The old hag grinned. It was an unpleasant sort of grin. A yellow-toothed, wizened, knowing sort of grin.
It was the type of grin that, normally, made any travellers to cross her path cross on the other side of the path. Unfortunately, the two travellers today did not have such an option. They were tired, and it was dark, and they had already stopped for the night.
They didn't know the old hag meant them no harm. They didn't know she only wanted to tell them a story.
The old hag glanced at one of the several watches on her bony, wrinkled wrist... and sighed. "I'll have to cancel my next appointment." She looked at the still-frozen pair, the flickering firelight illuminating her beady black eyes. "There's a knight who cheated his quest, see," she said, in a rather normal voice.
One of her companions started. In surprise? Fear? Who knew.
"Ah well, it can't be avoided, I suppose." She sat, slowly, on the nearest log which had been pulled up to the fire. The hood of her black cloak fell to her shoulders, revealing patches of limp, grey hair and a sunken-in face.
One of the campers shifted uncomfortably.
"Oh really, do sit. We have a long night ahead of us."
"You-you're-you're a..." one of the campers stuttered. The hag looked at him, waiting. She knew what was coming. Then again, she always knew what was coming. It was just that some version of this moment happened every time, and she'd come to expect it.
"You're a hag!"
"I am not," she corrected sharply, "a hag. I am a seer. Now sit. You're being rude, and I'm already running late." She shook her arm, and her several watches all rattled and clanked.
The campers sat, as one did when lectured about manners by an all-powerful seer.
The seer nodded, satisfied, then she spoke. Her voice was different this time. Raspier. Drier, like sand on a cliffside.
"Princess Ariabelle Tatiana," she began, for her confused but attentive audience, "was no ordinary princess..."
Imagine surviving in a fucked up Harry Potter AU with a murdering racist on the loose and an emerging Gray Lady.
Anne could not imagine surviving here if these Slytherin boys and 'queen' don't stop causing havoc.
Siriusly, why is Rosaline Potter?
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Excerpt
"Sallow stop right this instant!"
"And if I don't ? What are you gonna do Potter, let your dogs loose on me? How terrifying." She replies with a perfectly poised face.
However her brisk pace is halted suddenly as Lestrange closes in on her, grabbing her throat in a vice grip as he leans down to her eye level, whispering throatily, "She asked you a question, so you answer. Hmm?" Holding onto her wrists with his left hand and her neck in his right one he swipes up his thum to brush against her jawline.
Dolohov and Nott lean on the walls with identical poses as they both level her with a sharp gaze.
Tilting her head sideways so she is focusing on bright emerald eyes Anne speaks, "You might worship the ground she walks on Lestrange. But I don't own shit to your queen, especially not an explanation."
The addressed male get so enraged that he increases the pressure at her throat and she can already feel the bruises forming and - suddenly he is thrown on the floor with a loud thud as Anne gets enveloped in the familiar embrace of expensive cologne and the gentlest whiff of spices, as she hears her saviour's words, easily imagining his thick brows furrowed in urgency. "Are you okay, doll?"
With ice blue eyes clouded with worry.
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Let's not forget her identity, like Sebastian Sallow's great granddaughter? Gee thanks for the legacy. But ancient magic is cool.