The Ballad of a Broken Heart | Cedric Diggory

7

I've been told, I've been told to get you off my mind
But I hope I never lose the bruises that you left behind
- Bruises by Lewis Capaldi
-

"That's who you called?" Bane's voice was beyond furious.

"Is there a problem?" Luna looked towards Cedric, confused, but also weary. It took all the self-control Cedric had to not throw Luna as far away from the door as possible.

"Luna, please step away from her." Cedric's voice was compelling and deadly soft like velvet.

"Almost as intimidating as Bane's, but not quite," the voices told him with a mocking laugh.

"This friend of yours that you thought could be trusted tried to sell me out!" Cedric watched as Bane clenched and unclenched her fingers, poison dripping from them and sizzling on the glass floor.

Luna narrowed her eyes, turning almost as furious as Bane. "Cedric, is that true?" Her brows furrowed.

Cedric deigned her no response.

"Blondie, you've now sold me out exactly as you promised you wouldn't. I've been patient and reasonable, but I'm afraid my patience is at an end. This is the last time I'm going to ask you to move." The leash Bane was holding on her powers seemed to be breaking as the poison slowly started to make her entire body glisten.

"Wait!" Luna pleaded. "Cedric, you will not sell her out." Cedric started to argue, but Luna cut him off with, "If you do, I will tell your father that you had an innocent woman killed."

"Innocent?" Cedric and Bane scoffed in sync.

"Yes." Luna folded her arms across her chest stubbornly. "What's your name?" She turned to the white-haired woman.

"Bane."

"Bane is my friend, whether she likes it or not, and you will not sell out my friend to the moons damned king." Luna's voice held greater ferocity than Cedric had ever heard from her before.

"But-"

"No buts, Cedric," Luna snapped, and he scowled as Bane stifled a chuckle at him being put in his place by such a tiny woman. "You will help Bane earn her place in this castle and the king's approval. You will also help her get the answers from the king that she wants to know."

Cedric turned to Bane. "Answers from the king?"

"Since you won't give them to me yourself." She nodded.

Cedric frowned. If she got the answers that she needed from the king, assuming he didn't have her killed first, then Cedric wouldn't have any more leverage on her. Right now, he had something she wanted. Something she wouldn't stop at until she got. As dangerous as she was, the ball was truly in his court. He needed to exploit this while he could.

"The king doesn't have the answer you're searching for," Cedric lied. "No one does but me."

"He's the king," Bane said, heavy disbelief in her voice. "There's no way that you know, and he doesn't."

"What are we talking about?" Luna chimed in.

"She wants to know how to get back to earth," Cedric said, and thankfully Luna didn't contradict his lie of the king not knowing the secret of it.

"I've actually been wondering the same thing," Luna said instead, and Cedric cut her a glare.

"Look, even if the king did know," Cedric turned back to Bane, "he's the last person you'd want to find yourself associated with. He's the most powerful person in Ethereal because of all of the influence and support he has, and therefore he's the most dangerous, especially with us in the court who stand behind him on everything." It was obvious that Bane caught how he was purposefully excluding her from that, regardless of the fact that she somehow had powers like the rest of them. "If you want the answer to your question, you don't want to go to him," Cedric added.