The New Marauders and the Trickster God

Chapter 22: My Little Unicorn

The next days and weeks went by, and Sam slowly but surely got over the fact that his brother was in hell. When Harry one day commented that he would go down to hell himself to get him back in the worst case, and he would do it without hesitation. Sam finally understood that there was no need to worry. He would get his brother back one way or another. Though Loki made it clear that he won't let Harry go alone.

Loki then joked that they could make a school excursion to hell but was quickly hexed by Sam for that idea, children definitely did NOT belong in hell. However, Loki suggested that he imagine the demons' expressions when a horde of children suddenly walked past them, commenting on what they saw. Sam had to admit that the thought was quite amusing. Still, nevertheless, he would never go through with it and take children to hell.

"And here to your left, you see the equipment of eternal torment belonging to Alistair, the chief torturer of hell, being put to work by him and his apprentice Dean Winchester. If you would follow me please, our next stop is the pits of hell," Harry commented in his best tour guide voice before breaking out laughing. Luckily no one had been around them, except their friends whom they had let in on the secret, because otherwise people definitely would have questioned their sanity.

It was unfortunate that one evening McGonagall busted Harry, Loki and Sam while trying to sneak into the third-floor corridor to play with the Cerberus. Their punishment was to accompany Hagrid the next day into the forbidden forest. Something hurt and killed unicorns much to the three children's ire. Especially Loki, he was angered because there was nothing purer and more innocent than a unicorn, and even hurting one was a sin in his opinion.

So the next evening the three of them together with Hagrid went into the dark forest trying to find the injured unicorn. To Loki's dismay they split up, and Loki went with Hagrid. In contrast, Sam and Harry went together with Hagrid's dog Fang though Sam had to swear to Loki that he would protect Harry no matter what. Luckily in preparation for their trip into the forest, Sam had taken his new enchanted weapons with him. At the same time, Harry also carried his knives, not wanting to rely on magic alone.

Walking through the forest, Sam and Harry soon found the blood the unicorn had lost due to its wound, so they followed the trail. Soon, Harry suddenly took a sharp breath and clutched his hand over the lightning bolt scar on his forehead. Sam worried that something might be wrong instantly drew his pistol, looking around trying to find out what was going on.

"What's wrong," he asked Harry as soon as he made sure that nothing was lurking between the trees and waiting to attack them.

"My scar... it's hurting...I don't know why..." Harry ground out between clenched teeth.

"Come on, perhaps it'll stop when we get away from here," Sam pointed out.

They slowly went onwards. But Sam noticed that the pain in Harry's scar only seemed to intensify. That was until they reached a small clearing where they saw the unicorn lying on the ground and a shadow lurking over its neck obviously drinking the unicorn's blood. Harry screamed when the shadow raised its head and looked at them.

Sam instinctively took aim with his pistol and shot a round straight at the shadow with anti-demon ammunition. Yet, to his dismay, it just went directly through the spectre or whatever it was that they were facing. Hoping that this time it would work, he switched to iron ammunition layered in salt. It didn't have the intended effect in dissipating the thing, but at least it fled with a high-pitched shriek.

Once he was sure that the threat was gone Sam instantly turned around to Harry, who was on the ground from the pain now. However, Harry quickly recovered from it sitting up.

"Go look after the unicorn I'm okay," he told Sam who didn't move though. "Go! I don't need you right now, but the unicorn certainly does."

With one last concerned look towards Harry, Sam hurried over to the unicorn kneeling beside it and trying to assess what was necessary to help it. To his relief, the unicorn was still alive but only just, and if he didn't do anything soon it surely would die, but the problem was that he had no idea what he should do. So, for now, he merely put pressure on the still bleeding wound. That was when Harry finally also came over, having fully recovered from whatever made his scar hurt.