The Three Kings: Hunt
Disclaimer (1): Yu-gi-oh! Duel Monsters is owned by Kazuki Takahashi, Studio Gallop, Nihon Ad Systems, and TV Tokyo. Harry Potter is owned by J. K. Rowling, Bloomsbury Publishing, Arthur A. Levine Books, and Warner Bros. Please support the official releases.
Disclaimer (2): The Crucible and all it's characters are owned by Arthur Miller. A Song of Ice and Fire is written by George R. R. Martin. The McDonalds Corporation is founded by Richard McDonald, Maurice McDonald, and Ray Kroc. The author, AlcatrazOutpatient, claims no ownership of anything referenced in this chapter.
Warning: Original characters, sexism, ableism, homophobia, classism, loss of agency, and alcohol abuse.
Chapter 9: Looking Glass
Kisha Borrego has been working at Putnam's Clothing Store since graduating from Salem three years ago in hopes of paying off her student loans. William's Abbey isn't exactly the glorious position at the Ministry that she'd imagined when she'd gotten out of school, but it's work and it's money. Kisha may regret her decision to attend a private academy like Salem, but when there comes a day when she can move out of this dump, the name will come in handy.
It's a dull, cloudy Thursday and she's hoping that no one's going to show up so that she can close early. There is no one on the streets since it looks like it's going to rain. Kisha turns the page of her book, A Storm of Swords - which had been banned at Salem because of its muggle origins. She spots movement in the corner of her eye just before the bell above the door rings. Kisha hides her book under the desk and looks up.
They are the oddest group of people she's ever seen. There's five of them. One of the girls is blind and is being helped around by who she assumes in her brother. The other girl reminds Kisha of a friend, all blonde and curvy and beautiful. There's an Asian boy with muggle tattoos on his arms and - whoa.
The final boy is tiny, with white hair and purple eyes that are in direct contrast to his dark skin. There's also a prominent burn that passes directly over his right eye. Kisha can't tell how old he is, though his height makes her guess that he's the youngest in the group.
"Can I help you?" Kisha asks hesitantly. The blonde girl turns to her and gives her a smile that all pearly white teeth.
"Yeah," she even sounds exactly like Kisha's friend, valley girl accent and bikini body and everything. "You know that Job Fair that they're having at the Ministry this week? My friends and I wanna go, but we need some clothes that aren't… you know," the girl looks down at her red muggle t-shirt.
Kisha hasn't heard of the Fair, but then again, she stopped reading The Quill after it's chief political correspondent wrote an entire article on how Reyna Polamo, the new Minister of Magic, couldn't do her job and be a single mother at the same time. But she's not getting paid to give out lectures on her opinions (not that this California girl would probably care), so she says, "Sure. Anything, in particular, you're looking for?"
"I don't know about them, but I've always felt really confident in a red dress. You got anything like that?"
They're not a bad group to work with, but there is something very off about them. It might be the blind girl, whose disability is such a rarity to see out in public, as most wizarding families just hide those kinds of kids away in their homes. It's not the brother, who looks like he could play Quodpot professionally, but gets really confused when she brings up the topic in hopes of inspiring some small talk. Not to mention that the kid with the tats looks like he's keeping watch.
Surprisingly enough, it's the white-haired guy with the creepy scar that gets Kisha to relax and think that she's not about to get robbed. He catches her staring at him while she's pinning Valley Girl's dress and laughs, "I got caught in a transfiguration accident."
"Sorry. I didn't mean to- "
"It's fine. I get it a lot. I wouldn't be pissed, but I lost, like, a half foot in the process. Do you know how annoying it is to be in your twenties and constantly being denied service at bars?"
"That's not the worse of it either," says California Girl. "We stopped at McDonald's on the way here and they asked him if he wanted a toy with his Happy Meal."
"Thanks for reminding me," and he calls the girl by a name that she doesn't quite catch. She blames it on his accent. Kisha wonders where he's from.
"Glad to help, your majesty," the girl shouts back.
Things calm down after that. The five of them get a single outfit each and Kisha finds that a bit odd. Are they expecting to wear those clothes every day if they get jobs at the Ministry? For a second she thinks it's a money thing, but Scar Face handles the bill so that can't be it. Tattoo Guy raises an eyebrow when he spies what she's been reading and asks how far she's gotten, mentioning that he's just started A Feast for Crows. He's also really shocked to see that she even has the books. Kisha snorts and says, "Just because muggle books are banned at school doesn't mean they don't still make their way in."
She finds it odd that everyone in the room jerks suddenly when she says the word 'muggle.' Tattoo Guy recovers first and hesitantly asks, "Your school had an illegal book trade?"
"Your's didn't?"
"Ah, well, um… " he laughs nervously. "I'm a Squib."
"Oh." Damn, he is so not getting a job at the Ministry then. Which is a shame; Kisha kind of likes him, enough that she scribbles her floo address on the back of the receipt and hands it to him.
"Thanks for all of this," Scar Face says right before they leave and Kisha honestly wishes them luck even enough it's pretty unlikely that things are going to go well for any of them. She glances at them as the door swings shut, trying to think of precisely what it could have been that had bothered her about them.
When she gets home that night, her roommate tells her that the Ministry's Job Fair isn't for another three months. And Kisha Borrego remembers that she hadn't seen a single wand on any of them.
Tituba's isn't the nicest place in the world, but in the humble opinion of Royce Land, they have the best jerk pork in the country. Which is precisely why he's decided to take his boyfriend here for lunch.
"It's fine, Shawn. No one is gonna recognize you," he says.
"That's not what I'm worried about," Shawn tells him and that's a big, fat lie if Royce has ever heard it. He knows that if they're caught together, Shawn's family is going to disown him. Royce is a muggleborn and very, very male. And the Pendergrass's are up there with the Hawkins's when it comes to American wizarding royalty.
"Then what?"
"Come on, man. You know what they say about William's Abbey. You look like you're carrying around a few galleons here and you'll get mugged faster than you can say Quodpot."
"Please, it's not that bad. Besides, there's only been three deaths here in the last week, so - whoa! Hold your hippogriffs, Shawn," Royce laughs. "I was only joking."
"That's not funny!" Shawn hisses.
"Relax! Look, the people here at this time of day are pretty harmless," he jabs his thumb in the direction of the window behind him, beyond which are five kids dicking around with their wands like it's the first time they've ever used them. "Besides, if something did happen, do you seriously think that I'd just leave you behind?"
"No," Shawn smiles softly and, in a rare gesture of public intimacy, reaches across the table to take his hand. "I don't think that."
"Yes, so- " Royce stammers and grins, looking down at their entangled fingers with a fond longing. They can't hold hands for long. They found that out at school when one of their teachers caught them kissing in an alcove and would have destroyed them had Shawn not wiped the man's memory.
They have to be careful. They cannot be seen. Those are the rules.
They move apart just before the waiter, a muscular blond teenager, comes to their table. They order their food and Shawn swears that he'll try some of Royce's jerk pork even though he hates anything even remotely flavourful. They laugh over some joke before Shawn looks through the window behind him and frowns.
"What in Merlin's name are they doing?"
Royce turns in his seat and stares at the group of kids from before. They're making random sparks with their wands and every so often, there is a loud cracking sound. Then the white-haired says something that Royce can't hear and levitates some of the pebbles on the road. The others try to copy him.
He's teaching them, Royce thinks. And then, Wasn't there five of them earlier? One's missing.
"Excuse me. Are you ready to order?" Royce looks up suddenly to see a very different young man in a waiter's uniform pull out a quill and piece of parchment, standing in front of their table.
"Someone's already come around," Shawn says.
The man frowns, "I'm the only server on shift."
"Then who…?" Royce is taken aback, his hands going to his pockets in search of his wallet. It's there, though several Knuts seem to have disappeared (seriously, who steals Knuts?). And then he makes a discovery that nearly gives him a heart attack.
"My wand is gone."
And in the panic that follows, no one brings up the missing waiter or the group of kids outside that have mysteriously disappeared.
Gerry Maler, like most working-class Americans, hates his job. Yeah sure, it puts food on the table, and maybe it's helped him get laid all of once, but it feels like it's sucking the life out of him. Day in and day out, he sits in his chair and waits for people to queue up to be let into the Ministry.
Gerry's a security guard - a glorified wand checker (and yes, he's heard all of the jokes before). And he hates his job.
He's been sitting here for an hour, having taken over for Tony after lunch, but it already feels like an eternity has passed. Gerry doesn't look at the clock much anymore because time just seems to move slower when he does. The last person that he let through was some lady in her fifties who bitched about the long lines and his complete lack of quality customer service. Gerry's almost tempted to deny her access to the building, but she works for the Department of Magical Transportation and that shit can get him fired. He sighs and shouts out, "Next!"
A group of kids comes up to his station, but he only really focuses on the hot blonde chick with the hourglass figure all wrapped up in a tight red dress. He leans back in his chair and remembers how Nicole from International Co-operation once offered to blow him if he'd let her jump the line on her way to work.
"Names and registration," he smirks at her. She glares back, fishing in her purse for her wand. One of the guys in the group, a short-as-fuck black kid with a scar across his face, scowls and slams his wand on the table.
"Morgon Sammons," he says. Gerry looks up the name in the logbook and matches it up with the nine-inch cedar wand the kid has presented. His friends, Ellen Messer, Royce Land, and Delphia "Hot Ass" Caro, do the same before he turns to the tattooed Asian kid.
"Wand?"
"Don't have one."
"What? You lose it or something?" Gerry rolls his eyes.
"I'm a Squib."
Gerry smirks, "What the hell do you think you're doing here then?"
"Job interview," the guy answers.
"Funny. Pull the other one."
"I told you. I'm looking for a job."
He snorts, "Well, I'm gonna do you a favour and turn you back. We don't take your kind here. Go home and play muggle like a good boy, okay?"
"What? No!" The one he remembers as Royce Land shouts. The five of them exchange glances before the beautifully curvy Delphia nods and Gerry wonders if that means he's going to have her legs around his waist before the end of the shift.
But instead, the blind girl, Ellen Messer, approaches him and it's not that Gerry'd say no to this one either, but she rates a solid five on his scale and he likes to stick to the category of 'Above Average.'
Messer grabs his hand before he can move it away, "Hey, what the hell, lady?"
"~Stop~," she says in a voice that sounds like wine, spiced and aged to perfection. Gerry could listen to her for the rest of his life and have no regrets.
Messer continues on, speaking in that voice that he's come to love, "~You're going to let us pass through.~"
"I'm going to let you pass through," he repeats, smiling at her the whole time. She sounds like music. She asks him to quickly finish the paperwork needed to make that happen and he does, because she wants him to. When she hums in approval, Gerry feels his heart hammer in his chest.
"~Have a pleasant day,~" she wishes him and turns to leave with her friends. He stares longingly at her retreating form until it disappears into the crowd of people in the main lobby, and catches Morgan Sammons order of "Code names from here on out." He calls up the next person in line and grins happily when he greets them.
Gerry Maler loves his job.
Cyril Weller is at the front desk when they walk into the Archives.
"Excuse me, you're not allowed to be here- " he's cut off when the tattooed teenager raises a muggle gun and points it at his head.
"Hands where I can see 'em," the kid growls and he does exactly as he's told. The blond boy next to him moves forwards and pats him down.
"No wand."
"He wouldn't dare. Not with all the magic in here," says one of the girls. She has long auburn hair and is slumped against the wall. Cyril thinks she might have a headache. The black boy with white hair slips her arm over his shoulder and helps her up.
"Just a little longer, Seer," he tells him.
"Liar," she chuckles humourlessly.
He shrugs and looks directly at Cyril, touching his free hand to his stomach. Then he turns to the final girl, a beautiful young woman in a red dress, "Priestess, I know his name tag says Cyril Weller, but his real name is Seedling 115-36M."
"What the hell kinda name is that?" Priestess frowns as she pulls a length of rope out of her purse.
"Make a sound and you're dead," the tattooed boy threatens as Cyril feels the blond boy jab a knife into his back.
"It'll have to be the quick version," Priestess advances on him and wraps the rope around his wrist.
Who are these people? He wonders, What do they want? My name is Cyril. Cyril Weller. I was born in Mossel Bay. My father worked for the government. Why do you say that my name is a series of numbers?
"~With the thread of the crimes of your own design, I bind your soul as Isis, Clever of Tongue, bound Ra. I bind you from behind. I bind you from Before. I bind you from the left, the right, by day and by night. I bind you from below. I bind you from above. I bind you with your own soul within. And so let this magic unfold and spin.~"
She holds the two ends of the rope and ties a knot, "I know your name, Seedling 115-36M. I own your soul. And you will do exactly as I say."
"Or what?" He sneers as he thinks, She's a mage. They're all mages. And they're in our Archives.
"There is no 'or what.' Seedling 115-36M, you can't alert anyone to our presence, in any way, shape, or form," Priestess smiles.
"Holy shit. Snake - hell, everyone. Take a look at this," the boy with the knife calls. Priestess tells him not to move and he finds that he can't do anything more than breathe.
"How far down do you think it goes?" The one he assumes is Snake asks. Cyril realizes that they're looking through the window into the Archives below.
"Dunno. Can't see the bottom. Bet it's no worse than a tomb, though."
"It's got a better payload than a tomb, Dragon."
"Seedling 115-36M," Priestess calls again. "We're looking for your files on wizard born mages. Be a dear and show us where they are."
Cyril's body moves against his will and he walks them down the corridor. When they enter the elevator to take them to the ground floor, Priestess pulls what looks like a bottle of oil out of her purse.
"Really?" Dragon complains.
"We're in the middle of enemy territory. So suck it up," Snake says and it sounds like an order.
Priestess suddenly winces in pain and rubs just below her stomach, but continues on with whatever she's planning. She dips her fingers in the oil and draws a line on the foreheads of everyone in the elevator barring Cyril and, surprisingly, Snake.
"~I ask the power of Nephthys, She who is skilled in magic and words of power, Lady of life, and the Mistress of the Two Lands. Keep us safe. Dispel the darkness. Allow no evil to touch our lives. Keep fear at bay. Do not let us stumble. Surround us with light so no one can harm us. Let us be protected at all times.~"
Snake bows his head and whispers softly in a language that Cyril can't understand. They're praying to their dead gods, he thinks. How futile.
The elevator opens up and the six of them step out. There's an Unspeakable nearby. Cyril remembers that his name is Sid Griffith. The man turns to them and-
Griffith stops in his tracks, hands clawing at his throat. A blue aura surrounds the man as his body convulses and he spits up more water than his body could hope to contain. He falls to the floor and finally stops moving.
"And that is why we ask for help before trying anything. I know I haven't been able to pull a move like that in a while, but I can now," Priestess gives Dragon a despairing look before glancing upwards. "Thanks, by the way."
Cyril can swear that he hears a woman laughing.
"I thought we weren't killing anyone," Dragon says.
"He's not dead," Seer tells him as she leans against the wall. "There are others in here."
How can she tell? Cyril thinks.
"I know," Snake smirks and, Merlin, it's terrifying. And there's something about him, something ancient and powerful that makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand up as the mage steps forwards.
He's small and hunched over. His clothes are too big for him and his face is marred by a scar, but Cyril looks at this mage and is more frightened of him than the one that bound him with a rope.
The mage takes a breath and it feels as if all the air in the room moves with him. Then he raises his hands and the wind picks up, blowing around at impossible speeds. But he has such excellent control over it all that the contents of the shelves don't shake in their boxes.
"Don't move," he warns and makes a sudden swirling movement with his arms. The wind blasts upwards and the sound of screams echo throughout the vast corridors of the Archives. Cyril watches as his colleagues are blown into the air, arms and legs flailing as they are lifted above the tops of the shelves.
Cyril wants to cry. They're defenceless, he thinks. No one is allowed a wand. We weren't prepared.
Snake stamps his right foot to the ground and makes a compressing motion with his hands. There is a shockwave of air that rockets down from the ceiling and Cyril's only chances of hope are thrown to the floor and crushed.
He finds himself on his knees, his hands clasped over his mouth. He's scared. Snake doesn't look tired after taking down every witch and wizard in the Archives. He's too strong, too powerful. How does the Department not know about him? It's not like he could have just come out of nowhere.
There's a hand on his shoulder. Cyril looks up into the eyes of the girl who bound him.
"We have to go," she tells him.
"What do you want?" He weeps openly.
"Shhhh," she moves her hand to his cheek. "It's okay. It will all be okay."
"What more could you possibly do?"
"We want the files," the boy with the tattoos says. "The ones about wizard born mages."
"Why would that do you any good?" He cries out, "Most are either converted or dead! There's no one left for you to save!"
There is silence for a moment. His captors glance from him to Snake. The boy sighs.
"It doesn't matter," he says finally. "You may write them off as a lost cause, but I don't. We will find who we can, save who we can - even if there's just one. Because if we can take one away from the hell that is their lives here with you, it'll set a precedent. And more will follow."
The mage kneels in front of him and Cyril can see his white hair and purple eyes and feels the power that radiates from him in waves. And he is reminded of the Spirit of the Millennium Ring, whom he had once glimpsed at a distance. Cyril doesn't know why he makes that particular connection and he doesn't want to guess.
The Ring is gone. It was finally destroyed after years of trying. A mage took it with him to the grave.
"You asked what we wanted," the mage is still talking. "I want my people to have the right to live their lives as they want, free from harm."
"You'll never get away with this," Cyril says.
"Show me the files," the mages tells him. Priestess repeats the order, calling him Seedling 115-36M while she's at it, and he is forced to comply.
It's nearly the end of Auror Kimberly Ambrose's shift when Captain Laird touches her elbow gently and tells her that there are still some people in the waiting room. She glances quickly at the clock and sees that it's nearly seven.
"Let me guess. Silvana's manning the desk?" Kimberly asks, mentioning the receptionist known for dealing with complaining individuals by putting their reports on the bottom of her pile.
"Got it in one," Laird smiles. "Look, Ambrose. Would you mind grabbing this one? McAfee's husband just flooed her. Apparently, her son's coming down with something."
"Fine. But you owe me," Kimberly laughs. Laird waves her away and promises to buy her a drink after work.
Kimberly walks over to reception, grabbing her partner, Micah Clemons, on the way. Silvana's at the front desk when they arrive. She looks up from her crossword puzzle and smirks.
"Still here?"
"Still here," Kimberly says. "They giving you trouble?" She points to the small grouping of people sitting on the chairs in the waiting room.
"They weren't too bad in the beginning. Then one of them kept coming up to me and saying that he was Shawn Pendergrass and that he'd get his father down here if I didn't let them all jump the line," Silvana rolls her eyes.
"Is he really?" Micah asks, a little worried. The Pendergrass's are a bit more than a household name amongst Aurors. The current patriarch of the family is Head of the Department.
"Honey, if his daddy was really Neal Pendergrass, you seriously think I'd still have a job?" Silvana says and hands them the file folders. "Theft. In William's Abbey."
Kimberly and Micah glance at each other and roll their eyes as one. Because it's always William's Abbey where these things happen. When are people going to learn to just avoid the place entirely?
Micah thumbs through the files and calls out, "Royce Land, Ellen Messer, Delphia Caro, and Morgan Sammons."
"Well, it's about damn time," one of the men from the group calls out. "Are you usually this disorganized? We've been here for five hours."
"It's been a rather hectic day," Kimberly tells them. "But if you come with me, my partner and I will get your details and you can all be on your way."
As they move towards her desk, Kimberly swears that she hears the man from before grumble, "My father will hear about this."
"Can you please list the items that were stolen from you?" Kimberly asks.
"Our wands," says Morgon Sammons, a balding man in his fifties. Immediately, they have her's and Micah's attention.
"The four of us all had our wands stolen today while we were at William's Abbey," explains Ellen Messer. "Between twelve and twelve-thirty. This can't be a coincidence."
It's not. While petty theft is a rather common thing in William's Abbey, even the most brazen on lowlifes weren't stupid enough to steal someone's wand. The hard penalties associated with wand theft and the overall wizarding right to perform magic kept most people from even thinking about it. And four in one day is entirely unheard of.
"I'll need descriptions of each wand that was stolen so that we can track them down," Micah says as he grabs a piece of parchment and a quill. He scribbles down the measurements, wood types, and cores in his nearly illegible handwriting. Then he moves off to the corner of the room where the logbook containing the wands and owners of every witch and wizard is located.
"How long is it going to take to get them back," asks Delphia Caro.
"We'll put everything we have into finding the people who did this," Kimberly tries to reassure her.
"That's not an acceptable answer! I can't afford to buy another wand. Kiddel already charges an arm and a leg," she says in return.
"Hey! When did you guys all get here?" Micah calls from where he's standing next to the constantly updating reels that magically recorded those checking in and out of the Ministry security desks.
"A quarter after two. Here," the man who claimed to be Pendergrass's son pulled a piece of parchment from his pocket. "Here's our floo slip. It's time-stamped."
Kimberly raises an eyebrow. Only high ranking Ministry officials or their relatives could floo into the building, therefore bypassing security.
"Kim. Come here for a sec," Micah tells her.
"What's up?" She says as she approaches.
Micah glances at the theft victims and indicates that she should keep her voice down. "How accurate are these logs again?"
"They've never been wrong before," she responds.
"Then you really need to see this," and he points to an entry made this afternoon. Kimberly's heart thumps as she reads:
13:37 - Morgan Sammons. Nine inches, cedar, dragon heartstring
13:37 - Delphine Caro. Eleven inches, cherry, unicorn hair
13:38 - Royce Land. Ten inches, english oak, kneezle whisker
13:38 - Ellen Messer. Thirteen inches, redwood, kelpie hair
13:38 - Squib
- Gerry Maller
Kimberly spins around and stares at the group, wide-eyed and panicked. She whispers, "It couldn't have been them. Pendergrass's floo slip says that they all arrived at 2:16."
"Unless the people at the desk weren't them," Micah theorizes. "They stole the wands to get through security undetected. That's… brilliant, in a terrifying way." He pauses, frowning, "What's up with the Squib, though?"
"No idea," she says and hurries back to the group. "Was there anything you remember about the events just before you noticed your wands were missing? Anything strange? Maybe a group of people hanging around somewhere they shouldn't be?"
"It's William's Abbey, lady," Morgan Sammons snaps. "You just described ninety percent of the people there."
"It would have been a group of five people," she stresses, but all she gets in response are the shaking of heads. It's not that uncommon, she reasons. Most witness testimony is unreliable anyway. So unless they could get a warrant for their memories, there was no way to get a definitive answer, "I need to talk to my partner."
Very quickly, she ushers Micah into Captain Laird's office and signals that there's an emergency. The man ends his floo call with his wife and rises to his feet, "What's the problem?"
They explain the situation as efficiently as they can. Laird swears, "Someone broke into the Ministry using stolen wands?"
"There's five of them - and one's a Squib," Micah says.
"And how long ago did this happen?"
"Just after 1:30."
"That was over six hours ago!" Laird shouts. "Why am I just hearing about this now? Wait, don't answer that. Damn it, Silvana!"
"Sir, there's something else," Micah says. "Before we came in, I check the outbound logs. Whoever these people are, they haven't left the Ministry yet."
Laird gets up and throws a handful of floo powder into his office fireplace. He kneels down and shoves his head into the flames. Kimberly can hear him yell, "Someone find Neal Pendergrass! I need to lock the Ministry down! And I want Gerry Maller from Security in my office yesterday!"
Cyril has been ordered to remain silent and sit absolutely still unless one of his five captors asks him a question. That had been hours ago and he can barely feel his legs anymore. He wants to die.
The mages all settled around the shelves holding the files on wizard born mages. Snake is reading through them at nearly impossible speeds and taking absolutely no notes. It had taken Cyril almost an hour to realize that he must have some kind of photographic memory and is planning on carrying all of that information out in his brain. Chills run down his spine. This is the last place that someone like Snake should be in.
Priestess has taken to aimlessly wandering the nearby shelves. Occasionally, she asks for confirmation about what a particular artifact is and Cyril isn't always able to answer because he doesn't know everything in the Archives. Seer has been violently ill at least twice in the time that they've been sitting there and currently has her head on Dragon's lap. Cyril has learned that Seer and Dragon are siblings.
The final boy is called Smuggler and he is currently starring Cyril in the eye.
"So explain something to me," he smirks and Cyril eyes the gun that's still in his hand. "Why do you do it?"
"Do what?"
"This. Kill mages. Why?"
Cyril wets his throat, "We have to protect our kind from you. Mages are dangerous, deadly creatures. You will destroy us if given the opportunity."
"Is that what you tell yourself so that you can sleep at night?" Smuggler growls, "I call bullshit. Most are just kids when you take them-"
"Age doesn't matter. The return of mages would bring the world to its knees-"
"You mean your world," says Dragon. "Because, let's face it, you don't give a shit about non-magics."
"The purity of the ancient and noble houses must be preserved," Cyril looks down at his hands.
"Who are they? Your one percent?"
"They are The Sacred Twenty-Eight, named in Cantankerus Nott's Pure-Blood Directory," he answers, unable to stop talking. "The twenty-eight British families of true pureblood decent. They can trace their legacies back a thousand years to the time of Merlin."
"Twenty-eight…? You mean - gods, you mean the twenty-eight families that Hufflepuff's husband promised magic to if they helped them overthrow King Arthur," Snake looks up from his reading.
"The noble houses of Black, of Malfoy and Greengrass and Weasley-"
Snake snorts, "They weren't noble - at least, not back then. The Greengrass' were farmers. The Malfoys were mercenaries. Did they tell you about that when you joined this place?"
"No."
"The Blacks were a group of players," Snake hisses. "They approached the castle in costume and said that they wanted to put on a show for the children. Then those bastards cast the Imperius Curse on them and made them put their parents' heads on spikes. You want to protect that legacy?"
"Your Thief King was said to have travelled with a band of circus performers. What do you think he did while in their company - what with his title!"
"He stole. Everyone knows that. But he never took anything from anyone who couldn't live without it!" Snake shouts. "I… He never killed innocent children!"
"How could you know?"
"Because he knew what it was like to go hungry. And he knew what a dying child looked like," the mage growls.
"Snake," Seer moans.
"I know," Snake says and touches his stomach again.
"What's up?" Dragon calls from his seat on the floor.
"We're gonna have a problem in ten minutes," Seer explains and Cyril's heart soars. "Fifteen people. Not Unspeakables, just… they feel like police officers."
"Aurors," Snake tells her.
"They've been searching the building ever since they found out that we stole those wands," and Cyril notices her hands, both flat on the floor as she reads the entire Ministry. She's clairvoyant, he realizes. And the objects in the room are amplifying her powers. She can See everything, "They've locked the front entrance."
"I told you. You'll never get away with this," Cyril laughs.
"Snake," Smuggler sounds nervous.
"I'm done," the mage answers and puts the last file down. "Priestess, we've got company for supper." The smile on his face is more of a smirk and Cyril hopes that fifteen Aurors will be enough.
"And uninvited, too," Priestess grins and lifts something off the shelf. Snake's eyes shift towards the staff in her hands and gloss over like he remembers something. Cyril stares at the staff and hears his heart pounding in his ears.
It had been found in the Yucatan about four hundred years ago by the Spanish Division inside of a temple dedicated to the Aztec god of rain. It was said that its former owner was a high priestess who'd been able to take the forms of gods. Cyril had never believed the story, but when Priestess holds that staff in her hands and gazes at it like it's an old friend, he thinks that he may have been wrong.
"Let's get going," Snake orders and everyone gets to their feet. "Priestess, clear the way. I'll calm you down if things get out of hand. Dragon, Smuggler, Seer - get to the doors as soon as possible. Seer, you know what to do when you get there. And remember-"
"No one dies," Dragon rolls his eyes. "We know. Let's get moving while we still have the advantage."
"One last thing," Priestess turns to Cyril, wearing a smile that makes him think of how she could order him to kill everyone allied to the Department, to murder the Sacred Twenty-Eight in their beds, and he could be helpless to stop his own body.
She stares at him, beautiful and deadly, and whispers, "I need you to pass on a message for me."
The Department of Mysteries is the last place they are supposed to sweep in search of the five thieves. It's because of a few reasons, the main one being that they are located at the very end of the tunnels. Then there's the whole issue surrounding the fact that they're not even supposed to go in there without an appointment. But no one except an Unspeakable or a high-level government official can make those. Kimberly has always thought that it was a little unfair, but she guesses that the Department just really takes their name seriously.
But they haven't got a choice. Captain Laird is willing to make a few enemies upstairs if it means that they'll put an end to this manhunt early. That man has always been one for acting first and dealing with the red tape later. Kimberly would find it reckless, but Laird's headstrong attitude has saved people's lives before. So they turn the corner and prepare for their advance on the Department of Mysteries.
Micah stands beside her, steadfast as always. He smiles down at her and she loves him. It's not the kind of love where you date and move in together and get married, but it is powerful. And it's real. She nudges him on the shoulder and laughs, "Let's bring them in."
There are fifteen Aurors in total, which is all they could find in the building at this late an hour. But that's more than enough to take these punks down. And frankly, when this hits the press (and it will), it's going to be a high profile case, so everyone wants their name attached to it. Not to mention that Unspeakables are cocky as hell. It's about time someone took them down a peg.
Laird and Lieutenant Zielinski stand on either side of the door. Laird knocks loudly and shouts, "Auror Department! Open up!"
There's a sound on the other side. Kimberly and Micah raise their wands in anticipation. Then the door is blasted off its hinges. Sand and wind blow into the tunnel as the temperature skyrockets. Sweat drips down the black of her neck as Micah coughs, "What the hell?"
The sand on the floor moves, rising up into the form of a woman nearly eight feet tall. Kimberly sees a mouth full of fangs the size of her fingers before the creature's eyes open. They're glowing amethysts, embedded into the constantly shifting sand. The woman's head moves towards the Captain and morphs into that of a lioness.
The woman roars and blood leaks from her mouth. She leaps at Captain Laird with inhuman speed, grabbing him by the neck and slamming him into the wall. She uses the staff in her other hand to club Lieutenant Zielinski in the head and knocks him out. Kimberly and Micah raise their wands as one and fire a pair of stunners, the others following suit in their panic.
The red lights are blocked by an invisible force. A man - a boy? - appears in the middle of the room, a wicked looking knife in his hands. Kimberly's mind registers that it couldn't have been a disillusionment charm that hid him because she can spot them miles away. Who is he? What is he?
The boy throws the knife and impales Micah's left hand, causing him to drop his wand. Kimberly shouts, reacting instinctively and fires off a hex. The boy jumps and twists over it. When his hand connects with the ground, he flexes his arm and launches himself into the air. His legs wrap around her neck and he spins, yanking her down to the ground. She cries out as the air leaves her lungs and a dragon, black as night with burning red eyes, bursts from the door to the Department of Mysteries.
"Kim!" Micah calls, wandless and terrified, and the dragon's rider points a muggle gun and pulls the trigger. Micah falls, a red stain expanding around his shoulder. The boy that pinned her passes right through her skin like a ghost and crushes her wand hand under his foot. Kimberly screams. Her wand snaps at the handle.
The dragon opens its mouth and breathes a terrible fire, encircling the last remaining Aurors. One of them tries to cast a spell - something, anything, to hold their ground - but the woman made of sand lets out another roar and throws Captain Laird into its path. The man collapses on the ground and doesn't move.
The woman grins, her mouth horrible and dripping with blood, and laughs as a red aura surrounds her like a thin linen dress. She stalks forwards, dragging Lieutenant Zielinski by the back of his collar as she went. Kimberly clutches her broken hand to her chest and moves towards Micah. She bundles up the bottoms of her robes and presses them into his wounds. He's barely conscious, but she whispers to him anyway, "It's okay. It's going to be okay. You're going to make it home. You have to. She's waiting for you."
'She' is Micah's fiance, Marie Foreman, who'd been his girlfriend for nearly six years. Kimberly loves her too because Marie is as hardworking and tireless as Micah himself. She's training to become a healer. When Kimberly feels like giving up, she thinks of Marie and gains the strength to continue.
The boy runs towards the sand woman, grabbing her by the wrist. There's an actual person under there, Kimberly sees. The boy has reached through the golden sand and is touching flesh. He makes a face and says something she can't hear. The lioness laughs again, her free hand swinging her staff at him. He hisses, a forked tongue snaking out from between his lips.
"~Do not think that you can threaten me, bloodborne,~" the sand woman speaks and she sounds like an oncoming desert storm with howling winds and scorching heat. "~I am more than you. I am blood and death and war. You are but a child to me.~"
"You are not my goddess. I don't answer to you. Give her back," his skin turns grey and ripples into scales
"~She called upon me. She wanted me. And so did you,~" the woman tells him. "~I do not answer to mortals. I do not spare my enemy. I will tear their hearts from their chests and burn them for their insolence. They dare attack me. They dare to murder me again. I am Sekhmet. I will show them no mercy.~"
"It's not mercy. It's strategy. They die and the rest of their kind will kill us all. How long do you think you'll last this time with no one to know your name?"
The woman wrenches her arm from his grip, "~Do not lecture me on strategy, blood born. I spit on your plans. She called me. She called. And I answered.~"
The dragon behind them snorts and leans down. It's riders (and there had been two, Kimberly notices. She had not seen the girl) slide off it's back. They kneel before the sand woman.
"Goddess, please," the one who'd shot Micah says. "We know how you've suffered-"
"~You know nothing. You understand nothing. She called me. For the first time in a thousand years, I heard a prayer - a mortal voice asking for my power. I answered. I had to. She called and I answered!~"
"I know. But if these people die now, it will be another thousand years, another million before you'll hear a voice again," the boy who'd broken her hand threatens. "If there is going to be a war, it will be on our terms, fighting the enemy we want. Be satisfied with that."
The sand woman leans down and roars in the boy's face as if to have the last word. Then she growls, "~I will answer her if she calls again. But you… I will remember this, bloodborne. I always remember.~"
"I don't answer to you," he tells her again and shoves a flask into her hand. The woman spits blood on the floor at his feet and eats the entire thing, metal and all. She shudders, eyes closed. And when she opens them, they are green and human.
"Sorry about that," she says, but her voice is different. It's a girl who is beneath the sand, not a terrifying lioness. "I thought I had a hold on her."
"You haven't done this in several cycles," the boy tells her. "Hell, I'm rusty, too. You're allowed to slip."
"No. No, I'm not," the woman says and turns to the final girl. "Seer? Shall we?"
"Yes," Seer answers and Kimberly sees how young she is. The sand woman drops Lieutenant Zielinski on the ground next to Captain Laird and touches the girl on the shoulder.
The girl burns with power.
"~Forget us~," she says. And Kimberly does.
Seven hours later, Keith is awoken by the sound of thunder. It takes him a full minute to realize that it's not actually coming from outside his window, but his front door. He pulls on a shirt and stumbles out of bed. He smells like a bar.
"I'm coming," he growls as the person on the other side starts to knock again. He hopes that it's just an impatient, horny-as-fuck Kitamori because he isn't planning on being pleasant for anyone else.
"What?" He growls as he opens the door. It's not Kitamori. It's Mook.
"Get dressed. We have to leave. Now," Mook says bluntly.
"You know, the last time you showed up at my place at this time of night, you were saying the opposite of 'Get dressed,'" he slurs.
"Are you drunk?" She hisses.
"It's Saturday night. I can do what I want."
"It's Thursday," Mook corrects him. "Merlin's beard, Bandit! Sober up and get dressed. Pegasus is calling us in."
"What the fuck does Pegasus want with us at two in the fucking morning?" Keith grumbles.
"Something escaped from the Archives," she says and Keith immediately straightens.
"What?" That's impossible. There's down there with a conscience.
"That's not the weirdest part either. No one can remember anything except Cyril Weller - and he isn't talking."
"Why not?"
"He can't."
"What the hell happened?" He yells and regrets it as soon as he does. His head is spinning.
"I don't know. But fifteen Aurors are in the hospital, the entirety of the Ministry's lobby has been turned into a desert, there's fiendfyre blocking the main entrance, and there are dragon prints outside in plain view of muggles. We have to go. Now."
Hello again!
I'd like to thank those who reviewed for the last chapter: Tz342, Dana Sto Helit, Uryuu-Nipaa, green lilah, RogueDragonPrincess, dragomira, anita15, and Aqua girl 007.
So I'm going to keep this short because I've got to run off and do some prep work for tomorrow. But I hope you guys really like this chapter. It was one of my favourites to write.
Also: don't worry if you have any questions about what is revealed to have happened in the last scene. I'll explain it a little later.
Until next time,
AlcatrazOutpatient