Safe & Sound//Sebastian Sallow

twenty-five.

Despite my unconscious experience feeling like it had only been a few hours, I'd been in a coma for two weeks and had apparently plateaued, not getting better or worse. The team at St. Mungo's didn't seem to have an explanation for how I woke up. Once they looked me over and made sure I was actually okay, they allowed a couple of Aurors to come in and ask questions.

"Anita, Damian, it's good to see you despite the circumstances," I greeted as they came into my room. I'd worked with both of them and liked them well enough.

"Good to see you, too," Anita replied. "Congrats on the engagement."

"Thank you. It's been an eventful couple of months for me."

"You always had a way of attracting eventful situations," Damian laughed. "So where's this fiancé of yours?"

"He went to go get me something to eat and a change of clothes."

"A gentleman," Anita said approvingly before sitting down in a chair next to my bed. Damian sat next to her.

We spent the next half hour or so going over the events leading up to my attack. I told them about the package Sebastian and I had received, leaving out the part about me being able to see ancient magic. They took notes and asked if anything else had happened. Aside from the mysterious package, nothing else had seemed out of the ordinary. It didn't feel like we were being followed or anything else suspicious.

"This may be a long shot, but I want to reach out to your friend Ominis. The timing of things is rubbing me the wrong way," Damian said.

"What do you mean," I asked.

"He comes to tell you that he's broken the curse and then hours later you're attacked. It doesn't sit well with me. It seems too intentional to be a coincidence."

"Are you saying you think Ominis did this? He would never hurt me." I stared at Damian in disbelief.

"I'm not saying he did it. I'm wondering, though, if someone could be following him instead of you. It would be much easier than trying to spy on you or Sebastian. You've got the protection that Hogwarts offers. Ominis, on the other hand, doesn't have the same protections."

"We should still check is wand just in case," Anita said to Damian. "If he is being followed, it would be easy to put him under the Imperius curse and have him commit the attack. He'd fly completely under the radar."

"If that were the case, why wouldn't he have just attacked me when he was visiting us at the inn," I asked. I really didn't like what they were implying.

"She's got a point," Damian agreed.

"You know how it is, Althea. We've got to cover every angle. It's not personal," Anita shrugged.

"You're right. I'm sorry. I just trust Ominis and I know in my heart that he would never hurt me. Do what you have to do, though, to clear his name."

"Is there anything else you can think of that may be relevant," Damian asked me. "Even something small could help us."

I thought hard on anything that may be worthwhile. I was coming up blank, not noticing anything out of the ordinary leading up to the attack. There was one thing, however, that stood out to me. It was from my experience while unconscious.

"I don't know if anything will come of this," I began, "but do either of you know if Rookwood had any living family?"

"Rookwood? You think he could be connected somehow?" Anita wrote something down on her notepad.