Authors note: Thanks for reading my story, also if you want to please leave reviews! But I will only accept CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM AND ADVICE, not harassment!
Annabelle apparated from sands above right down into the underground den of Nyllia and her tribe.
*Hi,* she greeted the immediate swarm of a few hundred magi-arachnids, who all ranged from as small as a poodle to as big as a house. They all clicked and chattered around her - about her, she could tell. Then a wave of calm seemed to ripple over them all, starting nearest to Annabelle and going farther and farther back. Annabelle stayed calm, stood still, and kept her expression blank. *Elyrie, are you somewhere in there?* she called out with a voice magically enhanced to reach out across the masses. There was a faint rustling far in the back, then silence again. And then a few dozen arachnids were clearing a space in front of Annabelle; she turned her gaze to that space, and she waited. It didn't take but a minute or two for the dirt and rock to lift up like a toilet lid, and out of the dark of an even deeper underground emerged Elyrie.
Elyrie was about the size of a horse, and her dirtied exoskeleton was unique due to all the crisscrossing and zigzagging lines of neon scarlet magic. Annabelle had talked to her on last visit, and she knew what the lines were for. Shortly after Elyrie's hatching a few brief years ago, she had run afoul of a native magical creature - a giant scorpion - and had ended up being stung, and cursed to die within the hour. But some of the other, older arachnids had been there with her at the time, and they had pooled their own powers together in order to bind and slow the curse. They couldn't remove it, but what they had done for Elyrie had bought her at least another dozen years of life. These were years that Elyrie had been spending very wisely, despite her still quite young age. Despite it all, she was determined to achieve things in her life that others her age should not be able to achieve - something that she and Annabelle had in common.
Perhaps this drive that they shared, this drive that Elyrie had for herself, was why Annabelle was not surprised when Elyrie's first words to her were: *I heard you're going to Santellio'Nera - North America, to you - and I want to go too. I can contribute with valuable knowledge.*
*How do you know where I'm going?* Annabelle had to ask.
*Everyone here knows where you are going.* A great rumbling rocked the ground, and Annabelle lifted her head high and looked to the distant side of the den to see the ever-towering Nyllia making her way toward her. Nyllia's voice carried, deep and rumbling as the earth. *Everything that is said above, we who dwell below will hear it.*
*Okay,* Annabelle said slowly, shifting on her feet. *So, you know where I'm going, and so you have to also know what I plan to do when I get there. Can you help me with that?*
*I can, yes,* Nyllia answered, a touch of warmth in her voice. *In Santellio'Nera there exists a great tribe leader, Trucik, who would be willing to enter into a relationship with you the same as you have with me. However, her tribe's code is...different from most others, and this will make it exceedingly difficult and very dangerous for you if you are to attempt to approach her - or any in her tribe.*
*What's the problem?* Annabelle asked, holding away a frown.
*Trucik's tribe survives and thrives by cannibalizing our own kind.* For the first time, Annabelle heard flat-out disgust in Nyllia's voice, and a very real bite of anger. *She assaults and consumes other tribes, and takes their territories for her own. If we arachnid tribes had any such concept like your human one of "public opinion," I believe Trucik and her tribe would be the lowest in our collective esteems across the planet.*
*And this is the person you want to send me to?* Annabelle spoke carefully. *There's no else over there who might be a bit more approachable?*
*No.*
*Explain.*
Nyllia dipped her head to stare directly down at Annabelle. *Santellio'Nera is different, and it is not just Trucik's tribe that is run by different laws and rules - the majority of the tribes there are...very different from mine, and even from the ones in your Great Britain home. If you are to make any progress there at all with your mission, you must connect with Trucik, first and above all others. All unconquered tribes there currently defer to her, though they do so only because she promises them a significant delay in their cannibalization.*
*And why does she do that?* Annabelle questioned. *Why wouldn't she just take them, like all the others?*
*Because these remaining tribes have knowledge and abilities that she desires, wholly unique to their species and their tribe cultures, and if she were to annihilate them these prizes would be lost.* Nyllia paused. *There is also, from what I have heard, a problem of numbers; her constant invasions have dwindled her own tribe's members, to the point now where she has no choice but to hold off and produce enough hatchlings to make up the difference. I have also heard that she has been attempting to breed a new queen, so as to replace herself if she is to die, though she has been having no success in this thus far; queens require time-consuming and unique incubation, and even then the chances of successfully hatching one is extremely small.*
*So, you want me to get Trucik for the cause, because she'll then instruct, order, or demand that all the others follow her lead?*
*Yes.*
*Okay.* It made perfect sense to Annabelle. She turned her attention back to Elyrie and said, *So, you want to come with me? How are you going to do that?*
*The lucar bridges - a network of passageways we've created that connect to other tribe homes across the planet,* explained Elyrie. *They're what let us travel the world without being spotted by your nonmagic human types. Well, those of us that care about abiding by your Statute of Secrecy at all,* she added.
*There are a lot of humans who don't care to follow it, either,* said Annabelle. *I can't tell you not to go, and I do like you, and if you have knowledge I can use, then feel free to go over there your own way. We can meet up wherever you like - whenever you like.*
Elyrie told Annabelle her planned meeting place and time, and they left their separate ways. Elyrie disappeared into a swirling sand whirpool on the ground, and Annabelle disapparated back to Hermione on the surface of the desert.
"Come on - I've got the information we came for," Annabelle greeted Hermione, who's tense demeanor broke into relief at her reappearance.
"So we have a lead over there?" Hermione asked quickly, delighted.
"Yes." Annabelle took Hermione's hand, and disapparated a second time.
Manhattan Beach Park, Brooklyn NY
After their arrival in New York City, Annabelle and Hermione had checked into a two-person hotel suite (in the midtown Manhattan DoubleTree Hotel), and Annabelle had explained to Hermione about Lisa's presence in the city, and her request for a face-to-face meeting for the first time in months. Hermione hadn't judged Annabelle for the whole running-away-from-her-wedding affair when it had actually happened last year, and she had simply answered that it would probably be a good thing for them both, and that she was personally just happy to be able to go to the beach again - she hadn't been for a few years, since she was a teenager. With idle chatter, they unpacked a few little things in the suite, and generally just started making themselves at home. Because this would be their home for a while, their base of operations in New York.
Then they had gone to meet with Lisa at the agreed location.
On a bright and sunny day, Annabelle found Lisa exactly where she said she would be.
"I didn't expect you to actually show up. I guess you really have learned your lesson, haven't you?"
"Yes." Annabelle gestured calmly to the empty spot on the bench beside Lisa. "Can I sit with you, please?"
"Sure. Why not." Lisa shrugged, scooting over to the edge of the seat. "I'm in a good mood today."
"Because I showed up when you asked me to?" said Annabelle, sighing as she sat down with Lisa.
Lisa gave her a sideways look, and a small smile grew on her lips. "Hell no - it's because my target is just over there, and as long as he doesn't go anywhere, I'll be handing him over to the Magi United States government for a considerable fee at the end of the day. Financial security puts me in a real good mood. Same with life security, Anna. Social security…legal security…It's just so great to know that when you've committed to something, that you'll be able to trust it'll still be there, and that you can lean on it when you need to."
"Okay, you're going to open with this, then," Annabelle sighed, shaking her head. "And I deserve this, so it's fine - so I'm going to sit here and let you keep at it until you get bored of it, and decide to have a more productive dialogue with me about how you feel about the issue."
"More productive dialogue?" Lisa repeated, scathing. "If that's what you want from me, then how's this for productive dialogue: Calling abandoning your bride at the altar an issue is something I think is more than a little fucked up! Isn't it, Anna? Isn't it?! Shows how little you actually still care about it these days. How much you just don't see how much you hurt me. And that, that Anna, is a fucking issue!"
"I know you're still hurting over it," Annabelle replied, looking out at the ocean's glistening shallows. "I know that, okay? I do. And I'm sorry. It was important, it was emotionally…you were invested. And I could have been - should have been - more invested, myself. For you. I should have been sure, I should have talked to you. I should never have just ran like that. I wasn't sure, then, Lisa. I wasn't sure about you, or myself, or us, and I should have been before telling you yes. I shouldn't have kept on with it, after saying yes and knowing I wasn't sure about it all." She took a breath, looked at Lisa full on - in the eyes. "And we can sit together here, and we can talk about all of it, but…it's been a year, Lisa. A whole year now. So no matter what you think, or what I think, or what you say, or what I say, I don't know what this will even accomplish."
Lisa stared at her with a curled lip and trembling fists in her lap. She dropped her head to her chest and leaned forward off the bench. Her hands came up over her head to hold the back of it, and her nails dug into her short hair. "It was a year for you, but for me it was yesterday," her muffled tones came. "It was yesterday, Anna - goddammit, why the hell can't you understand?!"
"I - I don't know," Annabelle admitted, taking a deep breath. "I'm sorry, I just - I don't know what to say, I don't…know how to understand. I know I was wrong, I know I hurt you, and I know you're still hurt. But beyond that? I don't know what you want from me, and I'm not even sure what you want me to understand. It's done, it's past, we're both out in the world doing our jobs and our passions, and why are you bringing any of this up?" She tried to take another breath, but this one was caught in her throat somewhere. "I don't know how to understand what you want me to."
Lisa suddenly sat upright again. Her hands went to grip the seat under her, and she sort of gritted her teeth and stared out at the waters for a few moments. Then she turned to Annabelle with her whole body; their knees touched. "I guess…spending your first ten years of childhood locked in a little cupboard under the stairs just does that to a girl, huh? You just - you physically can't understand me, can you? You're mentally, literally incapable of it, is that right?"
"I…yeah." Annabelle looked away, swiping at her eyes as her vision blurred. "I guess that's it. I just…I can't understand, and I don't think anything could make me. I'm sorry. I just never got that lesson, I never figured out how, or…something."
"Fine," Lisa said, in thick tones of sadness and bitterness alike. "I'll just drop it all, then. Just never bring it up again with you. If it'll literally just be like trying to get a brick wall to sing…then fine. I guess we're done here, so get going. Get back to doing the shit you actually understand." Lisa stood, and started to walk away.
"Daphne raped me."
Lisa stopped. Turned very slowly back to face Annabelle. "What?"
"In Egypt, it was over a week ago, and she raped me." Why am I talking about this? Why did I bring it up? Why am I crying? And why did I bring it up with Lisa, of all people? "We were in our hotel room, and she just…did it. The details weren't in the newspapers - they just said I was generically attacked again - but that's what really happened. She raped me, and then she tried to kill me when I fought her off."
"Fuck." Lisa screwed up her face and came back to the bench. Sitting back down, she put herself very close to Annabelle. So close that their shoulders were together. Lisa put a hand on Annabelle's knee and looked at her up close. "I'm sorry to hear that. I mean, fuck, Anna. We graduate Hogwarts, and now it's like we don't even know anybody we spent seven years with. Look, if we can't make any headway with my issues, then feel free to talk to me about yours - if you want to, or need to, or anything like that. I can take a mirrorcall from you, for that, if you want to talk about it - about her. I can't believe she'd do that…but I believe you that she did."
"Thank you."
"You're welcome. And hey, if anyone posts a bounty on her, I'll be the first to pick it up," Lisa promised.
August 15, 1998 - Great Piece Meadow, New Jersey
"Norberta, what are you doing?"
Norberta startled in the brush; she swung her whole body around in a panic that sent several trees crashing down around them. She sat down on her haunches and reared her long neck, looking down at Annabelle with wide eyes. Her tail snapped out behind herself and then curled in around her, and her massive leathery wings folded at her sides to hide whatever she had grabbed - Annabelle had only caught a flash of leathery white. *Nothing! Why would I be doing anything? There's nothing to do - we're in a swamp! A smelly, wet, nowhere-place swamp. There's nothing here, no one here, and I was just taking a nap away from the eyes of the humans on the freeway a couple of miles in...that direction.* She indicated with a toss of her head and flick of her tongue - and not with her tail, as she usually would have. The tail she had tucked away beneath her wing still.
*Norberta,* Annabelle started delicately in draketongue, not moving from where she stood. *You've never judged me for anything I've done with anyone, and any problem I've had, or any situation I was in you've done nothing but support me. And I love that, and I love you, and...you have to know that it goes both ways; I'm never going to judge you, and I'll always be here to help you. So if something is going on with you, or something happened to you while you were alone here, or maybe it's just that you decided to leave a trail of one night stands throughout the continent, I am going to be here to support you - did you forgot that I was there to see you the day that you hatched?* she added with a smile.
Norberta's huge cat-iris eyes blinked. She let out a puff of fire, shifted her foreclaws, and then she opened her wings and carefully uncurled her tail to reveal a single, large egg.
*Oh,* gasped Annabelle. She looked at the egg, looked up at Norberta's face, then at the egg and back again. She was honestly speechless. *Oh - okay. Okay, you...this is...okay. What do you want to do? Do you- do you need my help with looking for a safe place to incubate, for the immediate future? And after...after they hatch, would you need help with raising them? I'll do anything you ask - I'll throw everything else away, put it all on hold, and I'll be there for you on hand and feet if you need me to be.*
*That's appreciated,* Norberta's body slumped in relief, and she settled in the swamp floor. *But aren't you going to ask me how it happened? Or when?*
*If you want to tell me,* Annabelle replied. *But otherwise, I'm not too interested in the specific details of your sex life - something I admit I didn't think even existed until just now.*
*It's not a sex life, it was just a sex event,* Norberta said quickly. *Just one time. I met another dragon like me here - a smart, civilized one - and after a few days of adventuring together, we were holed up in the mountains on the border of Canada because of some very angry thunderbird-riding dwarves, and I just sort of asked him if we could have sex, and...and so we did.*
*Okay. So was it just sex and you're done with each other, or do you want...what do you want from this?*
*I think we're still friends, and I'd like to keep being friends - maybe go on some more adventures - but he would not be my first choice of partner in raising my child. My first choice would actually be you.*
*Co-parenting without a relationship? Okay. Yeah, I can do that with you, no problem.*
Norberta pounced on Annabelle, took her to the swampy ground with huge claws, and gave her face a huge, sloppy lick. *I love you!*
*Love you too,* Annabelle gasped, resigning herself to laying in the swamp after a futile attempt at moving Norberta's claws. *By the way, your hiding place here wasn't very good - I was able to track you easily enough. If I could, anyone else could have too.*
*Next time I'll choose a cave,* said Norberta, contemplative.
*Glad to hear it. Now, please stop crushing me? And tell me how you feel about going back to Britain - Hermione and I are going to revisit some old friends of mine.*
Norberta lifted her claws off Annabelle and stepped back. She looked at her egg intently. *I'd like to stay here. Incubate here, hatch them here. I won't risk losing them with a flight over the ocean.*
*Okay. Let's see if we can't find you a much safer place to live here...*
August 19, 1998 - Scottish Highlands, Scotland
After a few days with Norberta in the States, Annabelle and Hermione had nothing left to do but to leave her and press on with the campaign, and just hope she would be fine on her own again. Though, Annabelle did promise to visit Norberta again a lot sooner than the last time. But for right now, they were back in Britain on a chilly night.
"The Bloody Spade Inn?" Hermione eyed the sign hanging over the doorway with an open frown. "Annabelle, is this place...errm, safe?"
"Depends on the day," Annabelle said honestly. "Listen, just remember a couple of things and you'll be fine. One: Don't look at anybody funny, no matter what they're doing, what they look like, or what they are. If anyone looks at you funny, just look away. Two: If anyone asks you to have a drink with them, conjure up your own or signal the barkeeper - only trust the barkeeper. Three: Keep to yourself in general, unless you're confident enough that you can win a fight with anyone currently in the place. Lastly: Don't talk to the harpy on the table near the stairs - she goes by the name of Anju."
"Err, all right, I'll keep this all in mind," Hermione said, drawing a nervous, quick breath. "Though, what exactly is the reasoning for that last rule?"
"She isn't dangerous or anything - she actually has a good cause going for her - but I don't think you want to end up a mother so soon, do you?" Annabelle responded, giving her friend a very serious eye.
"No, I don't," said Hermione. Then, because she always had to know, she asked, "What's her cause?"
Annabelle unbuttoned her long coat, let her ponytail go free, and went to lean against the wall; Hermione joined her, shooting a wary look at the door that was not even five feet away. "Anju is on a noble mission to save her people. She used to live in a lakeside forest nearby - it's actually over in that direction, past a mountain or two - but, about a year ago, a magical plague got to her and everyone in her community. And they didn't realize they had it, or what was happening to them all, until the bodies started dropping. The symptoms weren't gentle, it wasn't gradual. But what it was, was untreatable. Nobody even knows what it is today, and...it took everyone. Every harpy - except Anju. She was immune, or a fluke, or something, and it didn't get her. She had to watch village after village go to the disease, had to watch over five hundred of her people die when she couldn't do a thing."
Annabelle drew a breath, let it out in the cold, watching the smoke swirl. She shoved her hands into her pockets again and gazed out across the calm night ocean. "Now here she is, out here, mingling with so many other unknowns to her - people, species, communities not hers - and she's doing everything that she can to...entice people into procreating with her. We're really lucky we live in a world where interspecies relations are both possible and frequent enough - and even normalized in a few places so far. If she couldn't do that, if she didn't have all of us out here to do this with - if all she had was her own species, just other harpies - they'd be at severe risk of dying out entirely."
"As it is, the risk is...not so high. But it is there, it is substantial, and she's trying really hard to not let it happen. She's desperate, she's traumatized, and I don't blame her for using whatever she needs - pity, sympathy, gold - to accomplish her goal. I admire her for it, and I respect her for never forcing herself on anyone when it would probably be so easy for someone of her species to do - and when some do, in other places, other communities, even without the threat of extinction. The kidnap and rape rates for people at the talons of harpies are pretty high in some parts of the world; that's where all the mythology and stereotypes come from for them, you know."
Hermione didn't speak for a long time. She spent it chewing on the inside of her cheek and mirroring Annabelle in looking out at the ocean. "Did you help her, the last time you were here?" she said at last, in a hesitant, soft sort of voice that made it clear she thought she was crossing some sort of line in asking.
Annabelle smiled without looking over at Hermione at all - not even a glance. "Yeah. There's going to be a batch of a dozen half-breed harpies in the world soon with my hair, my eyes, my nose, my lips - hopefully none of my worse personality aspects, though. I don't know if you've noticed, but with Lisa, and Nikolett, and the other girls I dated back at Hogwarts I am pretty shit at personal relationships."
"I've noticed over the years, yes," Hermione laughed politely. "I'm honestly not so great at them, myself."
"Victor, Ron, Parvati and Hannah - yeah, I've noticed it about you, too. Anyway, come on." Annabelle pushed off the wall and headed for the door. Hermione followed after her in silence, her shoulders thrown back and her face a crude mask of inscrutability.
Immediately they were blasted with all sorts of commotion: the clinking of glasses, raucous laughter, thumping fists and boots, a dozen different conversations, and a hectic piano tune being played by a beholder. Beholders are floating, spheroid creatures; they are essentially floating heads. They have purple skin, gaping mouths of sharp teeth, a single cylcops eye in the forehead, and ten tentacles sprouting from their bodies that each have a smaller eye at the ends of them. Being the only one in the inn with the capability of seeing in all directions at once, the beholder was the only one with the confidence enough to play the piano for the patrons with their back turned.
Annabelle crossed the inn, her head on a swivel as her eyes searched out anyone familiar. She dropped to her hands and knees next to a table of rowdy orcs, looking briefly between their strong, fight-scarred legs before straightening again. She repeated this at a few different tables, earning looks and murmurs. Finally she turned her head up and searched the ceiling. It was there that she found a familiar face. "Gertrude!" Annabelle called, striding over to the corner, neck craned and with a smile on her face.
Gertrude uncurled her body, took one look at Annabelle, and dropped to the floor with a heavy thud. She spider-walked her way up to Annabelle, then rose to her feet into a proper, hag hunched posture. She stood there, stooped over, her blackened skin charred and scarred as ever. Even standing with her legs locked, Gertrude only came up to about Annabelle's waist - something of note, because Annabelle was an incredibly short woman herself due to stunted childhood growth. Gertrude's figure was the living embodiment of the phrase "skin and bones." Her dark robes hung off her in tatters - a deliberate choice of fashion, Annabelle knew it to be. Gertrude gave Annabelle a smile that brightened up her deformed face, and moved to grab her wrists with clawed fingers. She pulled Annabelle in, down to her knees, and put her face in close. So close that their noses nearly were touching.
"You came back!" Gertrude rasped. Her voice was as deep and throaty as Annabelle remembered. "I've never seen the same human back in here twice, and I have lived goddammit! But you...everything you told me that night was true, wasn't it?"
"Mhm," Annabelle nodded, not drawing away in the least. She held her awkward posture just as it was. She felt the claws digging into her arms; she didn't flinch at it. "I'll tell you again if you need me to: I enjoyed meeting you, and I enjoyed the time we spent together. I'm not like most humans."
"Hmmm..." Gertrude hummed thoughtfully. She let Annabelle go and whipped her head around to stare up at Hermione, who startled and shifted where she stood under Gertrude's sudden and intense gaze. "And is this another not-like-most-humans human you've brought to me?"
"Her name is Hermione - and, yes," Annabelle introduced. "Hermione, this is Gertrude." Annabelle drew her wand and flicked it at a table nearby, and it slid across the floor toward them (the chairs included). Hermione was the first to take her seat. Annabelle dragged her chair around to sit directly opposite Hermione. Gertrude looked between them, and climbed up onto the table and settled down on her knees facing Annabelle - presenting her back to a very offended Hermione. Annabelle leaned around Gertrude and gave her friend a certain look, and then Hermione's twisted expression had gone, and she had settled herself back in her chair with crossed arms.
"Have you had anything to eat tonight?" Annabelle asked Gertrude, giving her a warm smile.
"I took a bird a few hours ago," said Gertrude, licking her lips at the memory. "It was smaller than I'm used to, but I can't be a picky eater, can I?"
"Here - why don't I treat you." Annabelle conjured a large stone in the air, which she transfigured it into a chicken - and then immediately she struck it with a fatal curse. Gertrude pounced, seizing the chicken and burying her face in its feathery body. Her pure black eyes shone with gratitude as she took to her meal with messy hunger. Behind Gertrude, Hermione was making these little choked noises. Annabelle shot her another look, along with a horrible hand gesture that caused Hermione's jaw to drop (Gertrude noticed none of this byplay on their part, so consumed with her food was she).
"Want any seasoning with that?" Annabelle said, returning her focus to Gertrude. Gertrude paused, nodded, and reluctantly dropped the mangled, bloody, smelly chicken into her lap. Annabelle pushed her chair back and stalked over to the table of orcs. They were absolutely massive, brawny, and decorated with glowing jewelry - earrings and necklaces and bracelets, along with little pendants pinned to their oversized robes. Annabelle got right up to the table and slammed her fists right down in the middle of their board game (quite a popular one in their society, called ket'chna), scattering more than a few pieces. All four of the orcs looked at her with...nothing more than mild surprise and a dash of amusement.
"Seasoning. Give. Now," Annabelle said loudly, leaning forward and locking eyes with the orc sitting directly across from her. The orc looked at zir fellows, then back at her. They stared at one another like this for five seconds straight, then the orc let out a little chortle and tossed the seasoning shaker at her. She left them to their game for her own table, not giving them another word or look.
"You said not to talk to anyone or do anything with anyone!" Hermione burst out, as Annabelle dropped into her chair again. "What was that?! And what was with you when we first came in? You were bothering everyone! You could have- you could have been-"
"Unless you can take on everyone currently in the place," Annabelle quoted herself calmly to Hermione, interrupting her rant.
Hermione froze. Stared. Her eyes went wide with disbelief, and her lips twisted into something that conveyed outrage and a hint of disgust. "What the- what the hell, Annabelle! Only a few months out of Hogwarts, and your head is already so far up your own ass that you honestly believe you could solo the patronage of an entire, disreputable inn?!"
"Are you calling my home disreputable?" Gertrude spoke, whirling around on the table to face Hermione, her dark, stringy hair flying everywhere.
"She didn't mean it, she's just upset with me," Annabelle told Gertrude. Then, to Hermione she said: "Yes."
"Prove it," Hermione said smugly, a gleam of triumph in her deep brown eyes. Of course, she seemed to have forgotten just who she was talking to.
Annabelle stood up again. "Okay."
"Oh, we're doing this again?" Gertrude asked, her face lighting up with excitement.
"WHAT?!" Hermione screeched, turning on Gertrude with shock. "She did this before? Annabelle, no, don't you dare!"
Annabelle slid her coat off and hung it on her chair, then pointed her wand at her own head and sliced her hair off into a crude, short cut with uneven fringe long enough to cover her eyes - she trimmed this off with a very precise, final casting. She thrust her wand at Hermione, sending her flying back into the corner; and with a flourish she erected a half dozen protective barriers around the corner, causing Hermione to vanish from sight, and her outraged cries to fall silent, even to Annabelle herself.
Everyone in the inn was looking at Annabelle by now. Most were still seated, but even those that were looked suitably tense. "Anyone who doesn't want a part in this: you have five seconds to get out." No one moved; the table of orcs erupted into guffaws, and they shook their heads at her like she had just done something embarrassing. Regardless of the orc's opinions on her, Annabelle waited the five seconds out - waited for Anju to jump off her table and disappear up the stairs. Then, she twirled her wand over her head and sent a volley of purple magical fireballs right at the orcs. Even with their natural magical resistance and their formidable size, the fireballs did their work on the orcs; their table exploded, and the four were knocked back out of their chairs. Patches of purple fire stuck to and ate away at the orcs like a fast acid, and their astounding, innate regeneration abilities kicked in immediately to try and counter it.
That was the point at which all hell broke loose.
A pale-skinned teenage boy hopped off a bar stool, turned into a bat and flew right for Annabelle; he blew past her with a screech, and raked her across the face with magically enhanced talons that were six inches long and made of sharpest steel. She whirled around and created a stringy sphere like a spiderweb around the vampire bat, trapping him in mid air. One of the orcs had done away with her fire magic, and ze came running at Annabelle with absolutely enormous twin sickles, whose blades were burning with a blue fire of their own. Clearly, ze intended to return the favor to her.
Annabelle flicked her wand and caused the floor between her and the orc to bubble. The orc's momentum took zir over the bubbling floor, and then they began to sink down into it like quicksand. The more ze struggled, the faster the floor pulled zir under. Annabelle turned her wand on the other orcs, preparing to cast powerful Cutting Curses on their legs - but something stopped her dead. Something stopped everyone. A great and high wailing echoed throughout the inn, and the overwhelming power within the sound had caused every single person to be literally paralyzed. It was instant, and there was no fighting it. Annabelle couldn't muster up even a single thought for a nonverbal spell - her very mind had been paralyzed as well, it seemed like. Her whole physical and even mental being had been locked up. The wailing continued, turning even higher pitched and morphing into an aggressive shriek; everyone found themselves falling to their knees, and then flat on their faces. No one could resist, not even with a twitch of an eye or a movement of the mouth.
After a minute that could have been an eternity, the shrieking faded, and silence befell the inn.
Everyone got to their feet, and everyone suddenly had eyes only for the barkeeper. She would have looked perfectly human, were it not for the gray skin, the waist-length white hair that almost had a glow to it, and the eyes. The eyes were a bright silver, and they seemed to be trying to draw Annabelle in as much as repulse her - or maybe it was because she knew they were trying to pull her in that she also felt like she had to stay away. In any case, the barkeeper's silver gaze locked onto Annabelle alone.
"Enough," the barkeeper spoke, in a voice of melody that had Annabelle's stomach fluttering inside. "Do you humans really have such short memories? Do you really not remember that you've already proven yourself worthy of being here among us - not just that we let you pass through here, but that we actually decided to welcome you here freely! Here, in the one place where we can all feel safe and comfortable with ourselves! Or is it not a problem of your memory, human? Is it just that you're human? Do you just have this need inside of you to hurt us, to beat us down and lord your superiority over us all? Is that the great mystery solved of why all of us are raped, tortured, and kept away from the largest of your population centers, and everything you've built and made there? Is that why we're all here, living in these wild lands, these forests and these nowhere places? Is it just innate with you people, an irresistible urge to cause us as much misery and pain and loneliness as you can?"
"I wasn't proving myself to you," Annabelle spoke calmly, getting to her feet and slipping her wand into her pocket.
"No, you were proving yourself to the other human you brought here this time," the barkeeper retorted, her beautiful face twisting into ugliness as she glanced at Hermione in the corner - the protective barriers had been torn down by the barkeeper's screams. "How many will it be next time? Five? Ten? A dozen? Twenty? Do you intend to just keep taking advantage of the hospitality and the trust that we provided you - you, a human - to bring more and more of your kind here until you can overwhelm us? Has that been your goal since first visit? Is this your collective species final efforts at just doing away with us? Sweeping us under the rugs? Have you just grown bored with us here in our captivity at long last?"
"Do you think a human would do what she did for Anju, no hesitating and no turning her nose up about it, if she wasn't different?" These words came from Gertrude, loud and in her trademark raspy tones. But in there was also anger, and defensiveness as she stared down the barkeeper. "Do you think she could sit at a table with me like she did, and fuck me like she did if she wasn't different?"
"Well, we weren't all there to witness that last one, now were we?" the barkeeper responded, easily and with pure scorn. "But don't worry: we all understand that you're a bit more desperate than the rest of us for a little love and affection."
"She sat with Anju for hours, just listening to her, the last time she was here," said Gertrude, stamping a foot. "What normal human would do that? Be so kind, so caring?"
"She was probably laughing on the inside," said the barkeeper, dismissive. "Hell, she was probably doing what she did to Anju out of some fetish. You know how much humans love doing that. We're just objects, abstract ideas to them. We're not people to them, Gertrude! She was probably fetishizing you, too! Just so she can go back to her grand cities and tell all her people that she actually screwed one of your people."
"She wouldn't do that!" Gertrude yelled, and she bared her claws plainly. "So shut up, Teafa. Just shut up about her, about someone you don't understand, when she's the only one of them giving a damn about all of us! The only one trying to help us!"
"Evidence of that boredom," Teafa snarled. She leapt over the bar counter and balled her fists at her sides. "A human so bored of hurting us that she decides on her own whim to play around with us, and get us all worked up enough to actively go against her people! What a truly inspired, new kind of game she came up with!"
"She's close friends with a reawakened dragon!" Gertrude said, refusing to back down. "I've heard rumors from Romania that she's even convinced the magical government there to monitor and aid any others who've been waking up again these past few years!"
"No," Teafa said. "She rides a dragon. Like a pet, a steed, a common beast. Considering that she's already sexually satisfied herself with yourself and Anju, simply for what you are, I wouldn't be surprised at all if she gets off on riding that poor dragon around everywhere. Does she command her to pleasure her? Does she strike her with curses every time she disobeys, every time she refuses to be mounted again? We have no idea how this human treats her when they're not in public, or out on open sky where everyone can watch them!"
"I'm leaving," Annabelle spoke, voice devoid of even a trace of emotion. As for her heart and head...well, hearing that sort of talk about Norberta was causing her to struggle to contain it all for much longer. She looked to Hermione, who was pale and scared in her little corner. "Come on, Hermione." Hermione quickly ran across the inn and blew out the door far ahead of Annabelle.
"I'm leaving too," said Gertrude, letting her claws relax.
"If you leave here with that human, I'm not letting you back in," Teafa told her coldly. "If you try and sneak your way in, I'll scream loud enough to blow your head off - and you of all people know that I'm not exaggerating here."
Gertrude froze up. She looked at Annabelle, then at Teafa. "You- you can't just throw me out like that! This is- this is- this has been my home for the past twelve years! I won't have anywhere else to go!"
"You can come stay at my village," a sharp, fierce voice spoke up. Anju had just come gliding down the stairs, by power of her wings and her magic. "I know that right now it consists of only myself and dozens of empty huts, but that will change after my children grow up, and my people come back stronger than ever."
"Take her in, then," Teafa hissed at Anju, her gorgeous, deadly mouth working furiously. "Be together with your tainted selves, share in raising those filthy human half-breeds with one another, I don't care. Just don't come back here - either of you. I can't stomach the sight of you any longer."
"I will leave, as well." This proclamation came from one of the orcs - the one with the sickles. The one who had passed on the seasoning to Annabelle back at their table. Ze turned a stony face and strong eyes on Annabelle and added, "You have spirit, a surprising knowledge of my people's ways - and I still need to fight you properly."
"All of you weaklings get out!" Teafa screamed, anguish lacing her musical tones. "You- you weak, pathetic traitors! A human walks in here once, says a few things, fucks a few of you, and you're willing to just follow along behind her like a pack of starving animals! Just one human, one conversation and you're willing to forget thousands of years of torture, rape, murders, zero rights or consideration, no respect whatsoever, and dozens of acts of attempted - and even successful - genocide?!"
"She treats me like a person," Gertrude said quietly. "And she's never done any of those terrible things to me. I know she's the first human I've ever actually known - I don't have as much experience with them as you do - but as far as first impressions go, she's made a really good one."
"Get. Out," Teafa gritted.
Gertrude limped over to Annabelle, grabbed her wrist, and started off for the exit; Anju followed after, taking up a slow shuffle on her talons; and trailing along at the rear came the orc, zir sickles in hand like ze expected to be blindsided by Teafa at any moment. But they made it out of the inn without incident.
Cold night air washed over them. The ocean rapids slammed against the base of the cliffside far below.
Hermione was sitting less than ten feet from the cliff's edge, her knees pulled up to her chest and her chin resting atop them. Annabelle dropped to the grass next to her and adopted the very same posture. Anju and the orc remained standing, a little apart from Annabelle - but Gertrude fell to her knees and wrapped her arms around Annabelle's neck, and buried her head in her shoulder.
"I'm sorry," Annabelle whispered. "I am sorry for taking away your safe haven, your home."
"I'm not," Gertrude responded, even though her inflection seemed to suggest otherwise. Her raspy voice was quavering, soft and uncertain. "Teafa couldn't give you a chance - give your people a chance - because she's suffered because of them. Suffered worse than most of us have. Some of us haven't even suffered at all at your hands, and she hates those ones of us almost as much as she hates humans. Hatred is as bad for us to hold inside of us as it is for the humans to hold against us, I think. The hate is the worst of all this. It doesn't help any of it, any of us."
"I, Oguk of clan Shelor, declare that I have never suffered at the hands of a human," spoke the orc, proud and loud. "And I do not know of any in my clan that has, either. Most of my kind stands proud and apart from humankind, and we have done so for as long as we have memory and history. I do not know and I do not understand where all Teafa's rage comes from. I do not understand how it can blind her so. So much that she would make us outcasts of the Bloody Spade Inn." Ze crouched down and lay a strong, large hand on Annabelle's shoulder. "I saw nothing in you but respect and compassion - two things that my people hold above all else. Above all laws, any rules, and every word that could ever be spoken. I believe that your cause is true, and a righteous one, and I would be willing to support you in it however I can, if you continue to prove that respect and that compassion to me going forward."
"How wonderfully touching this little moment is - but alas, I'll have to interrupt it."
Annabelle, Hermione, Gertrude, and Oguk all turned to see an unfamiliar figure approaching them in the dark. It was a human, a man, perhaps a solid decade older than Annabelle and Hermione. This man had wild, shoulder-length dark hair and eyes a cheerfully light blue. He was freshly shaven, and his lips were curved into a humorous sort of smile. He was clad in heavy boots, and he wore a presentable button-up dress shirt and pants, with a thick, illustrious fur overcoat that trailed the grass and made sounds like a slithering serpent. His belt had several pouches, and shoved down in the belt itself were two different wands, a small dagger, a modern american handgun, and a wallet secured by a simple string. On his head sat an almost comically large-brimmed hat that looked to be straight out of the seventeen-hundreds.
"I'm sorry, who are you?" Annabelle spoke, getting to her feet and turning to face the stranger head-on.
"Adelyn, please," spoke the stranger, sweeping her hat off her head and turning it into a bow in one smooth motion. "Adelyn...hmmm, let's go with Barnes, why don't we? I'm feeling like a Barnes this evening."
"Okay," Annabelle said blandly, feeling severely thrown off by this stranger - this Adelyn woman. "Adelyn Barnes, Ms. Barnes? Why are you here? Or, to be more specific - and please don't take this as my being rude - why are you here talking to us?"
"Worry not for the rudeness, Ms. Potter," Adelyn waved off her words - literally, with a sweeping hand and a quick smile. "Your question is one easily answered: I stand before you now to ask if I might join you in your...momentous crusade."
"You have a real flair for the dramatics there, Ms. Barnes," Annabelle replied - not her finest response ever. But she was still feeling so - so off-kilter. What was it about this woman? It wasn't danger, not a gut warning of a threat. That wasn't it. She'd felt that before, and this wasn't it. So what was this? She couldn't ever recall feeling this way before in her life. Why...?
"Oh, no, no - I'm just quite dedicated to the part," Adelyn said, shaking her head and chuckling to herself. "And, of course, I find that it helps to get me through the dragging days to add a dash of my own brand of excitement to life."
"Are you a vampire?" Hermione said, speaking for the first time in an actual long while.
"Oh?" Adelyn breathed, eyes widening in surprise. "You are a perceptive one, aren't you? Do tell me, please, what was it that tipped you off as to my true disposition?" she went on, spreading her arms wide and tilting her head to one side.
"Well," Hermione began, taking the invitation without hesitation; Annabelle resisted the urge to groan. "your visible skin tone is off - not by much, and only in very small, nearly imperceptible patches along the neck - which would suggest a very excellently done, but ultimately imperfect transfiguration of the the skin alone. Very advanced, very dangerous - you must be incredibly talented to have pulled it off without causing any life-threatening reactions by your body - and not many people would have reason to ever even attempt such a thing unless it was seen as absolutely necessary...like a vampire trying her best to fit in. The second clue for me was the outfit and the attitude; it's all very, oh, could we say Shakespearean?" Hermione tried for a grin. "I'd thought you either had to be a vampire, or a traveling dramatic actor- actress, that is - I'm so sorry! And you said it was to help you get through dragging days, to add excitement, and, well, I'm highly knowledgeable about vampires, and I know you can't eat or sleep, and that physical contact just causes a numbing sensation, and that-" Hermione cut herself off quickly, dropping her head for a moment. "Anyway, there were a few other clues too, but the most important one I think was...well, your eyes," she finished, rushed and flushing with mortification and remorse at her slip-up.
"My...eyes?" Adelyn said slowly, her entire act dropping for the first time, for a brief moment. Then she laughed, doubling over and slapping at her knees, and it was back. She smiled widely, extended a hand to Hermione like she was going to ask her to dance. "I would have to ask that you explain that one to me, Ms. Granger."
"They're - they're old eyes," Hermione struggled to say. "There's weariness, loneliness, pain and loss, and...and it's all a lot more than I've ever seen in anyone before. You've lived longer than most - longer than any normal human, any normal mage."
"Indeed," Adelyn answered, her voice a low, throaty growl. She wandered off to the left, passing in front of them all, then she turned and stepped right up to the edge of the cliff. One more step and she would go over. She raised her arms and tilted her head back, letting her hair whip in the winds. "Oh, the life I've lived...longer than you could ever comprehend..." She looked over her shoulder, taking them all in with narrowed eyes. Her lips were curved downward. "A life of misfortune, curses and tragedies untold. Indeed, agonies inexpressible by these lips of mine. But alas, such is the fate of a vampire. Doomed are we to eternally experience the worst this world has to offer. Would there were a way to expedite the process, I would gladly proceed toward a death. Any death at all. Yet I continue onward, for I am immortal. Forever young, yet forbidden by fate itself to do anything good and positive with said youth."
"Maybe, maybe not," said Annabelle, carefully stepping up next to Adelyn. She delicately touched the woman's arm. "If you want to join the movement, no one's going to refuse you - it's not like it's some exclusive club."
Adelyn's frown turned to a small smile; she looked down at Annabelle's hand on her arm, and stepped back from the ledge. "Thank you, Ms. Potter. It does me good to be invited so - and I accept. Those open arms of yours are truly remarkable. Oh, I feel so warm inside!" She cocked her head and threw Hermione a sly little grin. Hermione responded with a half-hearted smile and an ashamed duck of the head.
"Excuse me, but I need to get back to my village and see to my eggs," Anju spoke up. She cast a sidelong look at Gertrude. "If others would care to join me...?"
"Of course - go," Annabelle said kindly. She drew her wand and her mirrortalker, and tapped it twice; two duplicates burst out of it like a dividing cell. "I want you to have these, in case you ever need or want to get in touch with me again," she explained, handing one to Anju and Gertrude, and the other to Oguk. "Just look into these mirrors and say my name when you want to talk to me. I'll always have mine on me, or at least nearby."
"I will see you again soon, I hope?" Oguk inquired of Annabelle. "We still need to fight."
"You'll get that fight," Annabelle assured zir. "But for now, Hermione and I-"
"Ah, 'Hermione and I, and Adelyn,'" Adelyn cut Annabelle off, perfectly and instantly mimicking her inflection and even her pitch. She threw up her hands and smirked. "For I shall accompany you for the foreseeable future, if you are to allow it," she added, in a mock-innocent little voice.
"Right," Annabelle said, that feeling of being thrown coming back. "The three of us will be heading to North America to look into the whereabouts of a friend of ours - of myself and Hermione, that is."
"Well, not a friend," Hermione put in immediately, scowling. "More like...this person that we know who's not really in our lives at all anymore, but when she was we weren't exactly happy to be spending time with her, but we still feel obligated to go and see to her safety because-"
"Okay, my friend," Annabelle cut across, exasperation seeping out of her. "No one else's. Just. Mine." She looked to Oguk, Anju and Gertrude. "It was nice meeting you and talking with you - some of you again. Thank you for pledging yourselves to the movement, early as it is right now."
Oguk gave a simple nod, then sat on the grass cross-legged and shut zir eyes. There was a moment of silence, and then ze faded away into thin air with a sweeping wave of blue particles, that started from the top of zir head and went down to zir bottom.
Anju smiled a fierce raptor smile at Gertrude. "We will go now, too."
"I can't do that," Gertrude said, staring in amazement at the empty spot of grass where Oguk had just been.
"You won't have to," said Anju. She flapped her wings mightily, hovered in the air, then she swooped down on Gertrude and snatched her up in her talons, gripping her by her upper arms. Another several, large flaps and Anju was soaring out over the ocean with her passenger. She banked wide and came back toward the cliffs. She swept right over Annabelle's head and continued on into the distance of inland, in the direction of her village.
Annabelle looked to Hermione and Adelyn, and she couldn't help the smile that came over her then. "All right, if you two are ready to go, we can go too."
"I assume you'll need a hand for this?" Adelyn said, offering hers to Annabelle with another of her little flourishes.
"Have you never apparated before?" Hermione asked, shocked. She slipped her hand into Annabelle's.
"Vampire's life," said Adelyn, with a helpless shrug. "In my witching days, I never quite got around to learning it, and once I became a vampire I lost the ability completely."
"Right," Annabelle nodded, taking Adelyn's hand. "It's an uncomfortable sensation, and it's a bit frightening when the world goes dark, but it's totally harmless as long as you don't move. That's an important thing about apparating: never make any unnecessary movements while in mid-apparition. You can lose body parts and even end up dead."
"Noted," Adelyn said earnestly.
Annabelle counted to three, and apparated.
DoubleTree Hotel, NYC
"I am just truly sorry to impose such additional monetary hardships upon you. I've never never wished in all my life to be such an absolute burden - or a parasite, I suppose, if we are to be more accurate here."
"It's fine, Adelyn," Annabelle spoke as she fell back onto her bed. "Just fine. The third person charges aren't too terrible, actually; they'll barely make a dent in my vault's nonmagic funds."
"Oh, how I could only imagine..." Adelyn's voice called into the bedroom as she wandered off into the suite's beautiful sitting room (two sofas and a television, and an amazing window view of the city). "What wealth you must have, being The Girl Who Lived! Historic, fabled, heroic! Yes, you must indeed be quite well off. Of course, I do wonder," Adelyn continued, her voice rising, and adopting a sly undertone. "if could even you imagine the wealth one might be able to accumulate if they were to, say, live three a thousand years of life, and live that thousand years without any need whatsoever to eat, drink, or sleep."
Annabelle sat upright as Adelyn strolled back into the room with a grin on her face that was the very picture of smugness. "Adelyn," she started, calmly as she could. "did you let me pay for you here when you could have just gotten your own room?"
"Well..." Adelyn set a hand on her hip and tipped her head back. "when you say it like that it doesn't sound all too kind, does it? But my concern was not monetary - it was group safety. Precisely the point that were we to room floors apart, we would leave ourselves both open to being assaulted and perhaps even abducted, and it would happen in such a way that the other might not discover it for hours. But of course, if you would feel more comfortable with my having my own room, I do believe the presidential suite would be to my satisfaction..."
"All right, exactly how rich are you?!" Hermione exclaimed from her bed, staring.
"At least three centuries of nonstop working, investing, and saving up rich," Adelyn answered casually. "If ever you would like, I could invite you to tour my private island - you could stay with me in my mansion home, even," she added, with a wide smile that seemed entirely innocent.
"You must be a billionaire," Annabelle said.
Adelyn raised a finger. "Trillionaire, actually; I have been for quite some time now, and I'm still counting up."
"Dear lord," Hermione muttered, shaking her head in disbelief.
"Yes, well, should you be so unfortunate as to live as long as I have, I think you'll find that even all the money in the world cannot bring you everything that matters," Adelyn sighed. No theatrics in this. Just weariness, just sorrow. Bitterness, too. She leaned against the dresser and shut her eyes. "In my very long, very detached existence I've lost several families I made the mistake of starting in the first place. Only one was due to old age - and that one was my happiest, my most...favored, if you can have a favorite family at all. As for all the others, they were taken from me by the vampire's curse. In one way or another, they were caught in accidents, abducted and tortured, or were murdered in the most random encounters with criminals of all sorts. In some ways, I suppose, you could say I'm like a bad luck charm. Everyone that I ever make the mistake of cherishing, I will lose them sooner rather than later. And everything I touch will quickly come to break, or end up destroyed in some otherwise inexplicable manner."
Adelyn drew in a harsh, ragged breath, and a tear escaped her eyes. "Luckily for me, I have the magic to constantly keep repairing things around me - but unluckily, the same magic rarely allows me to stop the people around me from suffering and dying just for coming close to me; I'm not often fast enough to catch the curse at work, and avert an incident. Which is why, up until a point about twenty years ago, I had spent a solid decade doing my best to stay isolated, solitary as anyone could ever be, because I was just tired of watching this all keep happening after so long of it." She opened her eyes and looked at Annabelle and Hermione, anguish deep within them. "But then, I began to hear about some intriguing new changes in the world - some things brewing, rising - and I thought to myself...give going out into the world another chance, why don't you? Do your best to help it along, contribute as much as you can. Maybe the curse has waned after so long alone. Maybe you can do something good again and not have it crumble before your eyes this time. Just one time. Just once..."
"I think I might know something that could help you with that," Hermione said quietly, suddenly, gazing at Adelyn with total sympathy. "It's a fairly recent potion, only really refined and made available to the public in the last several years, but...it's called Felix Felicis. It's said to bring people good fortune. It's a highly advanced, complicated thing, but it might be capable of counteracting your curse, mightn't it? If your curse is, as you say, something that brings you and those around you a case of bad luck?"
"Ahhh," Adelyn sighed, pressing a hand to her chest. "What is this feeling inside me now? Ah yes: hope. Ten years of exile, and I chose to return to the world because of hope. I dared to hope again. And now, I meet you, and you offer me something to even further stoke this fire called hope...Felix Felicis, you say? I've nothing to lose by testing it out, no..." She gave a little hum, thoughtful. "Yes, I'll have to get my hands on a batch of this brew soon," she decided. "Thank you, Ms. Granger."
"Please, call me Hermione."
"And call me Annabelle, if you'd like."
Adelyn smiled at them. "Well, as you both wish."
"On the matter of group safety; you can stay in the room with us," Annabelle informed. "And you don't have to pay your fee, I'll keep handling it."
Adelyn nodded - wiped the tears from her face - and strode from the room very quickly.
August 20, 1998
The next day, they had decided to go to the Grand Magi Library of NYC, in hopes of finding information on Felix felicis and on the fairy magic Confiance and her people used, so that they might discover a way to track and contain her properly.
It was during their walk about the city when Adelyn's "bad luck charm" kicked in for the first time for Annabelle and Hermione to witness.
Adelyn moved with speeds faster than that of any average human. She was a blur as she leapt forward and tackled the child, taking him out of harm's way just as the metal beams fell. She got up and brushed herself off. She hastily questioned the boy with, "Are you hurt? No? Good - get back to your parents," and she then continued down the sidewalk like nothing had happened. Her pace was such that Annabelle and Hermione had to nearly run to catch up with her again.
"That was amazing!" Hermione exclaimed, catching Adelyn's arm and giving her a great big smile.
"That time, it was," Adelyn snapped, pulling her arm out of Hermione's grasp and setting off again. Her head was on a swivel again, and her jaw was set. Her every limb was tensed now. She looked over her shoulder at Hermione, not breaking stride. "In past, I've not been so quick. How many children have you watched die because of you? Toddlers? Infants? Newborns in the hospital? No matter where I am, or who I'm around, my curse doesn't discriminate, Ms. Granger! The curse does not care for the innocence or age, or the fact that someone was born without arms or legs, nor for some unfortunate mental illness or intellectual disability that one may have! If they are in close proximity to me, they will suffer!"
"You almost talk like your curse has a will of its own," Annabelle observed. Having witnessed its effects now, firsthand and for the first time, her hand was gripped around her wand inside her coat, and her own gaze had taken up a sweeping vigil of the immediate area. Maybe if there were three magical individuals around who were prepared to counter the effects of the curse...maybe incidents, injuries and fatalities could be prevented at a much higher rate of success than was Adelyn's usual.
"Most days, I'm almost certain that it has to have one," said Adelyn tersely. "Some rudimentary intellect, some minuscule degree of thought - some ability to choose, to plan. Some days it's more malevolent than others, you see; some days it kills outright, other times it seems content to simply cripple, maim, or just inconvenience. And every day, regardless, I can't afford to stand around and wait and see which one it's going to be."
"Well, let's get to this library as fast as possible, then," said Annabelle.
After a whole hour of researching and discussions with the librarian and his attendants, Annabelle noticed a strange sight. A bird in the window, perched and almost pressing its beak against the glass. She pointed this out to Adelyn and Hermione, and got an unexpected response from Adelyn. Her head whipped around, locking onto the bird instantly.
The raven in the windowsill of the grand magical library cocked its head at them, almost like it was responding to their attentions.
"We need to leave," said Adelyn, her self-transfigured, normalized skin paling deeply. In a way, she looked how Annabelle imagined she would look without it. The look on her face as she gazed at the raven... "Please, let's leave," she said loudly, whirling on Annabelle and seizing her wrist with a grip so tight Annabelle couldn't help but cry out in pain. "I'm serious, Annabelle, do it right now: apparate!"
Annabelle, rather than choosing to stand around and question Adelyn on why she was in such a panicked, terrified state over a raven in the window, chose to apparate, on account of the fact that logically Adelyn would not just be having a near panic attack over a stray bird. She closed her eyes and concentrated on getting back to their hotel room, but she found herself still standing there after reopening them. "Important magical library - anti-apparition charms on the building," she told Adelyn, with a frustrated shake of the head.
"Then throw up some protective enchantments and keep him as far away from us as possible!" Adelyn said quickly. She had released Annabelle, and was now turning to flat-out run through the massive, winding library to the back of the building.
Annabelle gave Hermione a look, and they both obeyed Adelyn without much question; they started off after the panicked woman, throwing up protection spells and barriers every few feet as they navigated the endless, twisting shelves.
"Who is he? The raven - the animagus, right?" Annabelle asked.
Adelyn shook her head, pressing herself to the wall like a cornered animal. "He's my son," she whispered, in a voice filled with horror. "And if he's finally caught up with me, then the odds are my daughter is close by as well. Please, help keep them away from me. Please...dear god, please..."
Minutes passed, and the sounds of spells were heard echoing elsewhere in the great library. More and more frequently they came, and louder and louder. Closer and closer, overlapping footsteps were heard until...
Two teenagers came around the bend - identical in appearance and age (fourteen or fifteen, Annabelle would have guessed), save the differences of sex, demeanor, and clothing. Adelyn's daughter had long, shimmering black hair and olive green eyes - these eyes were narrowed and furious, fixated on Adelyn alone. The girl stood tall, her head raised and her fists balled, her whole attitude one of aggression. Adelyn's son, on the other hand, was standing almost behind the girl, his shoulders slumped, his head bowed, and his skin a sickly pale. On his head was a hat, jammed so far down it almost covered his eyes. He was afraid, he was frail - Annabelle could see it about him.
"Mother," spoke the girl, making that one word alone sound like an accusation and a curse, with the way she spat it out. She curled her lip and took several steps forward, jutting her chest out in pure challenge. She either expected, or actually wanted a fight.
Adelyn, speechless, cast a pleading look at Annabelle; Annabelle quickly raised her wand and threw up another barrier between them and the kids.
"Listen," Annabelle began, cautious and compassionate as she could be. "for your own safety, Adelyn doesn't want either of you two to get any closer than this. She carries a curse inside of her, and this curse is dangerous to everyone in her vicinity. I've seen it myself, and I don't want to see it hurt you two any more than Adelyn does - than your mother does."
"Bullshit," the girl snarled, stalking up to the barrier and slamming a fist to it. "Bullshit! You and that other lady are in there right now with her, and you're just fine!" She pressed her face to the barrier and locked eyes with Adelyn. "We look for you for years, and now we've found you the only excuse you can come up with for never wanting to see us is some kind of doom-and-gloom curse? And you don't even think it's believable enough to spill out at us through your own mouth? You have to have some- some- who even are these people to you? Who are they, that you'd make them say it for you?!"
Adelyn made a choking noise, shook her head. "I- it's not an excuse. It's real, and it's the reason why I left your mother-"
"Before we were even born!" the girl cut across, driving her fist into the barrier a second time; and this time, a blue ripple of energy appeared where her hand made contact. "Mom told us you did that - but never why. But whatever reasons you had, she didn't have to lie to us about it, and neither do you - not when we're right here! Look, if you just never wanted kids and- and we were a mistake you made, and you didn't want to deal with it, then just get some guts and tell us! It won't make us forgive you, it won't make us any less pissed off with you for abandoning us and mom all these years, but it'll at least be the truth. It'll at least be something. Anything but some moronic, I was cursed so I decided to never see you again to protect you thing. That's stupid, lame, fairy tale bullshit, mother, and I'm not having it. Nothing you say or do is going to make you look good to us...so just give us the truth."
"I never thought I would look good to you if this day ever came, no matter what I could say or do," Adelyn admitted, her breath hitching as she held back a sob. "You want the truth from me? This is it. This is all there is: I'm a vampire." She raised a finger and jabbed it against her forehead, and her skin shifted and shimmered, the color draining from it. Her eyes turned black. She bared her teeth, and two long fangs sprouted. "You're school aged, you have to have learned about vampires by now, right? Well I'm a vampire, and I have the vampire's curse. I left your mom when she was still pregnant because I couldn't stay with her, or in your lives once you were to be born, knowing that if I did stick around I'd be giving you all lives of misfortune. Accidents, losses, tragedies, sadness and pain and anger...I couldn't have stayed and given you all that, and ever called myself a good person for it!"
"This is the truth," Adelyn spoke gently, in a trembling voice. "Erika, Jack...this is the truth, this is what you came for, and now you have it, and now I have to ask you to get away from me. Get away, stay away, and go back home and forget you ever found me. I'm not going to watch you two get hurt or killed because of me, so don't make me watch it happen. Please."
Erika didn't move. She didn't speak. Her face fell, and she let her fist slide down the barrier to her side. She stepped back from the barrier, and then she threw herself bodily at it. She slammed into it with her shoulder, again and again, and she screwed up her face and screamed as she did. Adelyn's son, Jack, finally came to life; he raised his arms and directed his palms at the barrier, a look of utter focus on his thin, pale face.
Annabelle watched them work at her barrier, watched them undo every enchantment she had made - and then she watched it fall. The teenagers broke through; Erika moved swiftly toward Adelyn, and when she reached her mother she swung a fist at her. Adelyn could have avoided it, Annabelle knew she could have - had seen her speed before - but she just stood there and took it. She probably felt like she deserved it.
Erika swore, grabbed at her injured hand, but she never looked away from Adelyn. "I don't care," she said, her breath ragged. "Vampire or not, vampire's curse or not, I don't give a damn, mother - because you're my mother. We've spent fourteen years looking for you, looking to get answers out of you, and we're not leaving you alone until we know everything."
"If you just want to know my history, then I can tell you that," Adelyn said quietly, fearfully averting her gaze from her daughter. "But I'll only tell you over mirrortalker - or telephone, whatever you'd feel most comfortable with. We can talk, if you're really set on it, but please, please, you can't be anywhere near me like this again." She glanced at Annabelle. "Could you give them a mirror, and the number to our hotel room's phone?"
Annabelle nodded; she duplicated a mirror, as she had for her new friends made back in Scotland, and she conjured up a slip of paper with the number to their hotel room on it. She offered mirror and slip out to Erika. Both were snatched up in an instant, and without even a glance at Annabelle's face.
Erika stomped away from her mother and handed the mirror and the paper off to her brother. "Let's go," she told him shortly. With slow movements and a face wincing with pain, Jack followed his sister away.
The group was just leaving the grand magical library, when a man appeared out of thin air and flashed a wand at them. There wasn't any introduction, no taunting, nothing. Just the attack. It caught them all off guard - except Adelyn.
Adelyn tackled the man and rolled with him into the middle of the intersection. They both jumped to their feet just as a loud horn blared. A truck slammed on its brakes, but it was too late; it hit them both. Adelyn was sent flying, and the man went up over the truck's hood.
"Mom!" Erika made to rush into the streets, but Annabelle caught her with a nonverbal Body-Bind Curse, freezing the girl to the spot.
"Don't come closer!" Adelyn yelled - at all of them. The warning was as much for Annabelle and Hermione as it was for her children.
Annabelle went to apparate the kids away, but she suddenly found herself falling flat on her face due to one of her boots suddenly tightening around her foot. The boot squeezed her foot so hard she felt a loss of circulation, and then there was a crack as her ankle exploded in pain. Oh. Goddammit, Adelyn.