Run Away ✧ Hogwarts Legacy

chapter thirty

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Trigger Warning: This chapter includes sensitive conduct - please see the comment for a full description of conduct. 

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Fifth Year - The Day of The Catacombs

A fifth-year Antheia Wynters had walked until her feet gave out. That had been the intention of the curse, simply to keep walking until she couldn't anymore, to get as far away as possible from where she had started. Her body toppled over into the field of grass in an exhausted pain. There were blisters covering her ankles, her hands coated in dirt from the fall, and mostly her head screamed after the pressure of the curse lifted.

It felt like she had been forced awake when she had never fallen asleep, like falling in a dream, the ground under her felt nonexistent despite her connection to it. It had taken a few deep breaths to collect any sense of what had happened.

One moment she was standing in the Undercroft fighting with Sebastian Sallow and then suddenly collapsing in the field. Antheia remembered sinking into his chest as he pulled her forward and held his wand to her head. Then everything was fuzzy and her head no longer belonged to her. It was only his voice echoing through her mind.

"Run away," His voice echoed the words for hours as she blindly walked.

Antheia had started walking miles and miles before her body finally couldn't go any further. There was blood on the back of her heels that was preventing her from standing back up right away.

"Bloody hell," She cursed at the empty field, pulling her boots off.

Not only had her boots been stained with blood, but they were caked with thick mud. It looked as if she had walked through every swamp, pond, and muddy ditch in the region. Her legs ached tenderly. There was a sharp pain in the arch of her foot that shot up her nerves. It wasn't clear just how far she had gone, or how long she had walked, but all she knew was that she needed to get back to the castle.

The pain was a lot, but more than anything else, her pride was the most wounded.

Antheia considered giving up. She was angry, heartbroken, and full of spite. It had all started with the letter that morning, when she had seen his owl preach itself at her dorm window she was excited as always. Every letter from Sebastian had always left her with a sense of eager joy. Then the letter itself had made her less excited.

𝓜𝔂 𝓓𝓮𝓪𝓻 𝓐𝓷𝓽𝓱𝓮𝓲𝓪,

𝓘 𝓪𝓹𝓹𝓻𝓮𝓲𝓬𝓪𝓽𝓮 𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓻𝔂𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝔂𝓸𝓾'𝓿𝓮 𝓭𝓸𝓷𝓮 𝓼𝓸 𝓯𝓪𝓻, 𝓫𝓾𝓽 𝓘 𝓭𝓸𝓷'𝓽 𝔀𝓪𝓷𝓽 𝔂𝓸𝓾𝓻 𝓪𝓼𝓼𝓲𝓼𝓽𝓪𝓷𝓬𝓮 𝔀𝓲𝓽𝓱 𝓯𝓲𝓷𝓭𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓪 𝓬𝓾𝓻𝓮 𝓪𝓷𝔂𝓶𝓸𝓻𝓮. 𝓣𝓱𝓪𝓷𝓴 𝔂𝓸𝓾 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓮𝓿𝓮𝓻𝔂𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓷𝓰.

𝓢𝓲𝓷𝓬𝓮𝓻𝓮𝓵𝔂 𝔂𝓸𝓾𝓻𝓼,

𝓢𝓮𝓫𝓪𝓼𝓽𝓲𝓪𝓷 𝓔𝓭𝔀𝓪𝓻𝓭 𝓢𝓪𝓵𝓵𝓸𝔀

Antheia considered ripping it up into pieces after reading it. It was so dry and blunt, nothing like any of his other letters, she was mad instantly. Rather than just talk to her he sent a bird to break up with her.

What am I thinking? Break up? We aren't even courting!

She couldn't explain why the letter made her so upset, but it had. When she had stormed down to find an empty Undercroft she almost boiled over in frustration. The one time that Sebastian hadn't been there was when she needed to speak. If he hadn't appeared only minutes later then she had been prepared to break into the Slytherin dorms, even if it meant tearing the bloody wall down brick-by-brick.