A Cruelty Vivid and Sweet || Ominis Gaunt

Pick Your Battles

He was quiet at your bedside, and so were you.

After Anne had Disapparated, Sebastian had fled, and Missy had chased after him, Ominis had sobbed over your broken, cursed body. He'd sobbed and screamed and raged, until his throat was raw, until not even the coldness of the night gave him solace. When the stench of Dark Magic finally evaporated in the air, and the wind threatened to blacken his fingers, he knew he couldn't lay there with you anymore, mourning the demise you were so close to embracing.

He'd carried you all the way to Feldcroft, wand awkward in his hand as your body, so light in your unconsciousness, lay motionless in his arms. By the time he got there, exhausted, distressed, destitute, Solomon had been buried in a shoddy mound in the garden and Anne had disappeared, and the villagers had expunged the last of the Inferi, leaving behind a burning stench of the dead and multiple grievous injuries.

No fatalities. Good. Ominis didn't think he could handle more death.

The villagers tried to help you, but no Wiggenweld nor smelling salts roused you, and no bottled formula for minor curses worked. As you lay in Anne's abandoned bed, someone contacted the school, and eventually Professor Hecat Apparated to the door.

"Goodness gracious me—" She placed her hand to your forehead, fussing. "Are you all right, Master Gaunt?"

He couldn't say a word. He had been cleaved too much for explanations.

Hecat didn't press. "I've organised a Floo point directly to Madam Blainey's office. We'll go straight away."

He squeezed your hand as Madam Blainey did all the necessary checks – vitals, blood pressure, and heart, a slow and thudding beat. Never did it fluctuate. Never did you show any other signs of life. Blainey shooed him out as she worked, and he slept fitfully on the stairs outside until Hecat found him again, an hour later.

"Go to your dorm and sleep, Master Gaunt," she said firmly. "I promise, as soon as Madam Blainey has something to tell you, you will know."

He slept no better in his own bed. It was right next to Sebastian's, after all. Empty.

Afternoon rolled around by the time he found slumber, but it seemed like only a few hours later when someone roused him with news of Missy's return. He could barely find it in himself pry open his crusty eyes, let alone wash and dress, but he found her waiting outside, restlessly pacing.

"He fled," she said, once he was close enough to hear her whisper. "I tried to talk him down, but he's gone."

He swallowed this information about as well as a whole melon. His voice was raw. "And Anne? She wasn't at the house this morning."

"Also gone. I saw the grave in the back garden."

He expected no less. "Have you told anyone about— what happened?"

"No."

And though it pained him to say it, "We should. We must."

With Sebastian gone, Solomon dead, and you hospitalised, there was no way they couldn't.

"Let's go see Gibby," Missy said. "Perhaps she's woken."

He knew that, even before he got there, it was pointless to hope. You were the same as he'd left you hours ago – deep in a restless slumber and mumbling incoherently. Terror simmered low in his chest. What if this was it? What if he'd condemned you to whatever this was for the rest of your life?

"She's stable," said Blainey, once they'd seen to you, "but whatever curse she's suffering keeps her in fits. I can only assume its remnants of Dark Magic, something I cannot even attempt to heal without proper knowledge of what, exactly, caused it in the first place."