Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or Harry Potter.
Consul of the Underworld: End of Disc 1
Chapter Seventeen: Nostalgic Trip Down Wizarding Lane - Family Edition
Beta: ShadowofAxios
The day after the gala, Alkaid and Pyrrha paid a visit to the former's godfather, Sirius Black, and honorary uncle, Remus Lupin, at Sirius's London townhouse, 12 Grimmauld Place. A trip that they had naturally made alongside their daughters, Mina, Gracie and Kura.
"So Sirius, you got a new House Elf." Alkaid observed as the aforementioned Elf, Misty, led the girls off to begin a tour of the ancestral Black property so the adults could talk in private over some tea in the townhouse's sitting room.
"Had to." Her godfather shrugged. "Kreacher is old. I needed to take on Misty so he has a chance to train her up. Plus, I'm considering restoring the old Castle Black and moving back out into the countryside. And if I do, it means I'll need a bigger staff. You could say that hiring Misty is an experiment for that."
"You want to restore your family's old castle?" Pyrrha asked as she sipped at her tea. "Why? London not doing it for you?"
"Honestly? Not really. I lost more than a decade in Azkaban and things changed a hell of a lot in that time so when I came back, everything was just off." Sirius confessed. "Even being back almost as long hasn't helped with that."
"So you're thinking of moving to a restored Castle Black which has been in ruins even before you'd been born and so holds no difficult memories for you, so you can essentially start from scratch instead?"
"About right, Alkaid." Sirius nodded. "But enough about me. I have a question for you two."
"Yes," Remus added whilst looking at them disapprovingly. "Why weren't we invited to your wedding?"
Alkaid had the grace to blush. She knew the question had been coming. Both Sirius and Remus had both expressed their displeasure at having not been given a chance to attend her wedding through their letters. And unlike their friends who had been mollified about it through said correspondence, the two men harped on it constantly.
"It was a very spontaneous thing." The daughter of Hades explained for the umpteenth time.
Considering it had involved Hera, the goddess of marriage, overhearing her thoughts about wanting to marry Pyrrha right then and coming down from Olympus to force them to carry through with the whimsical thought, categorizing it as spontaneous was a gross understatement.
"Yeah." Pyrrha agreed. "It was basically a Vegas wedding if you get the reference."
"We do." Sirius assured her even as Remus nodded.
"Yeah, well, then you'd get it when I say that we didn't think we'd go through with the ceremony before we actually did."
Alkaid nodded. "There was simply no time to send out invitations. Though that won't be the case when we get around to renewing our vows and the accompanying reception."
"You'll definitely be getting invitations to those." Pyrrha added reassuringly.
"We better." Remus said with a frown. "We would be most cross with you if we don't."
"Exactly." Sirius added with a grumpy look, though it quickly switched to one of open curiosity. "When do you expect to carry out the ceremony?"
The answer was 'as soon as possible once we win the Second Titanomachy', but sadly they could not tell her Wizarding family that. Alkaid had never revealed her parentage to them. Something that was initially out of a need to keep the fact she was raised by her father, Hades, from the other gods but which had become a matter of habit. Besides, she cared for Sirius and Remus enough to not want to drag them into the often dangerous world of the world of the gods. They had enough troubles living in the chaotic Wizarding World as is.
"Maybe for our fifth anniversary?" Alkaid deflected. "It's only been a year. It seems a little too soon to renew our vows."
"Though that date's not fixed in stone. We might bring it up or push it back based on what we feel is right. Either way, we'll be sure to keep you informed." Pyrrha added.
Both men nodded, mollified. For now. Alkaid was under no illusions that Sirius and Remus wouldn't complain about it again sooner or later. Missing out on their wedding really bugged the two men.
"On another note, Alkaid, Pyrrha, why is it that for being only married a year you two already have three kids?" Sirius asked teasingly. "Did you get inspired by Mina and go on an adoptionthon or something?"
"'Adoptionthon'?" Alkaid asked, crinkling her nose in distaste at the nonsense word.
"What else would you call suddenly adopting two new girls all of a sudden?" Sirius replied with a shrug. "Not that I'm not happy to have Gracie and Kura as part of the family or anything."
"They are wonderful children." Remus added with a smile.
"They are," Sirius agreed before continuing. "But it's kinda a surprise."
"Gracie and Kura needed someone to take them in and we were in a position to do so, so we did." Pyrrha said with a shrug. "It was as simple as that."
"Are you saying then that you would adopt any child you come across who needs a family?" Remus asked with a worried frown. "If so, there would never be an end to that!"
"No, we're not going to adopt every child we come across in need." Alkaid said with a roll of her eyes. "We know our limits. As it stands, three kids is enough for us. At least for now."
"That might change in the future, but yeah, like 'Kaidy said, we're happy being a family of five."
Sirius and Remus sighed at this.
"So basically what you told us in your letters?"
"Of course," Alkaid scoffed. "Did you expect our position on the matter to have changed, Sirius?"
"Expect? No." Remus said with an exasperated shake of his head. "Hoped? Perhaps."
"Well, sorry to disappoint you then." Pyrrha said sarcastically.
"Okay, okay, that's enough of the heavy stuff I think." Sirius said with a tired sigh as he picked up his tea cup and took a long sip of its contents. "Why don't we chat about something less heavy?"
"What do you have in mind?" Alkaid asked eagerly. She wanted to change topics as much as Sirius seemed to.
"You know your friends in the PBP's (People Betterment Party) latest move to go about discovering heirs to dead families among muggleborns?"
"We have discussed it over letters. Beyond that, we briefly heard about it at the gala last night as well." Alkaid answered with a nod. "What about it?"
"Wait! Wait! 'Kaidy, Sirius, how is this a lighter topic!?" Pyrrha asked, shooting the two of them incredulous looks.
Alkaid and her godfather just returned her question with unimpressed looks even as Remus chuckled.
"Surely, you know the answer by now, Pyrrha." Remus said as he finished laughing. "To them politics is a light topic."
Pyrrha groaned. "Yeah, I know. I just wished it wasn't the case. I love you 'Kaidy, but your love of politics is just weird! And you Sirius are an enabler."
The daughter of Hades just shrugged at her wife's accusation. "I am the way I am and as you said, you love me regardless."
Her reply had Pyrrha blushing prettily, much to Alkaid's amusement. That was sadly the only sign that she'd gotten under the daughter of Ares' armor however as in a bid to escape further embarrassment, Alkaid's wife swiftly turned towards Remus.
"Remus! So I heard you've started a home tutoring business for pre-Hogwarts kids?" Pyrrha said, pulling the Werewolf into a separate conversation.
Giggling lightly at her wife's antics, Alkaid turned her attention back towards her chuckling godfather. "Where were we?"
"The PBP's initiative to discover heirs to dead families among muggleborns."
"Ah, right." Alkaid nodded. "As I said, what about it?"
"Well, since I last wrote to you about it, the rumblings among the traditional Pureblood families have gotten louder than ever. They are really unhappy about it."
"I warned my friends at the gala about it. They promised that they are being cautious."
"Then you might want to do it again. 'Cos the latest things I'm hearing are concerning. A lot more so than what I told you about in my letters."
"Are there any signs that the traditionalists might be considering moving beyond rhetoric and politicking to more direct action?"
"Not yet, but they are on the verge of it." Sirius told her seriously. "They've been looking for allies. And based on the confidence behind some of the things that they have been saying lately, I'm thinking they might have found some. Powerful allies at that."
"Who exactly are these 'traditional Pureblood families' that we are talking about here? The Dark families?"
Sirius nodded. "Yeah. The Notts, the Carrows, and that lot."
The Dark families are the same ones who Blaise's investigations claim are supporting the Titans. Which means the powerful allies that Sirius was talking about are Grandfather and his ilk.
"The Malfoys?"
"Their current head, Draco, was a classmate of yours at Hogwarts wasn't he?"
Alkaid nodded.
"Well, then you'd be pleased to hear that he has more sense than Lucius ever did. It seems he's trying to keep them neutral this time."
"I am pleased to hear that," Alkaid agreed with a sigh of relief.
Draco Malfoy had been her classmate at Hogwarts after all and after his father's death, at her hand, he had matured substantially. Such that, by the time they had graduated, he had become almost a decent person. Thus hearing that he had chosen neutrality instead of supporting the Titans was a relief.
It means I won't have to kill him. It would've been a shame to have to do so after all he's grown.
"You wouldn't happen to have an idea of what they are up to, would you, Sirius?"
"No firm details, unfortunately." Her godfather said with a shake of his head. "I do know they have set up some kind of meeting ground at the edge of the Forbidden Forest. The Carrows bought a decent chunk of land on the edge of the Forest just outside of the Hogwarts property line. They claim they want to build a new residence there that's closer to the school, but considering it's been months and there's no sign they've even laid any foundations-"
"You suspect they're up to no good? An attack on Hogwarts perhaps?"
"I don't think they'd be that daring." Sirius said with a shake of his head. "Not after what happened to the last group who tried that, but I can't rule it out either."
"I'll check it out and see if I can find out what the Dark families are up to."
"Be careful, Alkaid. I know you're a sorceress and all, but that doesn't make you invincible."
Alkaid was just about to reassure her godfather that she would take every precaution when Mina's excited voice boomed from just outside the sitting room. "Mum, Mama, we're back~!"
Abandoning her reply, the daughter of Hades just offered Sirius a nod before turning to face the door.
She was just in time to see her rambunctious middle daughter race into the room with Kura trailing behind her whilst Gracie and the House Elf, Misty, followed more sedately after them. Her oldest daughter was even apologizing to Misty for her sisters' unruliness as they did so.
"Welcome back, girls." Alkaid greeted her daughters. "How did you like the tour?"
That night, Alkaid and Pyrrha, once more donned the furs gifted to them by the Norse All-Father, and accompanied by the even more bundled up Mina, Kura and Gracie set out for the Carrow property on the edge of the Forbidden Forest just outside the grounds of Hogwarts that Sirius had mentioned during their visit with him earlier in the day.
"Now girls, what are the ground rules?" Alkaid asked with a soft clap of her hands to get the wandering attention of her little brood.
Kura and Gracie especially seemed charmed by the magical forest. It might escape the notice of the unobservant, but the very air of the Forbidden Forest was suffused with magical energy, at least more so than an average wood. Add in the abundance of magical flora and fauna, some more obvious than others, and Alkaid was unsurprised that her daughters were distracted.
Despite this, being the obedient girls that they were, they readily responded to Alkaid's prompt and quickly turned their attention towards her as requested. And as they did, Alkaid was looking through the eyes of Rhip as he scouted ahead from the sky, giving her a wonderful view of the camp that held their prey.
Let's see, some middling Wizards, both Greek and wizarding monsters and a small group of Dementors? Not too bad, though Mina will have to focus on the Dementors first. I hope she remembers that I told her to do that if the things are present as they clearly are. I'd rather Gracie didn't have bad memories dredged up.
At the center of the camp full of monsters was a large hearth which burned with the green flames of a Floo connection. One that Alkaid was fairly sure linked to a Titan base somewhere in the States.
Can we use it as a possible avenue of attack? No, too risky. We have no idea what could be on the other side. We best focus on this camp and seal it off, just in case whatever is on the other side decides to come through and ruin our day.
The next target after the Floo connected hearth would have to be the many, many crates and pallets stacked full of various materiel that the Wizards were sending through the green flames. Materiel that took the form of potions, various magical items and even raw gold that must be to boost Othrys' funds.
Those supplies cannot be allowed to reach the Titans.
"Be sneaky and stabby!" Mina chirped, excitedly waving the butcher's knife and serrated dagger that she had chosen to arm herself with tonight like they were poms poms. "Starting with the Dementors!"
"Mess things up!" Kura cheered, clutching the straps of the cute red randoseru bag that the Zashiki-warashi had used an online store to purchase from Japan, filled with items looted from the house and which she could manipulate with her telekinesis.
"Make them squeal." Gracie smiled with a drip of sadism as she gripped the two hunting knives of a similar design to those used by the Hunters of Artemis that she had taken to using since Mina started training her in how to use blades.
"Good. Your mother and I will be there too. So if you get in trouble, remember to come to us." Pyrrha informed them sternly, her eyes demanding they comply.
"""Yes, Mama!""" They chorused.
What obedient little girls we have. Alkaid couldn't help but think with a pleased smile even as she conjured a shadow portal beside her.
"Good, now get into the shadow portal." Alkaid said as she connected the portal to the shadows in the center of the enemy camp. "We have corpses to make."
The moment Mina and the rest of her family finished stepping through the portal and into the heart of the camp of monsters, Mum began barking out her orders. "Everyone split up and go have fun!"
Mina couldn't help but feel giddy at her mother's command, her urge to feel the sweet sanguine lifeblood of her victims on her skin singing in her divine mind. She'd prefer if she was hunting down naughty street ladies, but still! Getting to hunt with Mum and Mama?! It was the best!
Giggling, she had the fog of her personal pocket dimension, the Darkened Misty Metropolis, start to spill from her body. Fog that steadily grew thicker and more caustic. She made sure to tag her family as to not be affected by it if breathed in so as to avoid- What did Mum call it? Friendly fire mode? Yup that sounds about right.
Even with the cover of her magical fog, the goddess of serial killers didn't take any chances and went low like a lioness as she made every effort to hide her presence, effectively making herself disappear entirely from the perception of her prey. Thus hidden, she moved like the killer she was and closed with her first target.
It took her but a moment to get close and once she was in range, she lashed out with a low swing of her butcher's knife and hacked off the leg of some Wizard. His resultant screams alerted his friends to the fact that they were under attack and they responded by firing their silly spells at where she had been.
By the time the first of those spells even hit where they were aiming, Mina had already slinked through her fog until she was behind another of the stupid Wizards. And as they were busy attacking thin air, she leapt onto his back and shivved him in the lung five times.
Leaping off of him, a nasty Dementor tried to grab her but Mina just lashed out at the rotten thing with her dagger and took its head off. This left the cloak and the floating corpse hidden under it which were its remains to collapse to the ground in a lifeless heap that rapidly decayed away into nothingness.
Oh, right, Mum wanted me to take care of those nasty things first. Mina thought as she belatedly remembered what her mother had told her even before they set out for the night.
Apparently they made you feel all bad inside. And Mum was worried that if they got close to Gracie that they would make her remember the nasty time she spent with the Titan Army in the Labyrinth. When Mina learned they could do that, she instantly hated them. No one made her or her family feel bad! Anyone who did died.
Her mind filled with her hatred for these nasty creatures, Mina moved in a white and black blur, or like a Murder Blender as Mama loved to call her when she was being super bloodthirsty, and charged through the ranks of the Dementors. Each swing of her butcher knife or dagger, every stab and every slash left stinky, ugly black robes falling to the ground with howls of agony as these gross thingies met their final end in the face of her death dealing power as the goddess of serial killers.
The rest of the Dementors, realizing they were going to die horribly, attempted to flee. They wouldn't get far though. Mina would make sure of that.
"You're not getting away, you icky things! I'm not gonna let you mess with Gracie's head!"
Kura had to admit, when she begged to come on this outing, she didn't realize how limited she would be in a fight. When it came to Zashiki-warashi, she was powerful. Definitely in the top one percent of her kind. Her family, her source of her power, was just that powerful. Sadly, her kind just weren't very offensively powerful yōkai.
She didn't let that stop her however. There were ways around everything if you put your mind to it after all and so with a little thought, and admittedly some help from Mum, Kura had found a way to get past her weakness as a fighter. A workaround that saw her opening her cute randoseru she'd bought from her kind's homeland that she was wearing, one enchanted by Mum to carry far more than its normal capacity, and use her telekinesis to pull out her toys. Namely hundreds of pieces of cutlery.
The cost of them were cut from her allowance, but Kura felt it was super duper worth it!
"Fly my pretties!" She cackled like a witch, as her toys flew around her in a whirling storm of knives, forks and spoons.
They rained down like clanking hail, stabbing and bludgeoning the Wizards that she had picked out as her first set of victims. Her cutlery flew at them at dazzling speeds. Knives severed limbs, spoons broke bones and forks stabbed into faces. An assault that pulled from the hapless Wizards a beautiful song of agony.
The Wizards shot spells at her in response but they never got anywhere near her. She either had her cutlery hit their arms to throw off their aim as they fired or she sacrificed one of her toys to intercept whatever they cast. And when they tried one of the handful of spells which didn't seem to shoot beams from their wands, she just turned intangible. It seemed like the Wizards had nothing that could hurt her when she became incorporeal.
Kura was still busy finishing off the Wizards when there was a wolf's howl from her right. Turning towards it, she saw a small pack of doggy people running towards her.
"Hm? Mum said these things were called Werewolves, right? But they look so cute! Nah! Doggy people sounds like a much more fitting name for them." Kura mused as she used her telekinesis to pull even more cutlery out of her randoseru and sent this fresh wave of killer utensils shooting towards the doggy people.
The sight of which had them literally turning tail and attempting to flee.
"Run, run, run while you can~ You can't outrun me for I'm the, um, the silver wielding pretty girl of death!" Kura finished lamely, but it wasn't like it mattered! They were going to die and couldn't tell anyone she flubbed her super cool line!
"Um, uh, m-miss?" One of the doggy people addressed her frightfully as he turned back into a human and dove behind the cover of a conveniently placed tree.
"Yes, fresh meat?" Kura asked, politely not killing the now much more vulnerable man-shaped doggy person so he could tell her what he wanted to say.
"Um, silver doesn't kill us. That's all muggle nonsense."
What?
"What? But Greek werewolves die to silver!" Kura argued. Her Mama told her so!
"We're from Ireland?" Another piped up as he too abandoned his doggy shape to return to his man shape and throw himself behind a rock.
"Then how come you guys can change at will? Mum taught me that Wizarding Werewolves can't do that." Kura said with a pout as she finished killing the Wizards she'd first attacked and redirected the cutlery she'd been using against them to the pursuit of the doggy people pack. A pack whose number she'd already cut down by half.
"Why the hell are we talking with this thing?!" One of the more aggressive doggy people snarled as recognizing that Kura wasn't killing them as quickly if they became man-shaped, copied his smarter compatriots by transforming and diving behind a fallen log. "Kill it!"
He died with several knives and forks to the brain.
What a bad doggy person!
"Answer me!" Kura demanded with a stomp of her foot. Ew, she stepped in a puddle of blood. Gross. That was more Mina's fetish.
"If we answer you, will you spare our lives?" The first doggy person asked as Kura finished massacring the last of those who hadn't transformed back into their man-shapes and held the rest hostage with knives and other cutlery hovering dangerously in front of their various vital points.
"Sure." Kura promised easily.
"Our pack got a blessing from Lycaon, the first lycanthrope. It lets us shift whenever we want instead of being at the mercy of the moon." The smart doggy person said quickly.
"I see. I see." Kura said, nodding in understanding, before frowning. "Lame~!"
Her damning judgment of their fate made, Kura moved to carry it out.
With but a thought, all the cutlery she'd used to take the surviving doggy people hostage shot forward and cut off their arms and legs. As for the boys, she took off their penises too. And the girls, their breasts. Her Mum and Mama had taught her and her sisters that those were private parts and they couldn't show them to anyone but these naughty doggy people were running around with them all hanging out! Of course they needed to be punished. Besides, the T.V. taught her to spay or neuter pets.
"There! No more puppies for you!" Kura nodded, pleased with herself.
Leaving the now maimed doggy people to howl in agony as they slowly bled out, Kura quickly looked for more enemies to hunt and was pleased to see another pack of doggy people on the far side of the monster camp!
"More doggy people to play with!" She said, clapping her hands in excitement as she began racing towards her next group of playthings, her telekinetically manipulated cutlery following her as she moved like a deadly cloud.
Even as the rest of her family were doing their part in the extermination of the monsters, as one of the parents of said family, Pyrrha, was likewise doing her part. Thus the moment that Alkaid had given them the order to go ham on the enemy, she had slipped a hand into the black diamond embedded into the mithril bracelet that was the opening to Akoúo̱ (Listen)'s sealed space and pulled out several vials of Greek Fire bombs. Explosives that she readily threw at the mob of Dark Wizards and monsters nearest to her.
The blasts of mystical green flames that erupted from her bombs' detonations cut a deep path into the enemy's ranks and Pyrrha happily marched through it, occasionally using the flames that spat from the ruby embedded on the mithril bracelet that was Miló (Speak) to deal with any foolish opponent who thought that they could get in her way. In this way, she swiftly made her way into the very heart of one of the enemy's biggest concentrations whilst leaving piles of charred corpses behind her as signs of her passing.
As she almost casually strolled down the corridor of death that she had created, the daughter of war took a moment to check in on her family. The most notable of which was Kura, who, despite the roaring flames around her, could be heard laughing like a Saturday morning cartoon villain as she chased after a pack of Werewolves alongside a veritable tsunami of cutlery.
I'm thinking someone needs to have her T.V. time cut down. Pyrrha thought with a sigh before she turned to Mina and found that her middle daughter, just like Kura, was still chasing the small, and greatly reduced, group of Dementors in the same over top way as the Zashiki-warashi was pursuing her own prey.
Well, at least, no one can deny they're sisters. Pyrrha mused. Speaking of sisters, where's Gracie?
A quick survey of the battlefield soon showed her that her eldest daughter was dancing like a whirling dervish through a mob of the enemy, lashing out at every opportunity she had with her twin large Celestial Bronze hunting knives. Blades that were coated in Mist that seemed to alternate between taking on the properties of various elements. The seemingly ever shifting Mist sheathes making it so that one moment the knives were enshrouded in cutting winds, before becoming coated in flames next, before becoming surrounded in lightning shortly afterwards, and in turns, everything in between.
Pyrrha would have been worried for Gracie being so deep in the enemy ranks all alone. Hypocritical, she knows considering that was where she herself was, but she never said she wasn't. Besides as a mother it was her prerogative to worry excessively over her kid. Not that there was anything to worry about anyway since the daughter of magic wasn't alone. As even as she slashed her way through the enemy with her blades, her back was being watched by Mistform constructs she'd conjured that took the form of translucent, ghostly tentacles of varying size; and vaguely hound sized and shaped creatures whose exact features seemed to be in constant flux and thus remained indistinct.
It's not quite the same as what Mina and Kura are up to, but she's definitely got the same bloodthirstiness as her sisters. Pyrrha thought with an exasperated shake of her head as she watched Gracie's constructs tear one enemy to pieces after another without causing their creator to so much as bat an eyelid. Heck, her eldest seemed to be getting more and more hyped up the more enemies she killed, if the building bloodlust that, as a daughter of Ares Pyrrha could feel, building within Gracie was any indication.
I'm honestly curious, who do they get that from? Me or 'Kaidy? Pyrrha pondered even as she casually raised Miló to her side and used it to unleash a gout of flame that promptly reduced the idiot troll that had tried to charge her to ash.
Honestly! Trolls were weak to fire! Why the hell would the idiot charge through the flames already surrounding her!? Especially when it jolly well knew she had a flamethrower!? She knew trolls weren't the brightest but surely a creature that moronic would've been weeded out by evolution eons ago!
The daughter of war was pulled from her disparaging assessment of trolls when there were a series of sudden shouts to get away from nearby. Turning to their source, Pyrrha spied a group of Wizards opening one of the creature transport crates, wooden crates with air holes, that they had been about to ship through their illegal Floo connection and fleeing from it. Though not before one of them cast a quick Reviving Spell at the contents of the crate, rousing the creature within.
A creature that with an angry roar leapt out of its prison and revealed itself to be a beast with five legs, each ending in a clubfoot, and was covered with thick, red-brown hair.
Just great! Pyrrha thought with a frustrated sigh as she recognized the monster from her studies at Hogwarts. They've got a Quintaped.
Now, don't get her wrong, she wasn't frustrated at having to deal with a Quintaped. If anything she had a healthy respect of just how dangerous this particular breed of Wizarding monster could be. With incredible strength, a remarkable degree of spell resistance, impressive toughness, and a legendary viciousness, Quintapeds were not to be trifled with. And with her daughters on this battlefield with her as well, she was determined to kill it ASAP before it could endanger her girls.
No, her frustration came from the fact that Quintapeds were classified as XXXXX Beasts by the British Ministry of Magic. Which meant they were known for killing people and were thus supposed to be closely monitored and contained. So that one of these things was about to be shipped off to the Titans spoke of a level of corruption or incompetence that was galling.
I'm so siccing 'Kaidy on the Ministry after this! Seriously! Letting a Quintaped get into position to be anywhere near our girls? Utterly unforgivable! Pyrrha thought as she calmly drew her trusty labrys from Akoúo̱'s sealed space even as the XXXXX Beast finally noticed her presence and began charging towards her with a hungry roar.
"Surge, Water and Heaven!" She incanted as she raised her Celestial Bronze weapon over her head and channeled her magical energy into one of the gems socketed into it. "Tidal Slash!"
She completed her incantation in the same instant as she brought her labrys down in a powerful slash, the combined effect sending a tidal wave shooting from her weapon's blade towards the Quintaped. Said wave was only as narrow as her labrys' blade but it lost none of the fury of its larger counterparts for its small size. All that power hit the beast like an executioner's blade and neatly bisected the monster, sending the two parts of its corpse crashing to the ground in twin bloody smears.
Well, that was easy. Pyrrha mused disappointedly. They might be resistant to magic, but whilst the wave of my Tidal Slash is conjured by magic, its cutting power is purely physical.
Sadly, caught up in the moment, Pyrrha had forgotten one of the most important lessons taught to her in Heroing 101: don't jinx yourself.
Thus it was just as she was starting to get complacent that she heard a dozen more roars like the Quintaped's booming from around her. Glancing towards their source, she groaned as she saw the renegade Wizards had just opened another dozen of the creature transport crates that littered the area around her and released from within more of the five legged, furred monsters.
I guess I'm gonna be on pest control duty today. Pyrrha thought with resignation as readying her labrys, she charged at the newly unleashed monsters with a wordless warcry. One that was met with equal fervor by her bestial opponents as they too charged to see their battle joined.
"Todesdolch!" Alkaid cast as she conjured a small armory's worth of purple colored daggers that flew in the air courtesy of the magic which had conjured them and homed in on any and all targets within her vicinity. Once they found said prey, the blades proceeded to plunge themselves into their victims and promptly exploded without any need for Alkaid's input. A feature that was a useful upgrade from the blades conjured by the more basic Bloody Dagger spell from which Todesdolch was derived but which at the same time deprived the caster of the ability to use the aforementioned blades as anything but homing explosives.
Not that I need them to be anything but that at the moment. Alkaid thought idly as, for variety's sake, she switched spells.
"Axel Shooter, Phalanx Shift!" She incanted, conjuring hundreds of emerald bullets of magic all around her that promptly shot off in every possible direction and detonated in bursts of injurious magic amidst the enemy.
Enemies that were uniformly fleeing from her in terror as she casually used her various shooter and bombardment spells to decimate their numbers. The weaklings had tried resisting her at first by charging her or, in the case of those with the means, firing various ranged attacks at her. Unfortunately, Alkaid was simply too powerful for them. Any who attacked her were simply wiped out to a man by her spellfire.
And the worst thing? She wasn't even trying! Her rate of fire was languid at best and the mana she put into her spells were anemic. She hadn't even needed to use one of her spell cards, much less the full support provided by using Le Grimoire. All she needed to do to rout these bunch of lowlifes was lazily cast spell after spell.
She hadn't even broken a sweat!
Well, at least the lack of a challenge means I can better keep an eye on everyone else. Alkaid mused as she fired off an underpowered Επικαλούνται: βροχή φωτός (Invoke: Rain of Light) that sent a dozen low powered beams of light shooting from the equal number of magical circles that appeared behind her. Beams that literally carved through the enemy, decapitating and dismembering any unfortunate enough to get in their way.
Leaving the Επικαλούνται: βροχή φωτός (Invoke: Rain of Light) to continue its bloody work, Alkaid turned to check in on her daughters. She found to her satisfaction that they seemed to be having fun. Mina and Kura were happily playing cat and mouse with a mob of Dementors and a pack of Wizarding Werewolves respectively. For her part, Gracie wasn't toying with her opponents but she was still having a blast as she cut her way through a large concentration of the enemy whilst supported by some of her Mistform constructs.
The girls are fine but what about Pyrrha? Alkaid questioned as she turned away from her daughters and searched her surroundings for her wife.
It took a moment to spot her but when she did, what she saw Pyrrha dealing with had Alkaid frowning in concern. It seemed part of the war materiel that the Dark families had deigned to send to the Titans in exchange for their patronage had been Quintapeds. A dozen of which were her wife's current opponents.
She should be able to handle them just fine. Alkaid concluded. But it's probably best if I give her a hand.
Alkaid was about to put that thought into action, however before the shadows she was summoning around her to allow her to Shadow Travel to her wife's side could stabilize into a portal that she could step through, her instincts screamed a warning at her. Heeding her danger sense, the sorceress abandoned her efforts to teleport and threw her nearest arm out in the direction of the incoming danger.
"Exelion Shield!" She incanted, conjuring a multilayered round shield made out of green magical energy with her extended hand as the center.
A shield which was tested by the fiery orange beam of a powerful Blasting Curse. Said Wizarding curse under normal circumstances wouldn't have so much as strained a barrier as powerful as her Exelion Shield, however the current circumstances were decidedly not normal as though it failed to shatter Alkaid's barrier, the Blasting Curse still cracked her shield.
Despite that, Alkaid was unfazed and retaliated. "Plasma Lancer."
The lightning spell she had chosen was capable of conjuring the fastest projectiles she could launch but in spite of that, all that the spears of green lightning it sent flying back at the Wizard responsible for the Blasting Curse hit was empty ground.
"You'll have to aim better than that, Potter!" A pompous sounding voice taunted as he Disapparited well clear of the large cloud of dust created by her lightning spears impacting the ground where he had been standing just moments earlier.
Ignoring the taunt, Alkaid just looked at the man who had somehow proven himself well above the capabilities of the other rabble she'd been fighting today with some interest. He was blonde, had green eyes, and was well dressed by Wizarding standards but that wasn't ringing any bells for her.
"It seems you have me at a disadvantage," Alkaid said politely even as she took the lull in the fight, the other enemies having fled the moment this Wizard got her attention, to cast Multi-Defenser and give the spell the time it needed to create a comprehensive, multilayered, and powerful barrier around her. "May I know the name of the Wizard that I am dueling today?"
"You face Heracles Carrow, the Wizard who will kill you at last, Potter!"
Heracles Carrow? He's part of the Carrow family obviously but how exactly? To my knowledge, after a good number of the family had been killed or sent to Azkaban during the recent Wizarding wars, the Head and Heir are the twins, Flora and Hestia.
The two had been older Slytherins who had attended Hogwarts with her for a few years. What she had learned of their leanings had painted them as being supportive of the Dark side of Wizarding Britain's politics just like their family had historically. It was why she had been unsurprised when the camp she was currently raiding was found on land their family owned.
What did surprise her however was that a member of their family was standing out like this. Flora and Hestia had always kept a low profile at Hogwarts and had continued to do so even after graduation. They tended to do their best to support the causes they believed in without drawing too much attention to themselves. And a Wizarding family tended to follow the lead of their Heads and Heirs, so Alkaid had not expected to face a Carrow, of all people, in a Wizarding duel.
Even as she pondered this incongruity, Carrow had not been idle and had been pouring spellfire on Alkaid's Multi-Defenser. The fiery orange beams of Blasting Curses slammed into it alongside green beams of the Deprimo Spell that would've shattered the ground where she'd stood on if it hit; the blue of the object destroying Reductor Curse; and a whole host of others that the daughter of Hades did not take note of.
Her attention on that front was laxer than it really ought to be because even as she was pummeled by an unrelenting spell barrage, she was also counterattacking.
"Claíomh Solais!" Alkaid chanted, invoking the speediest of her bombardment spells and conjuring five intense emerald beams that screeched through the air from her position directly at her opponent.
Carrow, to his credit, responded to the sudden attack with remarkable speed. Abandoning his spell barrage, he attempted to Apparite to safety. But Alkaid had chosen Claíomh Solais for a reason. Not only was it the fastest of her bombardment spells to cast, it was also had one of the fastest moving attacks of that type of spell in her arsenal. And unlike with her Plasma Lancer earlier, the overconfident fool for some reason didn't seem to be expecting a counterattack this time or at least not one as swift as this. Thus he was still halfway through spinning on his heel to activate his Apparition when all five emerald beams of the sorceress' spell slammed into him.
What remained of him as the beams ran out of mana and petered out couldn't even fill a thimble. There was one notable exception to this fact though and as Alkaid Shadow Traveled to examine them in a bid to determine what had allowed Carrow to be so exceptionally strong for a Wizard, she noticed it immediately.
"A Game Boy Color?" The daughter of Hades said with a frown as she had some shadows gingerly pick up the out of place game system. Setting aside why someone would bring something like that to a fight, why would a Wizard, who were almost universally technophobes, have such a device in their possession?
The answer revealed itself the moment she probed it with her magic however. The device was no ordinary Game Boy Color. No, it was a divine artifact. One that she was more familiar with than she would've liked. It was the ability hacking artifact last known to be in the possession of the crazy son of Ioke that had tried to kill her during her sixth year at Hogwarts. It being one the artifacts the murderous rogue had looted from the many fellow Half-bloods that had ended up as his victims.
Okay! Who dropped the ball with this!? She thought angrily as she placed as many seals on the divine artifact as she could. Honestly! There are legions of daimons in service to Hecate and the other gods in charge of cleaning up after demigod battles, how could they let something this powerful fall into the hands of Wizards. Especially Wizards working for the Titans… Doh! Of course! Damn the Titans and their interference.
It took her a moment but Alkaid eventually ran out of sealing magic she could readily cast and so resigned to the fact that it was the best she could do in the situation, she tossed the troublesome Game Boy Color into the private shadow realm she could connect to via her Incantare: Umbra Spatium (Invoke: Shadow Space).
Now, with that out of the way, let's check who needs my help… The matriarch of the Potter family thought as she turned her attention to surveying the battlefield in search of anyone in her family which might need her assistance.
"Retreat! Carry as much of the supplies as you can and retreat!" The apparent leader of the Telekhines that Gracie was fighting shouted as she spun away from another of the sea daimons, gutting it with her knives in the process.
As the frost that the Mist which she had sheathed her knives with proceeded to freeze the Telekhine's corpse just as it collapsed into gold dust, leaving an empty ice sculpture behind, Gracie turned to look for her next opponent. Unfortunately, it seemed the Telekhines heeded their leader's call and were grabbing whatever war materiel they could get their hands on and were making a break for the green flames of the Floo connected hearth they were using as their link to the rest of the Titans's forces.
"Don't let them get away!" Gracie ordered her Mistform constructs, pointing at the fleeing Telekhines with one of her knives.
Heeding her commands, the Tentacles stretched towards the dog faced, seal bodied daimons and her Phase Hounds raced after them. The former stretched obscenely as they picked up one Telekhine after another and tore them to pieces. Her amorphous Hounds on the other hand, phased through every possible obstruction in their way as they ran down even more of the daimon smiths before ripping them apart with the vicious teeth and claws of their evershifting maws.
With that situation under control for the moment, Gracie nodded in satisfaction and turned to survey the battlefield to check in on her family.
Hmm… It looks like everyone is occupied. Gracie observed after a moment.
Nearby Sensei was fighting a particularly powerful Wizard whilst not far from her Mama was busy dealing with a pack of Quintapeds. As for her sisters, Mina and Kura were busy chasing after packs of their chosen victims, Dementors and Wizarding Werewolves, respectively.
Well, they are having fun it seems. Gracie thought with amusement.
"No! You're not gonna run away like cowards!" An Empousai standing in front of the hearth flanked by three of its kind and a pair of Laistrygonians shouted at the remaining Telekhines whilst they blocked the daimon smiths' path. "Not without at least putting up a fight against the Diplomats of Olympus! Do you know how many of our masters' plans that they've foiled! Do you want to be responsible for another such failed plan, little dogmen!"
Looks like there are about three dozen of them left. Gracie thought as she weighed her chances against the monsters that stood between her and the hearth where the Floo connection they needed to shut down to put an end to the aforementioned monsters' operation here. I can handle that.
Dismissing her now out position Tentacles, Gracie replaced them with other constructs. Six of them were Deep Ones, angler fish men with lobster claws that could spit fire. Another six were Nightgaunt Mistform constructs, vaguely humanoid sized and shaped creatures without eyes, ears or a mouth that sported leathery wings, inward-curving horns, and a whiplike tail with a barbed tip, and vicious talons on their hands and feet. In addition to her dozen existing Phase Hounds, she was sure she could take the monsters in her way.
"Are you crazy!?" The leader of the Telekhines asked incredulously as he gestured at Gracie and her small army of Mistform constructs. "She's been massacring us! And that's not counting the rest of her family who are doing the same to our allies! The smart move is to retreat with what supplies we can carry with us!"
"No, that's the coward's move." The leader of the Empousai said, prompting her three fellow flaming haired, winged, bloodsucking monsters to nod; and the eight-foot-tall cannibal giants with heavily tattooed arms and yellow pointed teeth that were backing them up to do the same whilst also brandishing the oversized crowbars they were armed with threateningly. "Now fight!"
"Um! Excuse me!" Gracie shouted, waving a raised hand to catch the enemy's attention. "Don't I have a say in this?"
The whole group of monsters in front of the hearth turned towards her.
"The only right you have is to die!" The Empousai declared as she pointed at her, gesturing at her fellow monsters to attack.
At her command, her three fellow Empousai leapt into the air with a powerful leap of their one prosthetic Celestial Bronze leg and one donkey leg whilst the Laistrygonians eagerly charged her on foot. The Telekhines were more reluctant about it but they too dropped the various boxes and crates they were carrying before turning and joining the giants in their charge.
"The only ones dying here today are you guys!" Gracie shouted back as she copied the lead Empousai and pointed at the charging monsters. "Go, my creations! Charge!"
Heeding her order, her Nightgaunts leapt into the air to engage the closing Empousai. Everything they did was absolutely silent and their tearing of the outnumbered bloodsuckers apart was no exception. Thus the only sounds from the aerial fight were the pained screams of the Empousai. At the same time, her Deep Ones began breathing fireballs at the Laistrygonians. The Telekhines were resistant to heat and as such fire-based attacks like those of her Deep Ones would have been all but useless against them, the Laistrygonians however had no such advantage. They thus were quickly reduced to gold dust as they were swiftly consumed by the flames that Gracie's constructs had shot at them. As for the Telekhines, they were swiftly dealt with by Gracie's Phase Hounds. The amorphous bodies of her dog-like constructs streaked through the ranks of the sea daimons as one by one, the monster fell and collapsed into gold dust.
The daughter of Hecate didn't even need to do anything on her own. Her constructs took care of everything and soon, there was only one last monster left.
"You were saying?" Gracie said, shooting a smirk at the Empousai who had led the monsters she'd just slaughtered to their deaths.
The vampiric monster just let out a furious growl and leapt at her. "Die!"
Unfazed, Gracie just rolled her eyes and leveled one of her knives at the closing monster.
"I think not." The eldest daughter of the Potter family said as she used her Mystiokinesis to manipulate the Mist sheathing the knife pointing at the Empousai, changing it into lightning and sending a bolt slamming into the monster.
The bolt surprisingly failed to kill the Empousai but Gracie wasn't too bothered by it as the monster surviving being electrocuted only managed to allow it a few seconds more to live. As though it did not kill it outright, the bolt had hit it with enough force that it was sent crashing to the ground and into the perfect position to be leapt on by the Phase Hounds, which promptly tore it to pieces.
"Well, that's done with." Gracie said dismissively as the last of the monsters was reduced to gold dust and she casually walked towards the hearth, readying her magic as she did so in preparation to seal the Floo connection.
"Can you do it on your own, Gracie?" Sensei asked from behind her, startling the daughter of Hecate.
Turning behind her, she saw that her whole family - Sensei, Mama, Mina and Kura - had gathered behind her. Even Rhip was there, with the raven perching on Sensei's shoulders.
"You're all done?" Gracie asked her family in surprise.
""Yup~!"" Mina and Kura cheekily sang together.
Mama chuckled at them but nodded at Gracie. "Yeah, we're all done."
"That we are." Sensei added. "So as I was saying, do you think you can seal the Floo connection on your own, Gracie?"
"I am, Sensei." Gracie assured her mentor in the magical arts and adopted mother.
"Okay." Sensei said with a nod, gesturing for Gracie to proceed. "Go ahead then."
Gracie nodded and turned her attention back to the green flames of the hearth that was at the center of the sacked monster camp. Channeling her magical energy into the Mist at her command, she surrounded the blazing green fire before her in a cocoon of the mana suffused, reality warping fog. She then had the Mist begin to smother the magic within the Floo flames. She faced resistance of course, but that was easily overcome with a little boost to the mana she had enhanced the Mist with. Thus, within minutes the hearth, both the green flames of the Floo connection and even its normal flames, found themselves forcibly put out.
"And done!" Gracie crowed with triumph.
"Great!" Sensei said, clapping her hands together enthusiastically. "Can we trust your constructs to do the cleanup for us, Gracie?"
"Gladly." Gracie said as she conjured dozens of Phase Hounds and proceeded to order them to do just that, with her various constructs, both old and new, moving to consume any and all evidence of the destroyed monster camp.
"Good." Mama said with a nod. "Then let's head back to your Grandma's."
""Yay~!"" Mina and Kura cheered happily.
Sensei smiled and conjured a shadow portal. "Then let's head home."
""Home, home! Home we go!"" Mina and Kura sang as hand in hand they skipped through Sensei's portal, much to Gracie and their parents' amusement. Her little sisters could be so cute!
"Come on, Gracie. Let's go." Mama said as she wrapped an arm over the daughter of Hecate's shoulders.
"Okay." Gracie said with a smile and a nod as she let Mama guide her into the portal as Sensei followed behind them. "Home, home! Home we go!"
What? She was a Potter daughter too, you know? Of course she had a bit of whimsy in her too.
The next day after a good night's sleep and a nice little lie-in, Pyrrha sat at a wrought iron table in the garden of her family's ancestral Welsh estate across from 'Kaidy, Gracie and her Mum.
"Honestly, Mum, you didn't need to skip breakfast just so you could eat with us." Pyrrha chided her mother as the four of them ate brunch whilst they watched Mina; Kura; Rhip; and Hatter, Mina's pet, the tophat wearing, man-eating Flemish Giant Rabbit, having fun chasing the Rockwell gnomes that helped protect the Branwen Estate around. "We had a late night and so woke up late but you didn't need to starve yourself on our account."
"Nonsense, Pyrrha." Mum said, waving the protest away. "It's not like I'm skipping a meal, I'm just waiting to have it alongside my daughters and grandchildren. That's hardly a sacrifice."
"You still didn't need to make it, Jane." 'Kaidy said countered. "You could've eaten earlier and just had tea whilst we ate."
"They're right, you know, Grandmother." Gracie said, taking a break from demolishing the plate of food she'd stacked for herself to pout at Mum.
Mum rolled her eyes at them but nevertheless conceded. "Alright, alright. I guess I could've eaten after all."
"Wow! I've actually managed to convince you of something, Mum? It might be a first." Pyrrha said with a laugh as she pushed away her finished plate, only to have it be teleported away by one of her Mum's House Elves, and she reached for her cup of tea.
"Haha, Pyrrha. Very funny. You make me sound so unreasonably stubborn." Mum said, shooting her a frown.
"Teasing her parents is a daughter's prerogative." Alkaid cut in, winking at Gracie and causing their daughter to blush.
"I think I'll leave that to Mina and Kura actually." Gracie quipped back.
"Oh, I'll throw that back at you the next time you tease us then." Pyrrha told their eldest with a grin.
"Fair." Gracie said with a nod as she picked up her tea cup and took a sip.
"It's really so good to have you guys here." Mum said, offering them a smile.
"It has been a pleasure to be here for us as well."
"Yup! Sensei's right. It's been fun!" Gracie agreed with a smile of her own.
"Oh? Are you talking about the whole stay or just last night, Gracie?"
"Both." Their eldest insisted. "Spending time with you has been great, Grandmother. And helping Sensei and Mama clear out those rogue Wizards and monsters was wonderful too."
"Really?" Mum asked skeptically.
Gracie nodded.
"Okay, and do you think your sisters would agree?"
"Considering how much fun they've had the past few days? I'm sure of it."
"Hmm… I'll trust you on it, Gracie." Mum said with a nod. "Then I'm glad. What about your mothers though…"
"We've enjoyed our time here too." Alkaid replied to Mum's incompletely voiced question.
"Yeah. Catching up with our Wizarding friends and family was great." Pyrrha added. "And, of course, so was getting to catch up with you, Mum."
"If that's the case then maybe you should visit more often, no?"
Pyrrha exchanged a look with Alkaid before after a long moment, her darling wife replied for the both of them. "Uh, we will try to do so more in the future."
"Good!" Mum said with a smile before she glanced at Gracie's tea cup and noticed she was running low. "More tea, sweetie?"
"Yes, please."
As Mum topped up Gracie's tea cup, Pyrrha shot her wife a sharp look and received a nod in return. A wordless promise on the daughter of Hades' part that she would do her best to visit more often.
Which would be nice. Visiting Mum is nice.
Done and done! Thanks to Nameless and Axios as always!
Whoo! Now that was a fun-fun time, huh? Nothing like a wholesale slaughter to bring the family together, am I right people? Hope you enjoyed how we had the girls handle things. Mina could have done all of it, as a goddess, but she knows sharing is caring. Sharing the blood of your enemies is a sweet gesture on her part. Kura using the home's cutlery was just plain funny to use, even her little backpack is a homage to her birthplace. Gracie being a maddened Lovecraftian construct maker was too good to pass up and it's always a treat to see her in action. Alkaid and Pyrrha have gotten a lot of combat spotlight so not much has changed on their strats and fighting styles, so I hope it was still enjoyable! Over all, it felt wholesome and bloody, a perfect day for our little murder family.
Nameless: I hope you guys liked this little excursion by Alkaid, Pyrrha and their girls to destroy those rogue Wizards. It's been a while we've had any action in the Wizarding World hasn't it? Hope this return to the old stomping grounds, as it were, was a fun time. We certainly had fun writing it. That said, a number of you might be wondering why we left so much of said action to the imagination by cutting away from the fights as we did. The answer is simple. It would've gotten a little repetitive if we didn't. We gave you enough to imagine what happens next so we left the rest for you to fill in. Besides, most of the time, I'd bet your imagination could outdo anything we'd write.
E4E: You know what to do! Smash that review button and tell us what you love! No flames and peace off my peeps!
