Blackened Feathers

Recovery

Omega spent two more days in the infirmary before Secondo finally allowed him to go home to the ghoul lair. He was still nowhere near recovered, but Secondo had gotten sick of him pestering the Sisters to let him go. He walked slowly back, leaning heavily on Rho and Zeta. By the time he got to his room, he felt exhausted again though, and spent the next couple of hours asleep. His fellow ghouls saw to his every need, bringing him food and drinks and spending time with him cuddled up in his bed.

Ifrit was settling in well, and everyone liked him. Now that his initial nervousness had gone, it became apparent that he expressed his fiery temperament in the amount of energy he possessed. He didn’t have a quick temper like Alpha had. He was more like Secondo’s ghoul, Fire, in that he had an unquenchable lust for life.

In the few days since he’d been here, he had become a firm favourite amongst the Siblings and he brought a welcome distraction for their pack. Ifrit was young compared to the others, but his friendly demeanour meant that he fitted straight in with them all and it was hard not to like him, even though they didn’t share much in common. He spent some time with Omega like the others had, and Papa had gifted him with a new guitar of his own, a white Fantomen. He brought it in to show Omega and was so excited to start rehearsals with the band. Omega was glad that Papa had not passed Alpha’s Gibson on to him. His room remained untouched since they'd thrown him into the cells, and they had all decided that they would leave it as it was for now; it was just too painful to sort it out, so they left it alone.

The day after he came home, he woke from a nap to someone knocking on his door. It opened slowly and Seren poked her head around it.

“Are you up to a visit?” she asked with a smile.

He nodded and returned the smile; he was happy to see her. She came bearing snacks and he could have kissed her when he saw that she’d brought two tubs of ice-cream. He still couldn’t eat most things without it hurting his throat, but soup and ice cream were two things he could just about manage, and he was hungry.

“I brought you this too,” she said when she saw him eyeing up the ice-cream. She handed him a travel mug and when he took off the lid, he smelled herbs and berries coming from the steaming liquid inside. “It’s a tea to soothe your throat. It should numb it for a while and help with your healing. I added a bit of something extra to it as well.” He sniffed it and it smelled pretty strong. It wasn’t an awful smell, but it wasn’t amazing either. He felt magic and he frowned, looking up at her. “It's my mum’s recipe, and I added some extra power to it.” He thanked her and took a drink. It didn’t taste good at all, but the relief from it was instant and he groaned. Seren gave him a satisfied smile. “See. It’s good stuff.”

Omega patted the bed next to him and she hopped up and sat beside him. He draped his arm around her shoulder and hugged her.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

He had been trying to save his voice and had actually rested it for the last few days. Over the last few days, he'd slept a lot and when the others had visited, he let them do the talking.

“You’re looking so much better. I can’t believe the difference. You scared us all, you know. Secondo refused to give up on you when the Sisters were telling him you’d gone. It took a lot of magic to keep your soul here while your body healed enough to keep on living,” she said as she stroked his cheek and he smiled down at her wearily.

Secondo had told him they’d used some pretty dark magic to save his life. He and the witches had essentially trapped his soul inside of his body to stop him from slipping away. Terzo had insisted on it, and he didn’t even want to think about what the cost of that magic would have been right now.