The Devil Doesn't Bargain (MatD part 2)

Chapter SEVEN - The Offer

Shortly after, the four of us had curled up into our makeshift beds and tucked our feet beneath the mountain of pillows and soft blankets. My stomach still warm and full of firewhisky and my brain nearly filled to the brim with thoughts, I found it hard to tumble across the line to sleep.

Sebastian had had no such problem.

Almost as soon as his head had hit the pillow, his breaths had deepened and the smallest hint of a snore crept over his lips. I'd never heard such a noise from him and I wondered if I'd just been too exhausted to hear it before or perhaps something about this night was different for him.

It was those thoughts that finally lulled my brain into a quiet and my heavy lids outweighed my heavy mind. I'd just started to fall asleep when Sebastian begun wriggling beside me. His shoulders bumped against mine and Ominis' in the dark, the blind boy grumbling from just the other side of Sebastian.

A moment later and Sebastian had settled in again, I let the sleep creep back but not before another fit of fidgeting from him.

Ominis' groans grew and I could nearly hear the way his fists clenched as they often did when he was irritated. "Sebastian what ARE you doing?"

Voice strained, Sebastian continued to shift back and forth. "I just... hmph... I just thought about how nice it would be to lay here without my jacket and... hughmph... now I'm trying to take it off."

"Just sit up and take it off then."

"But then I'll wake up too much!" He pouted.

Ominis was silent.

Anne giggled.

I smiled to the dark overhead.

Sebastian grunted once more and I could feel the shift of fabric as it brushed my arm and was tossed across the room.

"Got it." Sebastian beamed triumphantly.

Ominis grumbled to his pillow. "Thank Merlin."

----

The rest of the night ticked by behind tired lids but no sleep came. Instead, the heat of the alcohol pressed against my skull and behind my eyes as I lay still, back to the ground. Sebastian's hand had wound around mine in his sleep and I longed to snuggle against his chest but feared that too much movement would wake him or the others.

So instead I cuddled my thoughts.

Could a world as unpredictable as this offer a life of stability for someone like me?

Did I deserve it? Life.

Was I destined to live a cursed life from the beginning and only now had the curse become literal?

Would Sebastian still love me if I withered away to nothing?

Could I bottle the curse away or was that perhaps more dangerous than enduring it myself?

Would Isidora's triptych-

"Atley?" My name whispered so quietly in the night I wasn't sure who spoke it.

I paused a moment. Perhaps I had made it up in my own head. It wouldn't be the first time. 

"Atley darling, are you awake?"

Ominis.

"Yes."

A breath.

"Are the other two asleep?"

I turned my head slowly, lifting the upper half of my body to blink through the dark and cursing the strain in my abdomen at the effort. Anne was curled peacefully into the couch cushions, eyes tight and mouth hung partially open. Sebastian aside me had his arm thrown over his eyes, mouth completely open and one knee propped up awkwardly.

"I believe so." I lowered my aching muscles back down to my pillow as slowly as I could as to ensure the movement didn't wake them.

Ominis was quiet a few moments longer and I had just begun to wonder if he'd fallen back asleep when he spoke again, voice slightly raspy with sleep.

"Does it hurt terribly? ...The curse."

A silent chill wound its way down my bones. This certainly wasn't a conversation I had been expecting.

"Nothing I can't handle."

The blankets shifted from the other side of Sebastian and through the small flicker of candle flame I could just make out Ominis' silhouette slithering its way out from between the twins. He made his way over to me so silently I finally understood why Sebastian was always so startled by his sudden appearances.

Ominis Gaunt moved like a shadow.

The blind boy traced his fingers along the cold wood floor until he paused ahead of my pillow and folded himself there, legs crossed and hands clasped in his lap.

"What is it Ominis?" Ever so gently I pulled my hand from Sebastian's and even though he mumbled a bit and smacked his lips, he stayed deep in his drunken sleep. Rolling carefully onto my side and then up, I too curled my legs in front of my body, facing Ominis.

He fiddled with something at the edge of his pant leg. "I- You mustn't lie to me, I am not without ears you know."

"I do."

"I hear the way the curse eats at you. Much like it did Anne but- somehow different than it was with her. Deeper perhaps?"

I pulled my brows tight. "What do you mean?"

"You're putting up a front for our sake."

His whispered voice sent chills across my skin.

"I-"

"Just as you did in the Scriptorium with the Cruciatus curse."

Silence.

"What's this about Ominis?" A prickle of irritability nudged at my lungs and an instant wave of guilt smothered it whole.

The silent silhouette of his fingers traced tentatively out in front of him until they wound around my wrist. I startled at the chill of his skin on mine but didn't pull away.

"I know what it's like. To hold in pain." He swallowed, silence seemingly gaging my reaction. "To conceal the true reality of what you are going through so that others cannot know."

I pulled his grasp down to my palm and held tight.

"I mean it Ominis, it's nothing I can't handle."

His glistening eyes danced with candlelight. His brows pulled slightly forward. He took a few deep breaths and ran a thumb over the back of my hand.

"What I would have done to have someone who knew without asking."

I squeezed his hand and he continued.

"I got close, with Sebastian, but- I never wanted to trouble him in that way." He pulled my hand to his lap and ran his other palm up to my shoulder, squeezing it once.

"I just want you to know that you are never a trouble to us."

My breath lodged at the back of my throat but I forced out words. "Thank you Ominis. I do appreciate it."

His jaw tightened. "And I wanted to offer myself to share in your burden. To share in the curse."

A moment of silence.

Two moments.

"I don't understand."

"You took the curse once and placed it in your body..." The words tumbled out now, far faster than his usual precision. "...you could do it again. Pull it from yourself and place it in me, when it got too heavy."

"Ominis no. I don't-"

He squeezed my hand so tightly in his I couldn't help but stop talking.

"Just promise me you will consider my offer?"