dexterity8 - Tumblr blog

dexterity8 · 3 months ago

Text

Worthmore

24 — Patricide

(TW for detailed descriptions of gore in this chapter! Read at your own discretion.)

She must be hallucinating.

April's pulse thunders in her ears, but the rest of the world feels too quiet. Nothing moves. Not the trees, not the smoke curling from the lightning strikes. Not even the crows, who should've come by now to pick at the bodies. The world is holding its breath. Just like her.

She blinks once, twice—no, he's still there. Standing just a few paces across the clearing, framed by the slaughter she left behind, the crow mask in his hand like it's nothing more than a passing whimsy. His face—gods, his face. She's never seen it like this. Never this clearly. It's one thing to be told they look alike. It's another to see the reflection of her own features looking back at her from the face of a monster. It's in the set of his jaw. The shape of his eyes. The way his shoulders sit heavy with a burden he'll never name. He's her. No—she's him. And she wants to rip her own skin off just to separate herself from that truth. The years she spent trying to be better than him. The nights she prayed to be more like her mother. The effort. The grief. The rage. All of it, and she still ended up looking like him. Being like him.

She takes a step back without realizing it, a jolt of nausea crawling up her throat like bile. Her grip tightens around her wand, her fingers still stained red from everything she did tonight. Everything he made her become.

"Don't look at me like that," she finally chokes, her voice breaking from the weight of her own fury. "Like I'm yours."

Lester doesn't react. He simply lets the crow mask hang uselessly from his fingertips, and regards her with a quiet neutrality that makes her seethe.

"I'm not yours," she hisses. "You don't get to be here. Not after what you did. Not after what I had to do because of you."

Her voice cracks on the last word. The ground beneath her feels warped, distant. She thinks she might be trembling. And still, Lester doesn't raise his wand. Doesn't retaliate. Doesn't run. He just looks at her like he's waiting.

"You killed him," she snarls. "You killed my Ollie. And for what? For this?" She throws an arm toward the wreckage—charred limbs, mangled bodies, smoke curling toward the moon. "This is what you made me."

He finally speaks. And his voice is...gentle. Not soft, not apologetic. But...undeniably calm. Wrong in this place of death.

"I didn't make you anything, April."

And it's that line—simple, unassuming—that cuts the deepest. Because for all her rage, all her certainty, part of her wanted him to be the villain. Wanted him to wear the weight of her pain like chains. But here he is, as passive and indifferent as ever, placing the burden back in her hands.

"You chose this," he adds, just above a whisper. "Don't you dare pin your sins on me just because I wasn't there to stop you."

And just like that—like a match to oil—it all explodes.

"You left me!" she screams. "You left us! You walked away from everything—and now you think you get to stand there and judge me?! Don't you dare act like I haven't spent every fucking year of my life pretending I didn't care that you were gone!"

Her throat is sore, but she doesn't stop. She can't stop. "I had to force myself to not care. To not feel. I had to decide to take after Mum. Because if I didn't—if I let myself want to know you—then what? What would that say about me?"

She steps forward, wand still clenched in her fist like a threat. "Why would I want to be like the man who didn't even want me?"

Lester doesn't flinch. But his jaw tightens. His voice, when it comes again, is low and tired.

"Because it was better that way."

"Bullshit."

"I mean it," he snaps. "Your mother never wanted the marriage. It was arranged. Political. Our parents wanted the bloodlines to stay pure. There was no love—"

"But there was me," April retorts.

Lester's voice breaks then, in the tiniest way. "She loved you. I knew she'd protect you better than I ever could. I was never meant to be a father, April. Hell, I didn't even want—" He stops. Catches himself. Looks away.

April stares at him, scoffing. "You didn't want a daughter," she finishes for him, disbelieving. "Well, fuck me, right? So sorry I was born with the wrong fucking anatomy. My sincerest apologies for being the world's greatest fucking inconvenience."

"That's not what I meant—"

"Then what did you mean?" she snarls bitterly.

Lester's frustration finally simmers to the surface. "You think I didn't care? I did! I—" he exhales through his nose, exasperated. "I was the one who left that dagger for you. The one in your holster right now. The one only we can wield. Your birthright. I wanted it to mean something. Because even if I couldn't stay, I wanted you to—" He trails off, teeth clenched. "I wanted you to make me proud."

April's breath catches. Her face twists—not out of shock, but fury. "Proud?" she echoes. "Proud of what, exactly? Of surviving? Of growing up with an absent father?" She laughs again, but there's no joy in it—only fury. "You're not proud. You're ashamed. Because you saw what I've become and you didn't like it. You didn't think I'd be capable of something like this. Of killing. But you know what? You don't get to be disappointed in me. Not when you abandoned us to go out and kill beasts for money. Not when you slaughtered Ollie senselessly. Not when you nearly killed me that night. You don't get to stand there and tell me I'm the monster."

Lester cuts in sharply, agitated beyond belief. "The life of a beast isn't the same as the life of a person—"

"No!" April screams, her voice shattering in the air. "Don't you fucking say that! Don't you dare!"

Tears spring to her eyes, burning and never-ending.

"He was more than just a beast! He was mine! He trusted me! He loved me! And you took him from me like he was nothing!"

She paused, struggling to breathe amidst her sobs.

"You can't talk about justice. You don't know what justice is. And if this is what I've become because of you? Then good! Maybe I'm more like you than I thought."

Lester merely shakes his head. Dismisses her grief like it's a tantrum. "You're wrong," he mutters. "You're wrong about all of it. The life of that mooncalf shouldn't have led to this, April Crouch—"

Silence. April goes cold.

"What did you just call me?"

"It's your name."

"No. It's your name." Her voice falters slightly under the weight of her rage. "I'm a Worthmore. Always have been."

Lester's eyes flash with rage, and something in him snaps. "Fucking Celeste," he mutters under his breath. "That spiteful little—she changed it, didn't she? Knew damn well we gave you my last name at birth—"

"Shut the fuck up!" April screams.

He flinches.

"Don't talk about her like that! Don't you dare insult her like she's the one who abandoned us! She was your wife, for fuck's sake!"

Lester stares at her, and for a second, there's a flicker of something in his eyes. Anger, for the most part. But also regret, knowing his daughter has turned out like this.

April just stands there, breath ragged, barely holding herself together. She's never hated anyone more than she does right now. Not even herself.

The silence between them stretches for a long, excruciating moment. She doesn't notice it at first, but Lester's expression has changed. It's a subtle collapse—like a tower losing weight from within, stone by stone. The anger fades from his face like ash scattered in the wind, and what replaces it isn't pity or guilt or even shame—but something more subdued.

"I didn't know," he says at last, his voice unnaturally sympathetic. "That night... when we found you, when I saw you in the clearing, prancing with that mooncalf..."

His eyes drift to the massacre around them, really allowing himself to take it all in. "I didn't know it was you. I had a hunch, but—" he swallows. "If I'd truly known, April, I swear to you, I wouldn't have let them lay a finger on you. I never would've hurt you too. Not my daughter."

April doesn't move. Her gaze is unfocused now. Glassy. Her hands still curl into fists, but she's somewhere else—lost in her head, miles away.

"I'm sorry," Lester says.

Her eyes twitch. Not much. But enough to let him know this is affecting her.

"I'm sorry for Ollie. For taking him from you like that. I... I don't see it the way you do, I suppose. Not because it didn't matter, but because it's all I've ever known. Beasts are... income, to me. Meat. Pelts. Gold. It's disgusting, I know. But when you spend years killing something over and over, you forget that they mean more to people."

He's quiet for a moment, putting genuine thought in the things he's saying. To the way he's opening his heart to her.

"But I can see how much it hurt you. Still hurts you. I see it in your face now, even after everything. You loved him. And I took that from you. I—I'm sorry."

April doesn't respond. She's shaking now, but no longer with rage. Something dull. Something emptier.

"I wasn't there for you," he continues. "And there's nothing I can do to change that. I won't stand here and pretend like I didn't abandon you, or that your mother wasn't right about me.

He steps closer—slowly, carefully, like she's a wounded animal who might lash out at any moment. "I was a coward. A selfish prick. I didn't want a family because I didn't think I could ever be a part of one. But now..." His voice wavers. "Now, I'm looking at you, and gods, you're so strong. You're terrifying. And brilliant. And you survived, April. Without me. You're... stronger than I ever imagined. So much stronger than me. And I can't take credit for that, but I can say this—" He looks her in the eyes. "I want to know you. Really know you. I want to... try again. Be the father I should have been. We can start fresh, April. You and me. Celeste doesn't have to know. It can be just us. I can finally be what you've needed all this time."

April can't breathe. She stands frozen, like time's stopped. Her lips part, but no sound comes out.

Did he just say that?

After everything?

After fifteen years of absence, of not even knowing his voice, of looking for traces of him in strangers' faces—he's here. Right in front of her. Reaching for her like she's worth something.

And for one horrible, unbearable second, she wants it. She wants it more than anything in the world. She wants to believe in this fragile, impossible idea of starting over. Of having a dad who wants to be a dad. She wants to let her guard down and let him in, just like she always dreamed of when she was little. When she'd stare out the window on stormy nights and pretend he'd come back.

She's that little girl again. Alone. Vulnerable. Hungry for comfort.

And now he's stepping closer. He lifts his arms—slowly, almost nervously—and opens them in silent invitation.

A hug.

A simple, stupid hug.

April stares at him, wide-eyed.

Had he ever held her? She doesn't remember. Maybe not once. Maybe not ever. This might be the first time.

She doesn't know what to do. Her body won't move. Her mind screams not to trust him, but her heart aches, begs, yearns for it. And so, she leans in. Just barely. And that's all it takes. Lester steps forward and wraps his arms around her, gently pulling her in, pressing her to his chest.

He's warm. Solid. Real.

She stiffens at first. Every muscle in her body rebels. But slowly... surely, she sinks into it. Trembling. Coming undone.

He holds her tighter.

"I'll never leave you again," he whispers reassuringly. "I'll change, April. For your sake. I'll get out of all this. We can disappear. We'll figure it out."

He swallows, and for the second time in her entire life, she hears it.

"I love you."

The words leave Lester's mouth like a sigh, warm and clumsy against the top of her head.

It should've felt like light after a lifetime of darkness. But it didn't.

It felt like a trap.

April remains completely still at first. Her arms are wrapped tight around him, but there aren't any tears. No breathless gasps of joy. No sudden collapse of all that weight she's been carrying.

Something shatters inside of her, and not in the way she expected. Not in the way she wanted.

Because this should've been the moment. This should've been the thing that pulled her out of the abyss. This is supposed to be the part where she melts into his arms and forgives everything. The pain. The absence. Ollie.

But she can't.

Because a father doesn't kill his child's best friend and calls it business. A father doesn't let his colleagues take turns torturing his daughter for sport. A father doesn't run like a coward and tries to rewrite the ending when the damage has already been done. This isn't love. This is pity dressed in absolution. He doesn't just get to say sorry and make it all go away. He doesn’t deserve her. Not her forgiveness. Not her love. Not her mercy.

Forgiveness is a privilege. And Lester Crouch has done nothing to earn it.

April's fingers curl tight into the fabric of his coat. He exhales shakily, mistaking it for emotion. A helpless girl, clutching her long-lost father at last.

But she's seething. Her chest rises and falls violently, a barely-contained hurricane under flesh and bone. She presses her face to his shoulder like a child desperate for comfort—and then she opens her mouth and bares her teeth into the meat of his coat.

Lester shifts slightly. "Hey," he says gently, "April, are you—"

A sudden, guttural gasp cuts him off.

Because she's already stabbed him.

He goes stiff. Eyes wide.

A dagger. Her dagger. His dagger, lodged deep into his upper back, slipped in without a shred of hesitation. The blade sings straight into his spine. He can't move. He can't breathe. It paralyzes him instantly, and all he can do is choke on nothing.

April’s hands lock around the handle, and with practiced, methodical ease, she drags it downward—splitting sinew and vertebrae, carving a path through the root of the man who made her. Lester makes a sound no human should make. She holds his weight against her, almost tenderly, as the blade tears lower. Down past shoulder blades. Down through muscle and bone. A single, slow, clean line of ruin. Like she's unzipping him from the inside out.

And then she lets go.

Lester crumples to the dirt like a marionette with its strings cut. Blood pools beneath him, dark crimson catching in the moonlight. His hands twitch, just barely. He's dying. Fast.

April steps back, her breaths rasping. And then, finally, she speaks. Flat. Devoid of everything.

"I don't."

Lester wheezes. He tries to lift his head. Fails. His lips twitch, stretching into something almost like a smile. He gurgles when he finally manages to speak, bestowing one final, pathetic parting gift upon his daughter.

"...Good,” He chokes. “You’re… just like me…"

A raspy chuckle leaves his blood-drenched lips. “Vile little thing. I’m proud of you…”

April freezes.

And then, she loses it. She lifts one foot, then slams it down into his skull. Then again. And again.

"FUCK YOU!”

CRACK.

"YOU FILTHY FUCKING WORM!"

CRUNCH.

"YOU THINK THIS MAKES US FAMILY?!"

Her boots are soaked, slick with blood and brain matter.

"YOU THINK I’M LIKE YOU?!"

CRUSH.

"I AM BETTER THAN YOU! I AM MORE THAN YOU!"

And then she doesn't speak anymore. She just screams and stomps until his face is gone, until it's just pulp and bone and gore, until there's nothing left of him to haunt her. She can’t look like him if he doesn’t look like anything.

When it's over, she stumbles back. Shaking. Breathing like she's been holding it in for years. She wipes her boots on his cloak like he’s just filth she walked through.

Lester Crouch is unrecognizable. Lester Crouch is dead.

And for the first time in ages, April feels...

Light.

Not empty. Not hollow. Light.

Her shoulders fall. Her head lifts. She inhales deep through her nose. And then she exhales like it's the first clean breath she's ever taken.

This is what she’d needed all this time. The eradication of the man who ruined her. The one who planted rot in her marrow before she was even born. Just the death of the man who made her a weapon and called it love.

She feels it in her very soul—the unholy clarity of it. The silence that rings so loud it sings. It's not guilt. It's not grief. It's peace. She feels clean. Cleansed by the very act of destruction.

She’s complete.

Wretchedly, despicably, gloriously complete.

It was never about senseless bloodshed. Not carnage for the sake of carnage. Never about the poachers. They were just placeholders. Distractions.

This—him—he was the source. The genesis of the monster she became. And now he's gone. She's not his shadow. She's not his daughter. She's herself, for the first time in her life.

April steps back from the carnage, her boots squelching under the blood-soaked dirt. The moon bears silent witness, same as it always has. It has seen it all. The ruin. The slaughter. It had seen Ollie die. It had seen her at her worst. And now, it gets to see her at her best. It gets to see her be reborn.

She closes her eyes and sighs with the kind of pleasure that feels sacred. It’s euphoria. It’s clarity. It’s the ecstasy of becoming something much greater than herself.

A wicked grin curves her lips, and she offers a dramatic bow. It’s finality in its purest form. The thrill of freedom coursing through her veins. And as she straightens once again, blood-drunk beneath the cold eye of the sky, she realizes one thing with horrible, divine clarity.

She hadn’t just inherited her father’s cruelty.

She’d perfected it.

#harry potter #ravenclaw #hogwarts legacy #my writing #harry potter oc #hogwarts legacy oc #barty crouch jr #angst #Spotify

2 notes · View notes

dexterity8 · 3 months ago

Text

Worthmore

23 — Vestige

(TW for detailed descriptions of gore in this chapter! Read at your own discretion.)

The night is heavy. Suffocating. The kind of darkness that stretches too far, filling the spaces between the trees with something unnatural and alive. The moon barely claws through the canopy above, thin silver beams slicing through the black, casting long, skeletal shadows that seem to move when she isn't looking.

It's Halloween again.

Exactly one year since she took a life for the first time. Since she'd buried a blade into someone's throat and felt the warmth of their blood coat her hands like baptismal water. A life for a life, she had thought back then. Retribution. Justice. But now? Now she isn't even sure what it is anymore. A compulsion? A sick obsession? A tradition?

Maybe it doesn't matter.

April moves through the underbrush with the same porcelain mask fixed over her face. The vest clings to her frame as it had before, though it fits her better now, her body having grown into it like a second skin. That's all she is now, isn't she? A shell. A husk.

She adjusts the fit of her gloves, flexing her fingers. No hesitation. No room for doubt. Because if she hesitates, the screams come back. If she wavers, the memory creeps in. The look in the fox's eyes, the way his body had convulsed, the way his fingers had dug into the dirt as he choked on his own blood. The way she had felt in that moment, the pulse of something divine coursing through her veins as she watched him die. The sheer clarity of it.

That's what she's chasing now. That unbearable silence that had followed.

She wishes she could say she was here by accident. That she was taking a walk and simply stumbled across the vermin that scurry through these woods. But she's never been a good liar—at least not to herself.

No, she's here for a reason.

She's here because she wants to kill.

The thought should unsettle her. It doesn't.

Instead, it thrums through her bones like a heartbeat. Like a calling. The cold, hollow place inside of her is screaming to be filled. And what better way to do so than with the blood of the filth who took everything from her? The poachers who made her into this—this thing that barely recognizes itself in the mirror anymore.

April had told Sebastian and Ominis she wasn't feeling well, and Sebastian, ever the perceptive one, had arched a brow, leaning in as if studying her face for signs of deceit. "You said the exact same thing last Halloween," he had mused, arms crossing over his chest. "Strange, isn't it? Maybe Halloween makes you sick?"

She had only offered a feigned reassurance, as she always did. A lie dressed in sweetness, a mask within a mask. And, like the fools they were, they had let her go.

If only they knew.

Would they be afraid of her?

Would they look at her the way she looks at herself in the mirror—like something grotesque, something monstrous and wrong?

It doesn't matter. Nothing matters. Not when she still feels hollow, empty in a way that no amount of love or understanding could ever mend. She'd tried, hadn't she? Tried to bridge the chasm that had formed between her and her mother, tried to believe that maybe, just maybe, she could let it go. But resentment festered beneath the surface, gnawing at April like a parasite, a slow decay that would likely never heal. Because how could she forgive her? How could she simply ignore the truth? That her mother had made a choice for her. That she had been robbed of ever knowing who he was. That she had spent years believing she simply wasn't good enough for a father, when all this time, he had simply been a monster walking free.

No, forgiveness isn't so easily granted.

Maybe one day, but not tonight.

Tonight, she is something else entirely.

She can't find him, of course. She's not stupid. Lester is a ghost—he comes and goes as he pleases, never lingering long enough to be caught. But that's fine. Any of them will do.

A distant glow flickers through the branches ahead, a faint break in the darkness. Voices, low and muffled, bleeding into laughter. She stops, tilting her head ever so slightly, listening. The cadence of their speech, the rhythmic lull of conversation—it's unmistakable. Poachers.

There are more of them this time. Last year, it had only been two, and she had taken her time with them—made them feel everything they deserved to feel before she painted the grass red with their blood. But this? This is different. This is something bigger. A dozen, maybe more.

A grin curls behind her mask. She has been preparing for this.

The wand at her side hums with latent power, eager and yearning. She'll give it something new to taste.

A spell, crafted in secret for the past year, honed with every bad intention and every wave of pain that would otherwise leave her completely helpless against the elements. A spell made for them. The incantation is etched into the marrow of her bones, coiled like a serpent in the back of her throat, waiting to strike. She has never spoken it aloud.

Tonight, she will.

She moves closer, pressing herself into the shadows, navigating the underbrush like a wraith. The camp is a complete mess. A few rusted cages lean empty against makeshift posts. Pelts hang drying like grotesque trophies along twine. Crates filled with illegal goods—potion ingredients, powdered horns, clawed limbs—are stacked haphazardly, as though even the forest wants nothing to do with them. The whole place reeks of ash and death.

She surveys the scene with a kind of morbid detachment, like she's watching animals in a cage—feral, filthy, doomed. April hides behind the trees just long enough to count them. Fourteen. Maybe fifteen if the one slumped by the fire was sleeping and not a corpse in a cloak. Didn't matter. She'd carved through worse. And from the sound of it, they weren't expecting a thing.

Perfect.

She stepped forward. Slow. Steady. Let herself be seen. The effect was immediate. Conversations ceased mid-word. A card game paused mid-hand. A man stopped sharpening a blade, brows twitching as he stared at the figure emerging from the treeline.

"...You lost, sweetheart?" a gravelly voice asked.

The speaker was slouched near the campfire, one leg kicked over a low wooden stool, the other tapping absently against the dirt. His mask—crudely shaped like a pig's snout—looked to be made of stained leather. His left arm was a jagged hunk of wood carved into a vaguely hand-like prosthetic, splintered fingers twitching as though remembering how to grip.

"No candy out here," he continued, voice syrupy with sarcasm. "But I hear the forest's got some fun treats if you dig deep enough."

A few others chuckled. Someone muttered something obscene. April said nothing. Just tilted her head slightly, wand clenched so tight in her hand that her knuckles ached beneath the leather of her gloves.

"Fuckin' Hogwarts kids," someone else grumbled. "No decency, no manners."

"Wait," a woman suddenly spoke. Her voice was gentle, cutting through the haze of mockery. "Are you alright?"

April's gaze snapped toward her.

The speaker stood slightly apart from the others, half-hidden in shadow. Her mask was that of a sheep, dainty and delicate, with pale fabric draped loosely over her shoulders like some attempt at civility.

"Do you need help?" the woman asks, raising both hands slowly. "I mean it. You don't belong here. This isn't a safe place for a child. If you need help getting back to the castle, I can walk you part of the way."

Her voice isn't mocking. She sounds... sincere. Genuinely concerned. It makes April freeze.

The fire cracks. An owl shrieks somewhere above them. She couldn't answer. Couldn't breathe, for just a second.

Rage coils in her gut, but it's twisted with something else. Something worse. Confusion. Uncertainty. She doesn't like how it makes her feel. This woman is trying to unravel the fragile narrative she's built for herself. The one she needs to believe. That poachers are monsters. That what she does is righteous. That she is exacting revenge—not becoming something just as vile.

She clenches her jaw so tightly it hurts.

They're the ones who laughed when Ollie died. The ones who step on the necks of innocent beasts and brag about it later over mugs of piss-warm ale. They aren't supposed to care. They aren't supposed to be human.

She doesn't want the sheep-masked woman to be kind. She wants to hate her. Wants to throw her into the same pit of depravity where the rest of them belong. So how dare she? How dare this woman look at her like that? With sympathy?

It makes her stomach recoil. It makes her doubt. And that's worse than anything. Because what is she even doing this for anymore?

For Ollie?

Ollie is gone.

And here she is, standing in front of a bunch of strangers, trying to justify murder to a ghost. What the fuck is wrong with her?

She doesn't have time to answer.

"Oi!" another poacher barks, his voice slicing the tension like a blade. This one stood taller than the rest, body lean and confident. The cat mask he wore glinted silver beneath the firelight. "You deaf or just thick? This ain't a playground."

He steps closer, raising his wand and waving it at her like it's a toy. "I said, get the fuck outta here."

The sheep-masked woman turned sharply, with panic in her voice. "Stop! Don't—!"

"Don't what?" the cat sneered. "She's a little brat in a mask. Probably thinks she's being cute. Go home, lass. Or I'll make sure you never step foot in these woods again."

April's grip around her wand tightens so hard she might just break it. Her breath quickens. Her ribs feel too tight in her skin. Her thoughts—fractured. Blistering.

This is what you came for.

They're monsters, remember? Monsters that killed Ollie.

This is what you're fighting for. This is what he would want.

But... would he?

That question splinters something in her. Ollie's name, once a balm, now a question mark. Is this all still for him? Or for herself? For the anger? For the void?

She doesn't know. And she hates herself for it.

But there's no more time to think.

The man's wand glows red at the tip. He means to intimidate her. To scare her off. To assert power.

April blinks. And in that instant, something snaps. Because there it is. The mask slipping. The reality behind the facade. That's what they are. That's what they always have been. Predators in costumes. Heartless, wretched monsters unworthy of being deemed human. And she is done pretending otherwise.

So she lifts her wand toward the sky and finally utters the incantation. Her incantation.

"Cruciatus Fulgur."

A snap of her wrist—sharp, resolute—and a searing crimson bolt of lightning erupts from the tip, lancing into the heavens like a spear thrown by a god. It vanishes into the clouds, and for one, breathless moment, nothing happens.

Then the sky splits open.

The storm that blooms above them is not natural. It is not born of weather or whim. It is wrath made manifest. The clouds churn in a spiral of deep, violent red—veined with crackling light, their hue unnatural, like coagulated blood churned by hurricane winds. The temperature plummets. The air thickens, becomes electric, charged with malice. It smells like rusted iron and the distant stench of burning hair.

And then, the first bolt strikes.

It wasn't lightning as the world knew it. It didn't crack or arc. It dove. It hunted. Bolts of red-hot searing pain rained down like divine punishment, striking indiscriminately across the camp. One poacher screamed as a bolt hit his spine, his body writhing into a hideous arch before collapsing, spasming, mouth foaming.

It's not quite the pain of flesh being singed either. It's worse. It's nerves being detonated. It's like being set on fire from the inside, like every bone is being shattered with a hot hammer, over and over again. It's exactly what April felt when they did this to her.

Each strike sends another poacher to the dirt, writhing and clawing at themselves like they're trying to rip their skin off. Some slam their heads into the ground repeatedly, trying to knock the pain out of their skulls. Others convulse until their muscles snap like overstretched wire.

And at the eye of it all stands April. A bolt of lighting kisses her shoulder, and she staggers—but endures. This pain is part of her. It is her.

And when the last bolt fades and the screaming tapers into pitiful sobbing, she tucks her wand away and draws her dagger. She steps toward the nearest body. A man with a rabbit mask, his legs twisted beneath him, one arm slightly singed by the lightning. He looks up at her, eyes barely visible through the warped slits of his mask.

"No," he rasps. "Please—"

She kicks his head sideways so hard his jaw dislocates with a sickening pop, then plunges the dagger into his shoulder. She drags the blade downward, slowly, splitting open muscle, fat, and tendon. The sound it makes is wet and grotesque. He thrashes, tries to scream, but only gurgles through his broken mouth. She flips his body and stabs him in the lower back, just above the pelvis, before tearing the blade sideways. A spray of blood hits her mask. Something thick and yellowish leaks out along with it.

Next.

Another poacher reaches for her—barely, trembling—so she stomps on his hand until the bones crunch, then pins it under her heel and saws his wrist off with the dagger. It takes time. It takes effort. She wants it to. The bone resists her, but she forces the jagged edge through, tearing through the sinew until the hand separates with a final snap and the man blacks out from the pain.

She then catches a glimpse of a woman trying to crawl away. But before she can get any sort of distance, April grabs her by the hair and slams her face into the dirt. Once. Twice. A third time—until her skull caves and her goat mask cracks in half. Bone and brain matter splatter her vest. Still, she doesn't seem the least bit perturbed.

She moves from one body to the next, painting the camp red. One man she guts open like livestock, leaving his entrails steaming in the cold night air. Another she drags into the center of the camp and scalps. It's awful. Monstrous. It's exactly what she has become.

She is so far gone in her own madness that when she reaches the woman in the sheep mask, she nearly doesn't hesitate.

She hadn't run. Couldn't. She was cowering behind a burnt-out tent post, clutching her stomach. Her mask was tilted sideways, revealing a tear-streaked cheek beneath as she looked up at April. At the kid who'd just slaughtered adults twice her size in the most brutal ways she'd ever had the displeasure of witnessing.

"Please," she whimpers helplessly. "I—I'm not like them. I only do this to eat. To survive. I swear to you. I'm not a bad person—please—"

April's grip on the dagger loosens. Her breath stutters.

She's telling the truth.

And gods, it hurts. It hurts more than the lightning. More than anything. The mask on her face suddenly feels heavy. Suffocating. She remembers the way her mother used to stroke her hair after nightmares. The way Sebastian would roll his eyes when she rambled about magical theory. The sound of Ollie's happy chirps in the forest that night. Before the pain. Before everything.

What the fuck am I doing?

What have I become?

And for a split second, she sees herself. The real her. Small. Frightened. Crumbling beneath all the rot she'd piled atop her heart like armor. It doesn't matter how much she tries to lie to herself. She could be the strongest witch of her era, and it still wouldn't change the fact she longs for the comfort of being weak again. When she didn't have to rely on resentment and anger to give herself a purpose. When she wasn't a bloodthirsty killer. When she was simply April Worthmore.

The woman sobs. "Please. I have a sister. She doesn't know I'm— I don't want to die—"

In the midst of her inner turmoil, April crouches and suddenly pulls the woman gently into her arms. Cradles her. Rocks her. "Shh," she whispers, voice almost kind. "It's okay."

The woman exhales a shaky breath. She leans in. Trusts her.

That was her final mistake.

With a swift motion, April's hands snap up, grip the back of the woman's head, and twist it all the way around.

A sickening crack echoes through the camp. She lets the body fall gently to the dirt.

And she feels... nothing.

Not relief. Not guilt. Not catharsis.

Absolutely nothing.

The silence that follows is unbearable. It isn't the kind of silence that brings peace or resolution. It's not even the silence that follows the calm of a storm. No—this is the silence of aftermath. Of trauma. April doesn't remember standing. Doesn't remember drawing a breath again after ending the sheep-masked woman's life. Her eyes unfocus and her gaze shifts from corpse to corpse like she doesn't know how they'd gotten there. But she did. Of course she did.

She sways on her feet, staring at her bloodied hands, the dagger trembling between her fingers. Her mask stares blankly back at her in the reflection of a broken pan, porcelain splattered with gore. Her ears ring with phantom screams that no longer had throats to come from.

She exhales slowly. It comes out shaky.

Is this it?

She'd done it. Again. On Halloween, again. An agonizing tradition, honored with an unholy ritual she'd created for herself—one she'd committed to with the kind of certainty only grief could inspire.

But now?

Now it feels like meaningless. Not the righteous fury she'd once cloaked herself in. Not the adrenaline, not even the sickening surge of relief. Just emptiness. Just regret.

Maybe... maybe this needs to stop.

She doesn't even realize she's thinking it at first. The thought creeps in unannounced, soft like a whisper and just as unwelcome. But it lodges itself in her head like a splinter, refusing to go. She breathes in slowly. A year. It had been a year since she killed for the first time, and what had it changed? Had it made anything better? Had she felt anything different? She was in her sixth year now. So close to graduation. So close to building something of herself. She had options—her O.W.L.s had been near-perfect, her professors always impressed by her sharp mind and dedication. Even Professor Hecat, stoic as she was, had hinted that April might make an excellent replacement when she finally retired. That had stayed with her.

She could have a future. She could teach. She could heal. She could do anything.

Then why the hell is she still doing this? Why is she dreaming of a future when she's standing in the middle of a slaughterhouse she created? What kind of person could teach children after this?

She hunches forward slightly, steadying herself against a tree. Her mouth is dry. Her eyes burn. Her chest is a cavern of hollow static. She wipes the dagger clean on a dead man's coat and slips it back into its sheath. Her hand lingers over it for a beat too long. It's comfort. It's all she has left.

She has to leave. Now.

She turns, desperate to flee the thoughts swarming her like flies to a carcass. She stumbles through the camp, half-blind to the carnage she wrought, half-aware of how her legs barely feel like her own. But something catches her eye near the edge of the clearing. A pile of bones, scattered in a careless heap near an old fire pit, blackened with soot and char. At first, it barely registers. Just another grotesque detail in a tapestry of horror.

But something shimmers. Catches the light.

A silver ribbon.

It's tied around a small bone, delicate and thin, like it belonged to something pure. Gentle. Harmless.

That's not—no, no—it can't be.

Her body moves before her mind can catch up. She stumbles over the dirt, nearly tripping over a fallen limb in her haste, and drops to her knees before the heap. She scrambles through the pile with shaky hands until she finds it. The shape. The size. The familiar curve of the limb. And that ribbon—that damned ribbon, tied in the clumsy knot she remembered doing herself when he wouldn't stay still.

April curls herself around the bone like it's a newborn, pressing it to her chest, shielding it from the cold air, from the memory of what had become of him. Like if she holds it tight enough, he'll become real again. Fur and warmth and big, moonlit eyes. A twitching nose. That curious sound he always made when he was happy.

"O... Ollie...?"

The name barely forms in her throat, weak and disbelieving. Her lips tremble around it. She stares at the tiny limb in her arms and everything in her fractures at all once.

At first, it's just numbness. A cold, creeping sensation in her chest like her heart is drowning in molasses. Her vision blurs. The world feels miles away.

He'd been hers. He had trusted her. And now, here he was. In pieces. Left to rot in a corner like trash. Like he was nothing.

April's breath hitches at last. The first crack. A tremor ripples through her, and her lips part as she sucks in air through her teeth, shallow and unrestrained. Her chest heaves, but nothing comes out. Not at first.

Then it all breaks loose at once.

The scream that tears out of her doesn't sound human. It's hoarse, raspy, strangled through clenched teeth. The kind of scream that scrapes the back of your throat bloody. The kind that doesn't care who hears, or what sees.

"I'm sorry," she whispers, over and over, through uneven breaths. "I'm so sorry. I'm so—Ollie—I should've— I didn't— I should've protected you—"

But her voice doesn't sound like her own. It sounds far away, like it's coming from underwater. Everything is muffled. Her own body feels like it isn't hers. Her skin is buzzing, her limbs feel too heavy, her thoughts fractured into jagged pieces too sharp to hold. Her lungs starts to seize like her body doesn't know how to breathe anymore.

She tears off her mask with one hand and flings it aside. Her throat burns as air rushes in, ragged and desperate. Her face—free from the porcelain prison she'd worn both tonight and a year ago—is contorted into anguish. Snot runs from her nose. Her eyes swell red with tears she can't stop. Her whole body shakes as she rocks back and forth, clutching what was left of him. A leg. A single fucking leg.

This isn't fair. Why now? Why this way?

She doesn't know how long she cries. Time means nothing. Her voice grows hoarse, her fingers ache from holding too tight. Her tears soak the ribbon, the bone, the blood smeared across her clothes. And all she can think, over and over, is how this is all her fault. Because it is. Because she brought him here. Because she couldn't protect him. Because she let them hurt him and then let herself become something just as despicable.

She keeps whispering apologies, even when her throat gives out. She begs the empty air for forgiveness that would never come. She isn't a savior, and she isn't a hero. She is a killer. A liar. A coward. A little girl with too much power and no idea what to do with it. And no matter how many poachers she kills, no matter how much blood she spills—it will never bring Ollie back.

The moon above no longer offers comfort. Not like it had on the night she lost him.

She blinks away the last of her tears, vision blurring more from exhaustion than grief now. With great care, she unwinds the ribbon, fingers fumbling from how hard she trembles. The knot comes loose reluctantly, as though it too doesn't want to let go. But she manages.

She holds it like it was spun from something sacred, and then reaches for her wand. Her hands ache, joints stiff, but she ties it around the the handle all the same. Knot after knot after knot, she secures it like a lifeline—like if it came undone, she'd shatter with it. And maybe she would. Maybe it was the only thing keeping her together.

Then she looks down at what's left of him—just one small leg—and knows she can't leave him in that pile. He deserves better.

So she drags herself to her feet and crosses the ruined camp to a quieter patch of earth. No bones. No bodies. Just dirt. She kneels down again, every movement more painful than the last, and begins to dig. Her nails tear against stones and roots, the cold soil biting beneath her fingernails. Dirt turns to mud under her tears as she digs deeper and deeper, until it feels spacious enough for someone so small. So undeserving of this.

She lowers the limb into the hole with shaky hands, brushing a thumb over the curve of the bone like she might soothe him one last time. Then, slowly, she pushes the dirt back over it, her breaths becoming shallower with every handful. Once the earth is packed flat again, she just sits there. Staring. It looks like any other patch of forest. Invisible. Forgotten. But she'd remember. Of course she would.

She never thought she'd see him again. Part of her wished she hadn't. This hurt worse than not knowing. Worse than pretending he was somewhere better.

"I love you," she whispers, barely able to get the words out. "I'm sorry for letting you down. I'm sorry I let them take you."

The wind rustles through the willow above her, gentle but indifferent.

"I don't know if there's anything beyond this," she continues, "but... if there's some other world waiting for us—a world where I didn't fail you–then I hope I find you there."

She blinks up at the moon, almost trying to understand what about it was so captivating to him. To all mooncalves, for that matter.

"And maybe... maybe we'll still be in that field, dancing under the moonlight. You're by my side, and I'm... happy."

Her eyes fall back onto the grave like it might open again. Like he might come back, bounding toward her like he used to. But the world doesn't bend to wishes. It only takes. And it has taken everything.

She stands, numb and swaying slightly, and turns to leave. Curfew had probably already taken effect back at the castle, and her body aches like she's aged a hundred years in one night. She grabs the discarded porcelain mask from the ground, now slightly cracked along the cheek from the impact, and simply holsters it onto her hip. She wipes her eyes with the edge of her sleeve, leaving streaks of red in place of tears. Then, she casts one last glance at the grave, bidding it farewell without mustering the words. Resolute and final.

She turns, and then stops just as quickly. There's someone standing just beyond the treeline. She hadn't even heard him arrive.

April's blood runs cold as her eyes adjust. He's completely still, hands in his coat pockets. Unbothered by the blood-slick earth. The mangled corpses. The scent of death in the air. He looks at all of it. Then, he looks at her.

"...You always did love too hard."

#harry potter #ravenclaw #hogwarts legacy #my writing #harry potter oc #hogwarts legacy oc #angst #Spotify

1 note · View note