Chapter 14
Back at Hogwarts, the mood was far from calm. The castle’s usual hum of bustling students and chatter had taken on an edge. Blaise Zabini watched, ever the silent observer, as professors exchanged glances filled with something deeper than concern. Whispers spread in the hallways like wildfire, and everyone seemed to know that something was wrong, even if they couldn’t quite name it.
He caught sight of Professor McGonagall striding through the halls, lips pressed into a thin line as she spoke urgently with Professor Flitwick. Even Snape, usually impassive, had a sharpness in his expression that suggested more than the typical strain of teaching Potions. The Slytherin table felt oddly empty without Draco and Theodore. Blaise glanced at the empty seats, his thoughts turning inward.
In the common room later, Pansy paced with her arms crossed, biting at her thumbnail—a rare crack in her usually composed facade. “Where are they?” she muttered, her eyes darting to Blaise. “You’ve heard nothing, right?”
He shook his head slowly. “Nothing concrete,” he said, choosing his words carefully. He’d received a letter from Theo, delivered through mysterious means, and while it wasn’t exactly a beacon of clarity, it was enough to make Blaise sit up and think. The handwriting was Theo’s, hurried and unsteady. The words painted more questions than answers:
[Blaise—safe for now. Don’t trust all faces. Remember what I told you.]
That was it. No hint of location or an explanation of what had happened. Just a cryptic warning that played on the edge of Blaise’s mind like an itch he couldn’t scratch.
Pansy sighed, running a hand through her hair in frustration. “If Draco’s involved, he’d better not be doing something stupid,” she said, more to herself than to him. Blaise felt a pang at that. Whatever Draco was caught up in, Blaise knew it wasn’t out of recklessness. But he couldn’t explain that without revealing too much.
He leaned back, eyes narrowing as he watched the fire crackle in the hearth. The professors’ anxiety, Theo’s message, and Pansy’s worry all added up to one thing: something big was happening, and whatever it was, it was far from over.
The Gryffindor common room buzzed with restless energy as students swapped theories and shared worried glances. The absence of Hermione Granger was a gaping void that no one could quite ignore. Ron Weasley sat in the armchair by the fire, barely listening as Fred and George cracked jokes to lighten the tension.
“Bet you ten Galleons they ran off to start some secret society,” Fred said, waggling his eyebrows. George snorted, but even his grin looked forced.
Ron’s jaw tightened, his fingers curling into fists. “Yeah, well, wouldn’t be the first time, would it?” The bitterness in his voice silenced the twins, who exchanged a glance before George placed a hand on Ron’s shoulder.
“They’ll turn up, mate,” George said quietly. But Ron shrugged him off, staring at the flickering flames with a mix of anger and hurt.
The room swirled with speculation—some said Hermione had gone on a dangerous research mission, others whispered that Draco Malfoy’s absence meant something more sinister was at play. Neville fidgeted nearby, looking anxious, and Ginny watched Ron with an unreadable expression.
It was in that moment, when Ron's thoughts shifted from frustration to deeper worry, that he felt an odd tingling on his wrist. He glanced down, confused, as a subtle mark etched itself into his skin: an ᵢ. The strange inscription glowed faintly before fading, leaving a chill that settled in his chest.
Ron frowned, turning his wrist over and rubbing at the mark as if it might vanish. The room buzzed on around him, oblivious to the silent message now branded into his skin. What did it mean?
A nagging feeling clawed at the edges of his mind. Whatever this was, it was tied to the absence of Hermione, Harry, and the others. And Ron, left behind and out of the loop, had never felt more distant from them.
Matthew slumped onto the bench, feeling the unyielding chill of the metal beneath him. The silence of the bus stop gave him too much room to think, too much empty space where thoughts slipped in, unbidden and jagged. His left palm itched, the Μάγος symbol glowing faintly against his skin, the small Roman I inscribed underneath it. The mark throbbed, almost in sync with his heartbeat, and he felt the urge to stare at it, to lose himself in the ancient lines. Each curve seemed to whisper, feeding him a sense of… something. He didn’t know what, exactly. Power? Knowledge? It was intoxicating, yet bitter, like the taste of dark magic itself.
There was a pull, distant but irresistible, tugging him in directions he couldn’t identify, yet felt intimately. The symbol pulsed beneath his skin, and he imagined himself the puppeteer—the one with control, the one who held the strings. Not a puppet at all, no. He was the one with power here, the one with understanding. No one else could comprehend it.
But somewhere, woven into that pull, was a sick twist. Betrayal. It seeped into his mind like poison, sharp and unbidden, and he recoiled. The feeling wasn’t his, yet it crawled under his skin, latching onto him, claiming him. Betrayed. Betrayal. He repeated the word, wondering where it came from, why it felt so close yet so distant. Had someone betrayed him, or had he betrayed himself?
The thought fractured, bleeding into others. His mind darted, shifting between voices, memories, moments. Too many, too fast. Fractured, flashing, scattering. He couldn’t even tell if the thoughts were his own anymore; they felt like his, yet foreign. Familiar, yet twisted.
And then, like lightning jolting through his veins, a surge of energy coursed through him. It was raw and potent, and he felt its intensity tearing through him, but it carried a corruption with it, a stain that tainted everything it touched. Dark magic—the very essence he’d sought, studied, obsessed over. It was his knowledge, his understanding, yet it was also something darker, something that clawed at him from the inside.
Nothing felt solid anymore; his thoughts darted from shadow to shadow, too swift for his mind to catch. He saw the pull of dark magic, the web of lines twisting around him, barely visible threads drawing him to something distant, something that felt more like himself than anything else. Or was it someone else entirely? His fingers trembled slightly, but he clenched them into fists. It’s me, he assured himself. It’s my thoughts. My magic.
But was it really?
The phone Annabeth handed to Draco looked almost comically modern in his hands. He turned it over, pressing at buttons with a sense of barely hidden frustration. Hermione leaned over his shoulder with an exasperated smile, showing him how to swipe up, unlock it, enter a passcode. “You really forgot all this over the summer?” she teased, tapping at the screen until it pulled up the right app.
Draco mumbled something under his breath, too quiet to catch, but he gave her a brief nod of thanks. “Matthew,” he said, almost abruptly, his voice soft. “He’s... different. Not just the way he acts—there’s something else.”
Hermione’s gaze softened. She didn’t know all of it, but she could sense the tension in Matthew, the shadow of something that felt a little too heavy to be his alone. Before she could answer, a low growl came from nearby. Exodus, who’d been invisible until now, shimmered into sight, his scales blending back from camouflaged green to a brilliant iridescent sheen.
Exodus was staring, tail lashing, at a rustling bush a few feet away. He snarled, low and threatening, eyes narrowed as he crouched, ready to pounce.
Just then, a figure emerged from the bush. The sudden appearance of Vincent, wearing his signature Hello Kitty headphones, threw everyone off balance. Draco sputtered, his eyes wide, momentarily distracted from the phone in his hands. He looked like he might say something, but the words refused to form. The boy was barely ten, so small, yet there was something about the way he simply emerged from the underbrush, looking up at them with a quiet smile, that caught Draco completely off guard.
Hermione stifled a laugh, even as she too was surprised by Vincent’s unexpected arrival. The little boy had a way of doing that, popping up when least expected. She was still trying to process how the child had gone from being Matthew’s shadow to... well, this strange, silent figure. No one knew much about Vincent—where he came from, how he was related to Matthew. They all assumed he was just Matthew’s quiet, gentle little brother, but the reality of that was still a mystery, even to her.
Theo's reaction was nothing short of spectacular. The second Vincent popped into view, he physically recoiled, his face going through a series of transformations that ranged from utter confusion to what appeared to be an internal struggle with his very sense of reality. It was like he was trying to solve a complex math equation in his head, his thoughts desperately trying to catch up. He wasn’t even sure what to say to the child, other than a somewhat strangled, “What the hell...?”
Annabeth’s hand instinctively twitched towards her weapons, her reflexes honed by countless battles, but she quickly stopped herself. She didn’t attack. Instead, she let out a long sigh of exasperation, muttering something under her breath that sounded like, “Of course...” She didn’t seem surprised by Vincent's appearance, only like she was so used to things going sideways by now that this was just another moment in a growing list of them.
And then, Vincent’s focus shifted. The smile dropped from his face as he turned toward Matthew, and it was like something invisible slammed into the child, halting him mid-step. His small body stiffened, his eyes wide, and he froze a mere few feet from Matthew. As if stopped by an unseen barrier, he jerked back, his face contorting in something between confusion and fear.
Without warning, Vincent turned on his heel, sprinting toward Draco instead. His feet moved so quickly that, by the time Draco realized what was happening, the child had already barreled into him. Draco, caught off guard, gasped, and before he could push the boy away, Vincent had wrapped his arms around Draco’s waist in a tight hug.
For a moment, Draco stood there, completely still, his mouth agape. "Vince—what—" he started, but the words died on his tongue. The hug wasn’t like any of the others Vincent had given him before, playful or innocent. This was different. There was something urgently wrong with it.
Vincent pressed his face into Draco’s chest, clutching him like he was seeking refuge, and Draco just stood there, stunned, unsure of what to do. The child’s actions were undeniably out of character. It wasn’t the usual cheerful hug he had come to expect. There was a tension, an anxiety radiating from him, something dark and unsettling. Draco’s chest tightened as he looked over Vincent’s head, trying to catch Matthew’s eye, but the older boy remained blissfully unaware of what was unfolding.
Luna stood quietly, watching the interaction, her mind churning with the strange resonance in the air. She could feel it—something ancient, something broken and wrong. The words were already coming to her, threading themselves through her mind like a hidden melody. Η αληθινή επιλεγμένη της Απάτης θα μολύνει το στίγμα, Το αίμα της κόκκινης σελήνης δεν πρέπει να διεκδικήσει το σκοτάδι. The prophecy flickered in her mind, those Greek words turning into something deeper, heavier.
But Luna didn’t know what they meant. Not fully. She felt the weight of them, though, pressing on her heart, and she knew—something was coming, something darker. It wasn’t just Vincent’s reaction that unsettled her. It was the pull, the heavy atmosphere around them, the crawling sense of dread she couldn’t shake.
Exodus, still in his camouflage form, growled low, the hairs along his spine rising. His golden eyes narrowed at the ground, not at Vincent, but at something much farther beyond them, something lurking just out of view. The dragon's stance was protective, but not of the child. No. It was something far more dangerous.
Annabeth’s sharp eyes cut across the group, taking in the unspoken tension in the air. She didn’t hesitate. The decision clicked into place, the realization that they were no longer safe here—no longer safe anywhere. "We need to run," she said firmly, her voice cold with the authority that came from a lifetime of experience.
Without waiting for a response, she grabbed Draco’s arm, pulling him toward the street, a sense of urgency behind her every movement.
And then, just like that, the first distant growl sounded, barely audible at first, but quickly building into something more. Something much louder. Something that made her blood run cold.
A Yale was coming.
Annabeth’s thoughts flickered, and for a split second, it wasn’t her own voice she heard. It was Percy’s, sarcastic as ever, like he was right beside her, whispering into her ear. “Great, just what we need. A freaking Yale. Because what’s demigod life without one of those, right?”
Just then, Matthew snapped out of his reverie as the group broke into a sprint, adrenaline surging through his veins. Heart pounding, he matched their pace as they bolted down the bustling street. Pedestrians glanced at them with a mix of confusion and curiosity, some even pausing to murmur to each other. The normal world, the one they didn’t belong in, was so glaringly different now.
“Don't mind them,” Annabeth muttered, clearly used to the strange looks. “The Mist hides things. Don’t let it distract you.”
But that didn’t make it any less unsettling.
Suddenly, they made a sharp turn, weaving through alleyways. The adrenaline was high, and Matthew was trying to shake off the nagging feeling that there was something... darker now. Something pulling at him from the inside. His mark burned on his palm, a constant reminder of the forces he was trying so hard to suppress.
Draco, however, didn’t seem to care. His eyes flashed with a really bad idea.
"Wait, hold up. I’m the Δαμαστής," Draco muttered to himself, his hand instinctively clutching his right palm, where the mark glowed faintly. "I should be able to handle a Yale. How hard can it be?"
Annabeth groaned from behind their hiding spot, slapping her hand to her forehead. "Seriously? That is your plan?"
Hermione, right next to her, mirrored the sentiment with a resigned facepalm. "This is a terrible idea. Absolutely terrible."
Matthew almost laughed at the absurdity of it all, but then he felt Theo’s hand firmly clamp over his mouth. He stifled the giggles, eyes wide as he realized how close he was to blowing their cover. He obediently stayed quiet, biting back his amusement.
Luna, on the other hand, watched Draco’s declaration with a slightly raised brow. Then, to everyone’s surprise, she nodded approvingly.
The situation escalated fast. Draco charged ahead, a reckless determination in his eyes, hands outstretched toward the massive Yale that was beginning to charge at them, its lion-like tail flicking with menace.
“Draco, no! Don’t—!” Hermione tried to warn him, but her words fell on deaf ears.
The Yale was upon him in a flash, and it was all Draco could do to try and remain calm. He was barely able to dodge its tusks before a deadly swipe of its tail knocked him off his feet. Blood spurted from the shallow cuts on his body as he struggled to keep the creature in check.
"Really, Draco?" Annabeth muttered under her breath, eyeing the situation with a mixture of disbelief and frustration. Her fingers twitched near the hilt of her dagger, and she was a breath away from jumping in when she saw the Yale's claws get dangerously close to Draco’s face.
But the idiot didn’t back down.
Somehow, Draco managed to reach deep within himself and call on the power of his mark. It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t easy. And it certainly wasn’t painless. With every flick of the Yale’s tail, every blow to Draco’s ribs, the creature’s growls intensified as the process dragged on. Hermione was on the verge of running in, her instincts telling her to help him.
But Annabeth was already moving forward, holding her back. "Don’t. He’s trying something. Just… trust him. For once.”
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the Yale's tense posture shifted. The growling stopped. The creature’s tusks were no longer aimed at Draco’s throat, but instead, the Yale stood still, its breath shallow. It was subdued, but just barely, as Draco stood there, panting, his body bruised, bloodied, but victorious.
Then, the sound of a single, sharp clap broke the tension.
The wizards froze, their heads snapping toward the source.
Annabeth immediately felt it. She didn’t need to see his face, didn’t need him to say a word—she just knew. The feeling was unmistakable. It wasn’t the look of the man that gave it away, but the sheer presence. The power in the air, the unmistakable aura of a god. Her muscles tightened, not from fear but from the raw knowledge that whatever this was, they were no longer in control. Not in the slightest.
She didn’t need to ask who he was.
The man was dressed in rustic, earth-toned clothing, his wavy brown hair tied back in a short ponytail. His eyes were green, a strange shade of forest-like green that almost seemed to shimmer in the dim light. His clothing was casual, almost out of place in the tense situation—flip-flops and all—but his aura made it clear that he was not just another wanderer.
Draco looked at the man, still panting, but with a wariness in his eyes. His hand instinctively went to his mark, but the Yale had been tamed, and the immediate threat had passed.
Annabeth stepped forward, her instincts sharp and her stance defensive. The wizards tensed, but she held them back, watching the god closely. She didn’t need to say anything; her narrowed eyes spoke volumes. “You’re a god,” she stated flatly. It wasn’t a question.