well, it does!' she said impatiently. 'It's only a game, isn't it?' 'Hermione,' said Harry, shaking his head, 'you're good on feelings and stuff, but you just don't understand about Quidditch.' 'Maybe not,' she said darkly, returning to her translation, 'but at least my happiness doesn't depend on Ron's goalkeeping ability.' And though Harry would rather have jumped off the Astronomy Tower than admit it to her, by the time he had watched the game the following Saturday he would have given any number of Galleons not to care about Quidditch either. The very best thing you could say about the match was that it was short; the Gryffindor spectators had to endure only twenty-two minutes of agony. It was hard to say what the worst thing was: Harry thought it was a close-run contest between Ron's fourteenth failed save, Sloper missing the Bludger but hitting Angelina in the mouth with his bat, and Kirke shrieking and falling backwards off his broom when Zacharias Smith zoomed at him carrying the Quaffle. The miracle was that Gryffindor only lost by ten points: Ginny managed to snatch the Snitch from right under Hufflepuff Seeker Summerby's nose, so that the final score was two hundred and forty versus two hundred and thirty. 'Good catch,' Harry told Ginny back in the common room, where the atmosphere resembled that of a particularly dismal funeral. 'I was lucky,' she shrugged. 'It wasn't a very fast Snitch and Summerby's got a cold, he sneezed and closed his eyes at exactly the wrong moment. Anyway, once you're back on the team--' 'Ginny, I've got a lifelong ban.' 'You're banned as long as Umbridge is in the school,' Ginny corrected him. 'There's a difference. Anyway, once you're back, I think I'll, try out for Chaser. Angelina and Alicia are both leaving next year and I prefer goal-scoring to Seeking anyway' Harry looked over at Ron, who was hunched in a corner, staring at his knees, a bottle of Butlerbeer clutched in his hand. 'Angelina still won't let him resign,' Ginny said, as though reading Harry's mind. 'She says she knows he's got it in him.' Harry liked Angelina for the faith she was showing in Ron, but at the same time thought it would really be kinder to let him leave the team. Ron had left the pitch to another booming chorus of 'Weasley is our King' sung with great gusto by the Slytherins, who were now favourites to win the Quidditch Cup. Fred and George wandered over. 'I haven't even got the heart to take the mickey out of him,' said Fred, looking over at Ron's crumpled figure. 'Mind you ... when he missed the fourteenth--' He made wild motions with his arms as though doing an upright doggy-paddle. '--well, I'll save it for parties, eh?' Ron dragged himself up to bed shortly after this. Out of respect for his feelings, Harry waited a while before going up to the dormitory himself, so that Ron could pretend to be asleep if he wanted to. Sure enough, when Harry finally entered the room Ron was snoring a little too loudly to be entirely plausible. Harry got into bed, thinking about the match. It had been immensely frustrating watching from the sidelines. He was quite impressed by Ginny's performance but he knew if he had been playing he could have caught the Snitch sooner ... there had been a moment when it had been fluttering near Kirke's ankle; if Ginny hadn't hesitated, she might have been able to scrape a win for Gryffindor. Umbridge had been sitting a few rows below Harry and Hermione. Once or twice she had turned squatly in her seat to look at him, her wide toad's mouth stretched in what he thought had been a gloating smile. The memory of it made him feel hot with anger as he lay there in the dark. After a few minutes, however, he remembered that he was supposed to be emptying his mind of all emotion before he slept, as Snape kept instructing him at the end of every Occlumency lesson. He tried for a moment or two, but the thought of Snape on top of memories of Umbridge merely increased his sense of grumbling resentment and he found himself focusing instead on how much he loathed the pair of them. Slowly, Ron's snores died away to be replaced by the sound of deep, slow breathing. It took Harry much longer to get to sleep; his body was tired, but it took his brain a long time to close down. He dreamed that Neville and Professor Sprout were waltzing around the Room of Requirement while Professor McGonagall played the bagpipes. He watched them happily for a while, then decided to go and find the other members of the DA. But when he left the room he found himself facing, not the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy, but a torch burning in its bracket on a stone wall. He turned his head slowly to the left. There, at the far end of the windowless passage, was a plain, black door. He walked towards it with a sense of mounting excitement. He had the strangest feeling that this time he was going to get lucky at last, and find the way to open it ... he was feet from it, and saw with a leap of excitement that there was a glowing strip of faint blue light down the right-hand side ... the door was ajar ... he stretched out his hand to push it wide and-- Ron gave a loud, rasping, genuine snore and Harry awoke abruptly with his right hand stretched in front of him in the darkness, to open a door that was hundreds of miles away. He let it fall with a feeling of mingled disappointment and guilt. He knew he should not have seen the door, but at the same time felt so consumed with curiosity about what was behind it that he could not help feeling annoyed with Ron ... if only he could have saved his snore for just another minute. They entered the Great Hall for breakfast at exactly the same moment as the post owls on Monday morning. Hermione was not the only person eagerly awaiting her Daily Prophet: nearly everyone was eager for more news about the escaped Death Eaters, who, despite many reported sightings, had still not been caught. She gave the delivery owl a Knut and unfolded the newspaper eagerly while Harry helped himself to orange juice; as he had only received one note during the entire year, he was sure, when the first owl landed with a thud in front of him, that it had made a mistake. 'Who're you after?' he asked it, languidly removing his orange juice from underneath its beak and leaning forwards to see the recipient's name and address: Harry Potter Great Hall Hogwarts School Frowning, he made to take the letter from the owl, but before he could do so, three, four, five more owls had fluttered down beside it and were jockeying for position, treading in the butter and knocking over the salt as each one attempted to give him their letter first. 'What's going on?' Ron asked in amazement, as the whole of Gryffindor table leaned forwards to watch and another seven owls landed amongst the first ones, screeching, hooting and flapping their wings. 'Harry!' said Hermione breathlessly, plunging her hands into the feathery mass and pulling out a screech owl bearing a long, cylindrical package. 'I think I know what this means--open this one first!' Harry ripped off the brown packaging. Out rolled a tightly furled copy of the March edition of The Quibbler.He unrolled it to see his own face grinning sheepishly at him from the front cover. In large red letters across this picture were the words: HARRY POTTER SPEAKS OUT AT LAST: THE TRUTH ABOUT HE WHO MUST NOT BE NAMED AND THE NIGHT I SAW HIM RETURN 'It's good, isn't it?' said Luna, who had drifted over to the Gryffindor table and now squeezed herself on to the bench between Fred and Ron. 'It came out yesterday, I asked Dad to send you a free copy. I expect all these,' she waved a hand at the assembled owls still scrabbling around on the table in front of Harry, 'are letters from readers.' 'That's what I thought,' said Hermione eagerly. 'Harry, d'you mind if we--?' 'Help yourself,' said Harry, feeling slightly bemused. Ron and Hermione both started ripping open envelopes. 'This one's from a bloke who thinks you're off your rocker,' said Ron, glancing down his letter. 'Ah well ...' 'This woman recommends you try a good course of Shock Spells at St. Mungo's,' said Hermione, looking disappointed and crumpling up a second. 'This one looks OK, though,' said Harry slowly scanning a long letter from a witch in Paisley. 'Hey she says she believes me!' 'This one's in two minds,' said Fred, who had joined in the letter-opening with enthusiasm. 'Says you don't come across as a mad person, but he really doesn't want to believe You-Know-Who's back so he doesn't know what to think now. Blimey, what a waste of parchment.' 'Here's another one you've convinced, Harry!' said Hermione excitedly. 'Having read your side of the story, I am forced to the conclusion that the Daily Prophet has treated you very unfairly ... little though I want to think that He Who Must Not Be Named has returned, I am forced to accept that you are telling the truth ...Oh, this is wonderful!' 'Another one who thinks you're barking,' said Ron, throwing a crumpled letter over his shoulder '... but this one says you've got her converted and she now thinks you're a real hero--she's put in a photograph, too--wow!' 'What is going on here?' said a falsely sweet, girlish voice. Harry looked up with his hands full of envelopes. Professor Umbridge was standing behind Fred and Luna, her bulging toad's eyes scanning the mess of owls and letters on the table in front of Harry. Behind her he saw many of the students watching them avidly. 'Why have you got all these letters, Mr. Potter?' she asked slowly. 'Is that a crime now?' said Fred loudly. 'Getting mail?' 'Be careful, Mr Weasley or I shall have to put you in detention,' said Umbridge. 'Well, Mr Potter?' Harry hesitated, but he did not see how he could keep what he had done quiet; it was surely only a matter of time before a copy of The Quibbler came to Umbridge's attention. 'People have written to me because I gave an interview,' said Harry. 'About what happened to me last June.' For some reason he glanced up at the staff table as he said this. Harry had the strangest feeling that Dumbledore had been watching him a second before, but when he looked towards the Headmaster he seemed to be absorbed in conversation with Professor Flitwick. 'An interview?' repeated Umbridge, her voice thinner and higher than ever. 'What do you mean?' 'I mean a reporter asked me questions and I answered them,' said Harry. 'Here--' And he threw the copy of The Quibbler to her. She caught it and stared down at the cover. Her pale, doughy face turned an ugly, patchy violet. 'When did you do this?' she asked, her voice trembling slightly. 'Last Hogsmeade weekend,' said Harry. She looked up at him, incandescent with rage, the magazine shaking in her stubby fingers. 'There will be no more Hogsmeade trips for you, Mr. Potter,' she whispered. 'How you dare ... how you could ...' She took a deep breath. 'I have tried again and again to teach you not to tell lies. The message, apparently, has still not sunk in. Fifty points from Gryffindor and another week's worth of detentions.' She stalked away, clutching The Quibbler to her chest, the eyes of many students following her. By mid-morning enormous signs had been put up all over the school, not just on house noticeboards, but in the corridors and classrooms too. BY ORDER OF THE HIGH INQUISITOR OF HOGWARTS Any student found in possession of the magazine The Quibblerwill be expelled. The above is in accordance with Educational Decree Number Twenty-seven. Signed: Dolores Jane Umbridge, High Inquisitor For some reason, every time Hermione caught sight of one of these signs she beamed with pleasure. 'What exactly are you so happy about?' Harry asked her. 'Oh, Harry, don't you see?' Hermione breathed. 'If she could have done one thing to make absolutely sure that every single person in this school will read your interview, it was banning it!' And it seemed that Hermione was quite right. By the end of the day, though Harry had not seen so much as a corner of The Quibbler anywhere in the school, the whole place seemed to be quoting the interview to each other. Harry heard them whispering about it as they queued up outside classes, discussing it over lunch and in the back of lessons, while Hermione even reported that every occupant of the cubicles in the girls' toilets had been talking about it when she nipped in there before Ancient Runes. 'Then they spotted me, and obviously they know I know you, so they bombarded me with questions,' Hermione told Harry, her eyes shining, 'and Harry, I think they believe you, I really do. I think you've finally got them convinced!' Meanwhile, Professor Umbridge was stalking the school, stopping students at random and demanding that they turn out their books and pockets: Harry knew she was looking for copies of The Quibbler, but the students were several steps ahead of her. The pages carrying Harry's interview had been bewitched to resemble extracts from textbooks if anyone but themselves read it, or else wiped magically blank until they wanted to peruse it again. Soon it seemed that every single person in the school had read it. The teachers were of course forbidden from mentioning the interview by Educational Decree Number Twenty-six, but they found ways to express their feelings about it all the same. Professor Sprout awarded Gryffindor twenty points when Harry passed her a watering can; a beaming Professor Flitwick pressed a box of squeaking sugar mice on him at the end of Charms, said, 'Shh!' and hurried away; and Professor Trelawney broke into hysterical sobs during Divination and announced to the startled class, and a very disapproving Umbridge, that Harry was not going to suffer an early death after all, but would live to a ripe old age, become Minister for Magic and have twelve children. But what made Harry happiest was Cho catching up with him as he was hurrying along to Transfiguration the next day. Before he knew what had happened, her hand was in his and she was breathing in his ear, 'I'm really, really sorry. That interview was so brave ... it made me cry.' He was sorry to hear she had shed even more tears over it, but very glad they were on speaking terms again, and even more pleased when she gave him a swift kiss on the cheek and hurried off again. And unbelievably, no sooner had he arrived outside Transfiguration than something just as good happened: Seamus stepped out of the queue to face him. 'I just wanted to say,' he mumbled, squinting at Harry's left knee, 'I believe you. And I've sent a copy of that magazine to me mam.' If anything more was needed to complete Harry's happiness, it was the reaction he got from Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle. He saw them with their heads together later that afternoon in the library; they were with a weedy-looking boy Hermione whispered was called Theodore Nott. They looked round at Harry as he browsed the shelves for the book he needed on Partial Vanishment. Goyle cracked his knuckles threateningly and Malfoy whispered something undoubtedly malevolent to Crabbe. Harry knew perfectly well why they were acting like this: he had named all of their fathers as Death Eaters. 'And the best bit,' whispered Hermione gleefully, as they left the library, 'is they can't contradict you, because they can't admit they've read the article!' To cap it all, Luna told him over dinner that no issue of The Quibbler had ever sold out faster. 'Dad's reprinting!' she told Harry, her eyes popping excitedly. 'He can't believe it, he says people seem even more interested in this than the Crumple-Horned Snorkacks!' Harry was a hero in the Gryffindor common room that night. Daringly, Fred and George had put an Enlargement Charm on the front cover of The Quibbler and hung it on the wall, so that Harry's giant head gazed down upon the proceedings, occasionally saying things like 'THE MINISTRY ARE MORONS' and 'EAT DUNG, UMBRIDGE' in a booming voice. Hermione did not find this very amusing; she said it interfered with her concentration, and she ended up going to bed early out of irritation. Harry had to admit that the poster was not quite as funny after an hour or two, especially when the talking spell had started to wear off, so that it merely shouted disconnected words like 'DUNG' and 'UMBRIDGE' at more and more frequent intervals in a progressively higher voice. In fact, it started to make his head ache and his scar began prickling uncomfortably again. To disappointed moans from the many people who were sitting around him, asking him to relive his interview for the umpteenth time, he announced that he too needed an early night. The dormitory was empty when he reached it. He rested his forehead for a moment against the cool glass of the window beside his bed; it felt soothing against his scar. Then he undressed and got into bed, wishing his headache would go away. He also felt slightly sick. He rolled over on to his side, closed his eyes, and fell asleep almost at once ... He was standing in a dark, curtained room lit by a single branch of candles. His hands were clenched on the back of a chair in front of him. They were long-fingered and white as though they had not seen sunlight for years and looked like large, pale spiders agairst the dark velvet of the chair. Beyond the chair, in a pool of light cast upon the floor by the candles, knelt a man in black robes. 'I have been badly advised, it seems,' said Harry, in a high, cold voice that pulsed with anger. 'Master, I crave your pardon,' croaked the man kneeling on the floor. The back of his head glimmered in the candlelight. He seemed to be trembling. 'I do not blame you, Rookwood,' said Harry in that cold, cruel voice. He relinquished his grip on the chair and walked around it, closer to the man cowering on the floor, until he stood directly over him in the darkness, looking down from a far greater height than usual. 'You are sure of your facts, Rookwood?' asked Harry. 'Yes, My Lord, yes ... I used to work in the Department aftet--after all ...' 'Avery told me Bode would be able to remove it.' 'Bode could never have taken it, Master ... Bode would have known he could not ... undoubtedly, that is why he fought so hard against Malfoy's Imperius Curse ...' 'Stand up, Rookwood,' whispered Harry. The kneeling man almost fell over in his haste to obey. His face was pockmarked; the scars were thrown into relief by the candlelight. He remained a little stooped when standing, as though halfway through a bow, and he darted terrified looks up at Harry's face. 'You have done well to tell me this,' said Harry. 'Very well ... I have wasted months on fruitless schemes, it seems ... but no matter ... we begin again, from now. You have Lord Voldemort's gratitude, Rookwood ...' 'My Lord ... yes, My Lord,' gasped Rookwood, his voice hoarse with relief. 'I shall need your help. I shall need all the information you can give me.' 'Of course, My Lord, of course ... anything ...' 'Very well ... you may go. Send Avery to me.' Rookwood scurried backwards, bowing, and disappeared through a door. Left alone in the dark room, Harry turned towards the wall. A cracked, age-spotted mirror hung on the wall in the shadows. Harry moved towards it. His reflection grew larger and clearer in the darkness ... a face whiter than a skull ... red eyes with slits for pupils ... 'NOOOOOOOOO!' 'What?' yelled a voice nearby. Harry Hailed around madly, became entangled in the hangings and fell out of his bed. For a few seconds he did not know where he was; he was convinced he was about to see the white, skull-like lace looming at him out of the dark again, then very near to him Ron's voice spoke. 'Will you stop acting like a maniac so I can get you out of here!' Ron wrenched the hangings apart and Harry stared up at him in the moonlight, flat on his back, his scar searing with pain. Ron looked as though he had just been getting ready for bed; one arm was out of his robes. 'Has someone been attacked again?' asked Ron, pulling Harry roughly to his feet. 'Is it Dad? Is it that snake?' 'No--everyone's fine--' gasped Harry, whose forehead felt as though it were on fire. 'Well ... Avery isn't ... he's in trouble ... he gave him the wrong information ... Voldemort's really angry ...' Harry groaned and sank, shaking, on to his bed, rubbing his scar. 'But Rookwood's going to help him now ... he's on the right track again ...' 'What are you talking about?' said Ron, sounding scared. 'D'you mean ... did you just see You-Know-Who?' 'I was You-Know-Who,' said Harry, and he stretched out his hands in the darkness and held them up to his face, to check that they were no longer deathly white and long-fingered. 'He was with Rookwood, he's one of the Death Eaters who escaped from Azkaban, remember? Rookwood's just told him Bode couldn't have done it.' 'Done what?' 'Remove something ... he said Bode would have known he couldn't have done it ... Bode was under the Imperius Curse ... I think he said Malfoy's dad put it on him.' 'Bode was bewitched to remove something?' Ron said. 'But--Harry, that's got to be--' 'The weapon,' Harry finished the sentence for him. 'I know.' The dormitory door opened; Dean and Seamus came in. Harry swung his legs back into bed. He did not want to look as though anything odd had just happened, seeing as Seamus had only just stopped thinking Harry was a nutter. 'Did you say,' murmured Ron, putting his head close to Harry's on the pretence of helping himself to water from the jug on his bedside table, 'that you were You-Know-Who?' 'Yeah,' said Harry quietly. Ron took an unnecessarily large gulp of water; Harry saw it spill over his chin on to his chest. 'Harry,' he said, as Dean and Seamus clattered around noisily, pulling off their robes and talking, 'you've got to tell--' 'I haven't got to tell anyone,' said Harry shortly. 'I wouldn't have seen it at all if I could do Occlumency. I'm supposed to have learned to shut this stuff out. That's what they want.' By 'they' he meant Dumbledore. He got back into bed and rolled over on to his side with his back to Ron and after a while he heard Ron's mattress creak as he, too, lay back down. Harry's scar began to burn; he bit hard on his pillow to stop himself making a noise. Somewhere, he knew, Avery was being punished. Harry and Ron waited until break next morning to tell Hermione exactly what had happened; they wanted to be absolutely sure they could not be overheard. Standing in their usual corner of the cool and breezy courtyard, Harry told her every detail of the dream he could remember. When he had finished, she said nothing at all for a few moments, but stared with a kind of painful intensity at Fred and George, who were both headless and selling their magical hats from under their cloaks on the other side of the yard. 'So that's why they killed him,' she said quietly, withdrawing her gaze from Fred and George at last. 'When Bode tried to steal this weapon, something funny happened to him. I think there must be defensive spells on it, or around it, to stop people touching it. That's why he was in St. Mungos, his brain had gone all funny and he couldn't talk. But remember what the Healer told us? He was recovering. And they couldn't risk him getting better, could they? I mean, the shock of whatever happened when he touched that weapon probably made the Imperius Curse lift. Once he'd got his voice back, he'd explain what he'd been doing, wouldn't he? They would have known he'd been sent to steal the weapon. Of course, it would have been easy for Lucius Malfoy to put the curse on him. Never out of the Ministry, is he?' 'He was even hanging around that day I had my hearing,' said Harry. 'In the--hang on ...' he said slowly. 'He was in the Department of Mysteries corridor that day! Your dad said he was probably trying to sneak down and find out what happened in my hearing, but what if--' 'Sturgis!' gasped Hermione, looking thunderstruck. 'Sorry?' said Ron, looking bewildered. 'Sturgis Podmore --' said Hermione breathlessly, 'arrested for trying to get through a door! Lucius Malfoy must have got him too! I bet he did it the day you saw him there, Harry. Sturgis had Moody's Invisibility Cloak, right? So, what if he was standing guard by the door, invisible, and Malfoy heard him move--or guessed someone was there--or just did the Imperius Curse on the off-chance there'd be a guard there? So, when Sturgis next had an opportunity--probably when it was his turn on guard duty again--he tried to get into the Department to steal the weapon for Voldemort--Ron, be quiet--but he got caught and sent to Azkaban ...' She gazed at Harry. 'And now Rookwood's told Voldemort how to get the weapon?' 'I didn't hear all the conversation, but that's what it sounded like,' said Harry. 'Rookwood used to work there ... maybe Voldemort'll send Rookwood to do it?' Hermione nodded, apparently still lost in thought. Then, quite abruptly, she said, 'But you shouldn't have seen this at all, Harry.' 'What?' he said, taken aback. 'You're supposed to be learning how to close your mind to this sort of thing,' said Hermione, suddenly stern. 'I know I am,' said Harry. 'But--' 'Well, I think we should just try and forget what you saw,' said Hermione firmly. 'And you ought to put in a bit more effort on your Occlumency from now on.' Harry was so angry with her he did not talk to her for the rest of the day, which proved to be another bad one. When people were not discussing the escaped Death Eaters in the corridors, they were laughing at Gryffindor's abysmal performance in their match against Hufflepuff; the Slytherins were singing Weasley is our King' so loudly and frequently that by sundown Filch had banned it from the corridors out of sheer irritation. The week did not improve as it progressed. Harry received two more 'Ds in Potions; he was still on tenterhooks that Hagrid might get the sack; and he couldn't stop himself dwelling on the dream in which he had been Voldemort--though he didn't bring it up with Ron and Hermione again; he didn't want another telling-off from Hermione. He wished very much that he could have talked to Sirius about it, but that was out of the question, so he tried to push the matter to the back of his mind. Unfortunately, the back of his mind was no longer the secure place it had once been. 'Get up, Potter.' A couple of weeks after his dream of Rookwood, Harry was to be found, yet again, kneeling on the floor of Snape's office, trying to clear his head. He had just been forced, yet again, to relive a stream of very early memories he had not even realised he still had, most of them concerning humiliations Dudley and his gang had inflicted upon him in primary school. 'That last memory,' said Snape. 'What was it?' 'I don't know,' said Harry, getting wearily to his feet. He was finding it increasingly difficult to disentangle separate memories from the rush of images and sound that Snape kept calling forth. 'You mean the one where my cousin tried to make me stand in the toilet?' 'No,' said Snape softly. 'I mean the one with a man kneeling in the middle of a darkened room ...' 'It's ... nothing,' said Harry. Snape's dark eyes bored into Harry's. Remembering what Snape had said about eye contact being crucial to Legilimency, Harry blinked and looked away. 'How do that man and that room come to be inside your head, Potter?' said Snape. 'It--' said Harry, looking everywhere but at Snape, 'it was--just a dream I had.' 'A dream?' repeated Snape. There was a pause during which Harry stared fixedly at a large dead frog suspended in a jar of purple liquid. 'You do know why we are here, don't you, Potter?' said Snape, in a low, dangerous voice. 'You do know why I am giving up my evenings to this tedious job?' 'Yes,' said Harry stiffly. 'Remind me why we are here, Potter.' 'So I can learn Occlumency, said Harry, now glaring at a dead eel. 'Correct, Potter. And dim though you may be--' Harry looked back at Snape, hating him '--I would have thought that after over two months of lessons you might have made some progress. How many other dreams about the Dark Lord have you had?' 'Just that one,' lied Harry. 'Perhaps,' said Snape, his dark, cold eyes narrowing slightly, 'perhaps you actually enjoy having these visions and dreams, Potter. Maybe they make you feel special-- important?' 'No, they don't,' said Harry, his jaw set and his fingers clenched tightly around the handle of his wand. That is just as well, Potter,' said Snape coldly, 'because you are neither special nor important, and it is not up to you to find out what the Dark Lord is saying to his Death Eaters.' 'No--that's your job, isn't it?' Harry shot at him. He had not meant to say it; it had burst out of him in temper. For a long moment they stared at each other, Harry convinced he had gone too far. But there was a curious, almost satisfied expression on Snape's face when he answered. 'Yes, Potter,' he said, his eyes glinting. 'That is my job. Now, if you are ready, we will start again.' He raised his wand: 'One--two--three--Legilimens!' A hundred dementors were swooping towards Harry across the lake in the grounds ... he screwed up his face in concentration ... they were coming closer ... he could see the dark holes beneath their hoods ... yet he could also see Snape standing in front of him, his eyes fixed on Harry's face, muttering under his breath ... and somehow, Snape was growing clearer, and the dementors were growing fainter ... Harry raised his own wand. 'Protego!' Snape staggered-- his wand flew upwards, away from Harry--and suddenly Harry's mind was teeming with memories that were not his: a hook-nosed man was shouting at a cowering woman, while a small dark-haired boy cried in a corner ... a greasy-haired teenager sat alone in a dark bedroom, pointing his wand at the ceiling, shooting down flies ... a girl was laughing as a scrawny boy tried to mount a bucking broomstick-- 'ENOUGH!' Harry felt as though he had been pushed hard in the chest; he staggered several steps backwards, hit some of the shelves covering Snape's walls and heard something crack. Snape was shaking slightly, and was very white in the face. The back of Harry's robes was damp. One of the jars behind him had broken when he fell against it; the pickled slimy thing within was swirling in its draining potion. 'Reparo,' hissed Snape, and the jar sealed itself at once. 'Well, Potter ... that was certainly an improvement ...' Panting slightly, Snape straightened the Pensieve in which he had again stored some of his thoughts before starting the lesson, almost as though he was checking they were still there. 'I don't remember telling you to use a Shield Charm ... but there is no doubt that it was effective ...' Harry did not speak; he felt that to say anything might be dangerous. He was sure he had just broken into Snape's memories, that he had just seen scenes from Snape's childhood. It was unnerving to think that the little boy who had been crying as he watched his parents shouting was actually standing in front of him with such loathing in his eyes. 'Let's try again, shall we?' said Snape. Harry felt a thrill of dread; he was about to pay for what had just happened, he was sure of it. They moved back into position with the desk between them, Harry feeling he was going to find it much harder to empty his mind this time. 'On the count of three, then,' said Snape, raising his wand once more. 'One--two--' Harry did not have time to gather himself together and attempt to clear his mind before Snape cried, 'Legilimens!' He was hurtling along the corridor towards the Department of Masteries, past the blank stone walls, past the torches--the plain black door was growing ever larger; he was moving so fast he was going to collide with it, he was feet from it and again he could see that chink of faint blue light-- The door had flown open! He was through it at last, inside a black-walled, black-floored circular room lit with blue-flamed candles, and there were more doors all around him--he needed to go on--but which door ought he to take--? 'P OTTER!' Harry opened his eyes. He was flat on his back again with no memory of having got there; he was also panting as though his really had run the length of the Department of Mysteries corridor, really had sprinted through the black door and found the circular room. 'Explain yourself!' said Snape, who was standing over him, looking furious. 'I ... dunno what happened,' said Harry truthfully, standing up. There was a lump on the back of his head from where he had hit the ground and he felt feverish. 'I've never seen that before. I mean, I told you, I've dreamed about the door ... but it's never opened before ...' 'You are not working hard enough!' For some reason, Snape seemed even angrier than he had done two minutes before, when Harry had seen into his teacher's memories. 'You are lazy and sloppy, Potter, it is small wonder that the Dark Lord--' 'Can you tell me something, sir?' said Harry, firing up again. 'Why do you call Voldemort the Dark Lord? I've only ever heard Death Eaters call him that.' Snape opened his mouth in a snarl--and a woman screamed from somewhere outside the room. Snape's head jerked upwards; he was gazing at the ceiling. 'What the--?' he muttered. Harry could hear a muffled commotion coming from what he thought might be the Entrance Hall. Snape looked round at him, frowning. 'Did you see anything unusual on your way down here, Potter?' Harry shook his head. Somewhere above them, the woman screamed again. Snape strode to his office door, his wand still held at the ready, and swept out of sight. Harry hesitated for a moment, then followed. The screams were indeed coming from the Entrance Hall; they grew louder as Harry ran towards the stone steps leading up from the dungeons. When he reached the top he found the Entrance Hall packed; students had come flooding out of the Great Hall, where dinner was still in progress, to see what was going on; others had crammed themselves on to the marble staircase. Harry pushed forwards through a knot of tall Slytherins and saw that the onlookers had formed a great ring, some of them looking shocked, others even frightened. Professor McGonagall was directly opposite Harry en the other side of the Hall; she looked as though what she was watching made her feel faintly sick. Professor Trelawney was standing in the middle of the Entrance Hall with her wand in one hand and an empty sherry bottle in the other, looking utterly mad. Her hair was sticking up on end, her glasses were lopsided so that one eye was magnified more than the other; her innumerable shawls and scarves were trailing haphazardly from her shoulders, giving the impression that she was falling apart at the seams. Two large trunks lay on the floor beside her, one of them upside-down; it looked very much as though it had been thrown down the stairs after her. Professor Trelawney was staring, apparently terrified, at something Harry could not see but which seemed to be standing at the foot of the stairs. 'No!' she shrieked. 'NO! This cannot be happening ... it cannot ... I retuse to accept it!' 'You didn't realise this was coming?' said a high girlish voice, sounding callously amused, and Harry, moving slightly to his right, saw that Trelawney's terrifying vision was nothing other than Professor Umbridge. 'Incapable though you are of predicting even tomorrows weather, you must surely have realised that your pitiful performance during my inspections, and lack of any improvement, would make it inevitable that you would be sacked?' 'You c--can't!' howled Professor Trelawney, tears streaming down her face from behind her enormous lenses, 'you c--can't sack me! I've b--been here sixteen years! H-- Hogwarts is m--my h--home!' 'It was your home,' said Professor Umbridge, and Harry was revolted to see the enjoyment stretching her toadlike face as she watched Professor Trelawney sink, sobbing uncontrollably, on to one of her trunks, 'until an hour ago, when the Minister for Magic countersigned your Order of Dismissal. Now kindly remove yourself from this Hall. You are embarrassing us.' But she stood and watched, with an expression of gloating enjoyment, as Professor Trelawney shuddered and moaned, rocking backwards and forwards on her trunk in paroxysms of grief. Harry heard a muffled sob to his left and looked around. Lavender and Parvati were both crying quietly, their arms round each other. Then he heard footsteps. Professor McGonagall had broken away from the spectators, marched straight up to Professor Trelawney and was patting her firmly on the back while withdrawing a large handkerchief from within her robes. 'There, there, Sybill ... calm down ... blow your nose on this ... it's not as bad as you think, now ... you are not going to have to leave Hogwarts ...' 'Oh really, Professor McGonagall?' said Umbridge in a deadly voice, taking a few steps forward. 'And your authority for that statement is ... ?' 'That would be mine,' said a deep voice. The oaken front doors had swung open. Students beside them scuttled out of the way as Dumbledore appeared in the entrance. What he had been doing out in the grounds Harry could not imagine, but there was something impressive about the sight of him framed in the doorway against an oddly misty night. Leaving the doors wide open behind him he strode forwards through the circle of onlookers towards Professor Trelawney, tear-stained and trembling, on her trunk, Professor McGonagall alongside her. 'Yours, Professor Dumbledore?' said Umbridge, with a singularly unpleasant little laugh. 'I'm afraid you do not understand the position. I have here--' she pulled a parchment scroll from within her robes '--an Order of Dismissal signed by myself and the Minister for Magic. Under the terms of Educational Decree Number Twenty-three, the High Inquisitor of Hogwarts has the power to inspect, place upon probation and sack any teacher she--that is to say, I--feel is not performing to the standards required by the Ministry of Magic. I have decided that Professor Trelawney is not up to scratch. I have dismissed her.' To Harry's very great surprise, Dumbledore continued to smile. He looked down at Professor Trelawney, who was still sobbing and choking on her trunk, and said, 'You are quite right, of course, Professor Umbridge. As High Inquisitor you have every right to dismiss my teachers. You do not, however, have the authority to send them away from the castle. I am afraid,' he went on, with a courteous little bow, 'that the power to do that still resides with the Headmaster, and it is my wish that Professor Trelawney continue to live at Hogwarts.' At this, Professor Trelawney gave a wild little laugh in which a hiccough was barely hidden. 'No--no, I'll g --go, Dumbledore! I sh--shall--leave Hogwarts and s--seek my fortune elsewhere--' 'No,' said Dumbledore sharply. 'It is my wish that you remain, Sybill.' He turned to Professor McGonagall. 'Might I ask you to escort Sybill back upstairs, Professor McGonagall?' 'Of course,' said McGonagall. 'Up you get, Sybill ...' Professor Sprout came hurrying forwards out of the crowd and grabbed Professor Trelawney's other arm. Together, they guided her past Umbridge and up the marble stairs. Professor Flitwick went scurrying after them, his wand held out before him; he squeaked 'Locomotor trunks!' and Professor Trelawney's luggage rose into the air and proceeded up the staircase after her, Professor Flitwick bringing up the rear. Professor Umbridge was standing stock still, staring at Dumbledore, who continued to smile benignly. 'And what,' she said, in a whisper that carried all around the Eintrance Hall, 'are you going to do with her once I appoint a new Divination teacher who needs her lodgings?' 'Oh, that won't be a problem,' said Dumbledore pleasantly. 'You see, I have already found us a new Divination teacher, and he will prefer lodgings on the ground floor.' 'You've found-- ?' said Umbridge shrilly. 'You've found? Might I remind you, Dumbledore, that under Educational Decree Number Twenty-two--' 'The Ministry has the right to appoint a suitable candidate if--and only if--the Headmaster is unable to find one,' said Dumbledore. 'And I am happy to say that on this occasion I have succeeded. May I introduce you?' He turned to face the open front doors, through which night mist was now drifting. Harry heard hooves. There was a shocked murmur around the Hall and those nearest the doors hastily moved even further backwards, some of them tripping over in their haste to clear a path for the newcomer. Through the mist came a face Harry had seen once before on a dark, dangerous night in the Forbidden Forest: white-blond hair and astonishingly blue eyes; the head and torso of a man joined to the palomino body of a horse. 'This is Firenze,' said Dumbledore happily to a thunderstruck Umbridge. 'I think you'll find him suitable.'

#OrderofthePhoenix #HarryPotter

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