Hosie - Hogwarts Au (Harry Potter / Legacies)

Chapter 53

The man in front of her is just like she remembers.

Cold. Emotionless. Both nothing and everything like his son. Hope fights to not squirm away from his touch. His hand in her own feels slimy. Staring into his grey, dead eyes makes a shiver run down her spine.

“Are you well?” Hope isn’t sure his mouth even moves when he asks it. His jaw is set like stone, his face squared off into a brick. She can tell that he was handsome, maybe sometime in his life, but his age has caught up to him in all the wrong places. Wrinkles are etched into his skin, like cracks in dried mud.

“Very,” Hope says, even though she knows he doesn’t care. “Thank you for meeting with—“

“I won’t waste your time,” Malivore cuts her off, “and I hope you won’t waste mine.”

The dance shifts and he spins her across the floor, but his hold on her tightens and his grip stays firm. He doesn’t let her go to the next partner like he’s supposed to, and only pulls her back to his own body.

“I believe we have a common goal, and even more, I believe I have a plan to achieve this goal,” he tells her. Hope absently thinks that her fingers feel chilled in his own. “I am willing to share it with you. Your father tells me that you can be trusted. Is that true?”

“Yes.” Hope nods stiffly. She hates him. Merlin, she hates this. “Of course, sir.”

Malivore smiles. It’s unnerving. Hope has the thought that that it doesn’t fit him.

“Good.”

Hope’s jaw ticks.

“I have a friend in the ministry,” the man reveals. Hope keeps her eyes over his left shoulder, scared that he’ll see right through her if she looks him in the eye. “From the Department of Mysteries. He informs me that the staff of this school are keeping a secret prophecy among their ranks. I fear that this prophecy is being kept so because it concerns us.”

The prophecy?

Us?

Oh no.

Hope swallows and nods, trying to hide her lack of a reaction. It’s been a long time since she thought about the prophecy, and it shows. Malivore doesn’t seem to miss it. He narrows his eyes.

“You don’t look surprised,” he observes. They step off to the side. One, two, three, Hope counts in her head. She wants to close her eyes and pretend that she’s dancing with Josie.

“No, sir,” she tells Malivore quietly. Her voice doesn’t sound like her own. She hardly recognizes it. “I heard about it a few months ago, along with the rest of the school. We were told that it was a mistake.”

Malivore frowns.

“Do not be fooled, Miss Mikaelson.” One, two, three, turn. “The prophecy is real.”