Up and Down

Angels and Fiends

TW: graphic violence.

The crackling of the spell subsides along with the screaming. His heel presses down at the yielding flesh beneath and twists.

Every spell his brother doesn't break is more time wasted. Every minute spent torturing the answers out of him is a minute that Anna is captive in Orceus' clutches. There have been... too many minutes.

"Well?"

"I don't know... where exactly..."

"What use are you to me then?" He asks coldly. His senses overwhelmed with the stench of blood and ash, he breathes in the cold air greedily.

It's bitter, a pungent medicine he had to force down to awaken from his dream.

A dream of being better than his family. Better than the legacy of his blood. Clinging to his morals however impossible to uphold.

But those high morals can't save the woman he loves from a fate worse than death.

"Just know... he is on the Isle of Skye in the Hebrides... it's where his... lair is..."

His wand jabs under Marvolo's chin and he can't help the pleased smirk when he feels his brother wince at the touch, trying to crawl away.

"Anything else?"

"Somewhere underground, I don't know anything more!"

Ominis stands back up and turns away.

"We fly right now, Sebastian. Let's go."

"He could be lying..."

Ominis tilts his head to the side, considering.

"No... no, he was not lying. He wouldn't dare."

The terror and pain in his brother's voice were true, and so were the words he spoke.

"And what do we do with him?"

His wand shoots angry sparks, but he is past the hellfire raging through his emotions, leaving behind only ash.

"Crawl back to Father. And if either of you ever tries to come after us, I will burn off your balls... and that would be the end of Gaunts."

He doesn't wait for a response from Marvolo, turning on his heel and Apparating to the bounds of the castle grounds. The night chill rips through his soaked and torn shirt. He shivers, but not from the cold.

Stay alive. Please stay alive. We're coming.

Sebastian appears next to him and they sprint through the silent grounds, up the hundreds of steps and over to the Astronomy tower.

Summoning the door to Anna's Room, they rush into the Vivarium. Sebastian whistles sharply, the piercing sound making Ominis cringe. About a minute later, a screech, a gust of wind and the stomping of mismatched feet let him know that the hippogryphs have landed nearby.

But there are more beating wings and another sound, a whistling kind of call he hasn't heard before.

"Uh... hello there? You're coming with us?" Who in Merlin's beard is he talking to?

"What is it, Sebastian?"

"Anna's phoenix. Lugus, I think, is its name."

"She had a phoenix all this time?..."

"You are writing with its tail feather every day, you fool."

"... oh."

"Get on, then, you. We're going to go up to the Astronomy tower and fly from there."