Passion | | Sebastian Sallow *under slight editing*

Chapter Twenty-Eight

A few of the poachers were trudging back into the swamp, miles, and miles away from the main camp, and wondering why on Godric's green earth they were doing this. Earlier that morning, they received word that they were to go find Leon's old camp that was destroyed by Astoria, Ominis, and Sebastian and then plant a letter there. None of them had any idea what was going on but none of them were willing to question it either.

"Back and forth in this swamp... I'll tell ya," One of them sighed as they continued to trudge through the murky water. "Just to go back to some destroyed camp and put a letter that they may or may not find. What does it even say?"

Abram, the poacher who worked with Leon before their camp was destroyed, shrugged his shoulders and had a very similar expression of confusion. "I don't even know, I was forbidden from even opening it. Guess Rookwood really does want this to be a secret."

The two men looked down at the letter that Abram was carrying with much confusion and was very tempted to open the letter and reseal it. After all, it wasn't like Rookwood could find out, right? Abram was moments away from ripping it open when he suddenly just shoved it away in his pocket, not wanting to go against direct orders just so he could be nosey.

"Oi, what are you doin'?" The poacher beside him asked. "I thought we were gonna open that and read it! It's not like Rookwood could know or anything."

"I'm not defying orders. You know if he ever found out, he'd kill us." Abram said, continuing to walk through the swamp. The poacher rolled his eyes, following Abram down. He didn't understand what was so important about this letter that they couldn't open it, had to place it in a destroyed camp miles and miles away, and had to act like it wasn't important after this.

Abram noticed how upset the other poacher seemed about it and rolled his own eyes. "Mate, act like an adult for five seconds, would ya?" He asked, shaking his head. "Look it's not that hard just to... not read, just stop thinkin' about it. You're only causing yourself more problems."

The poacher with Abram didn't seem to want to listen. To Abram, working with Rookwood's other men felt like you were working with a bunch of children who didn't want to ever listen to any sort of authority at all.

It was going to be a long walk to Leon's camp...

***

Astoria was sitting on her bed, holding two bobby pins in her mouth while she was taking the third trying to pin her hair up. Having long hair while being out in a disgusting swamp and fighting a bunch was not the most ideal thing, so she would always have to find more ways to keep her hair up and out of all the mess. Since she hadn't had anything to at least trim her hair with for the past few months, it was getting a bit too long, even for her liking. It was getting more and more difficult to put it up every day.

Sebastian, who was walking by to get to the kitchen, noticed Astoria's struggle with her hair. He chuckled a bit and walked over, grabbing her hair that was in a ponytail from her hands and holding it up so she could finish putting the pins in.

Astoria didn't even notice he was walking up behind her and she flinched when she felt someone grab her hair. "Sorry about that, I just thought I should help," Sebastian said quietly, seeing her flinch.

A sense of relief passed Astoria and she chuckled softly. "Oh, thank you. I just didn't even hear you come up." She said, trying to put the bobby pins in their desired place. Sebastian saw her fumbling with them and gently took one of them from her hands and put it in, making sure to secure it firmly so it wouldn't fall out.

Astoria furrowed her brows and turned around when he was finished. "Now just how do you know to do that?" She asked, a small smile on her face.

Sebastian let go of her ponytail and crossed his arms, shrugging a bit with a proud look on his face. "I know things. And besides that, it isn't even that hard." He chuckled, then took a seat on the bed next to her. "I also used to do Anne's hair a lot, especially those first few weeks after she was cursed, she was too weak to do anything so I just learned." He shrugged again.