It was quiet in the room now. Sirius sat on the sofa with Esme beside him, his arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders while his other hand rested lightly on Lyra. After the terrifying outburst, Lyra had finally exhausted herself and passed out, sleeping peacefully in her mother's arms. Sirius couldn't blame her; she hadn't had a full night's rest in weeks.
Madam Odalie sat on the opposite sofa, her posture straight and composed, while her two imposing bodyguards stood like statues behind her.
Isaac occupied a single armchair placed between the two opposing sides. On the small side table beside him sat a steaming cup of rich, dark Creole coffee, the deep, aromatic roast laced with chicory that was customary for formal hosting in Louisiana.
The heavy silence in the room wasn't peaceful. It was charged, thick with the weight of unasked questions and the looming reality of what they had all just witnessed.
"What exactly just happened?" Sirius asked, his voice dropping low and tight now that the chaos had subsided and Lyra was safely resting.
Odalie didn't answer immediately. She picked up a small silver spoon, stirred a touch of raw sugar into her steaming cup of dark Creole chicory coffee, and took a slow, measured sip before looking back up at them.
"It would seem that due to your daughter's complete lack of proper wards and protections, she has become an unintended beacon for the many entities and spirits lingering in this area," Odalie began smoothly. She glanced toward the shuttered windows, gesturing vaguely toward the damp, humid bayou stretching out beyond the hotel. "This part of the country is ancient, and it is deeply rich with them. To an unshielded, open child, especially one with true mediumistic blood, they are drawn like moths to a flame."
She set her porcelain cup down onto the saucer with a soft click, leaning forward to lock her dark eyes directly onto Sirius and Esme.
"Mediums are living doorways between the world of the living and the Veil," Odalie explained, her tone turning grave. "The dead, particularly some of the more nefarious spirits who refuse to cross over or are trapped in their own misery, will use an open conduit like a child to claw their way back, to touch the physical world again, or to escape and fight off the finality of their fate."
"So, there are wards and charms that can keep them away?" Esme asked, leaning forward slightly. Even in English, a subtle trace of her native French cadence sharpened her words, her healer's mind instantly looking for a systemic solution to a chaotic problem.
Odalie shook her head slowly, her gold bracelets whispering against one another.
"There are, ma chère, but they are only temporary," Odalie replied smoothly. "The spell I cast just now is among those my ancestors created to beat back the tide for a moment. But make no mistake: they are still outside this room, lingering in the halls, waiting for the energy to fade so they can crowd back in."
She paused, taking another slow sip of her dark chicory coffee before setting it down.
"The only thing that can actually keep them away permanently is a foundational warding rite," Odalie continued, her expression turning dead serious. "What we call Le Cercle de l'Ombre, the Shadow Circle. It binds the threshold of a home so that the dead simply cannot cross it."
Sirius narrowed his eyes, sensing the catch. "There's a catch, isn't there?"
Odalie offered a thin, knowing smile. "Always. It is a powerful, unyielding spell, and it comes with a rather inconvenient side effect. Once the circle is cast, it blocks all unanchored entities indiscriminately. Restless spirits, shades, inferi, even vampires cannot step foot across the line."
She sighed softly, shaking her head with a look of feigned disappointment. "Which is a bit of a social nuisance, I must admit. Some of my extended relatives on the St. Cyr and Beaumont sides are quite partial to the company of vampires, and it makes dinner parties dreadfully complicated when half the guest list can't get past the front gate."
Sirius and Isaac exchanged a brief, quiet look, balancing the absurdity of complaining about vampire dinner guests against the grim reality of protecting a four-year-old child from an army of wandering spirits.
Odalie's gaze shifted smoothly from Sirius to Esme, her dark eyes glittering with sharp observation.
"I have noticed, Lady Black. Am I to call you lady? I sensed a hint of French in your accent, did I not?"
Esme turned to Sirius for a brief, quiet second before turning her steady gaze back to her. "Oui. I am French. And oui, you can call me Lady Black."
"Ah, wonderful. I am delighted to make your acquaintance, even if the circumstances are rather grim," Odalie replied, a thin, knowing smile playing at the corners of her lips. "I hope you find our hospitality very well?"
Esme smiled softly and glanced back at Sirius, who merely frowned in response. When they had first arrived in Louisiana, the locals had not taken to Sirius at all. They had eyed him with lingering suspicion, clearly harboring a deep distaste for foreign nobility, especially high-handed aristocrats from Britain. But the moment Esme spoke to them in her native French, their guarded demeanors vanished completely, turning polite and accommodating in an instant. It seemed that in the heart of the bayou, speaking French was an invaluable asset.
Esme offered Odalie a polite, measured nod, her guard still securely in place. "Thank you, Madam Delacroix."
"So, is little Lyra your only child?" Odalie asked, her dark eyes shifting toward the sleeping girl before looking back at Esme. "If no, are the others showing any signs of the gift?"
"Non," Esme replied smoothly. "We have three more back home being taken care of by their great-grandparents. They have not shown any sign of the gift. They are all boys."
"Ah, oui," Odalie murmured, a faint, knowing nod accompanying her words. "Boys are far less likely to inherit the vision or the Veil. It is almost always us women who are burdened by them."
"Oui. But let us return to the matter at hand. You mentioned this warding rite, Le Cercle de l'Ombre. What would be required to cast it, and more importantly, can it be established in our home across the ocean?"
Odalie's expression shifted, the social pleasantry giving way once more to the gravity of a master practitioner. She picked up her cup of coffee, swirling the dark liquid slowly before setting it back down.
"Cast it across the Atlantic?" Odalie murmured, her dark eyes narrowing thoughtfully. "A foundational ward of that magnitude cannot simply be cast remotely from the bayou, ma chère. The ritual must be anchored directly to the land, woven into the very stones of your residence by someone who commands the bloodline and understands the weight of the Veil."
She looked up, locking her gaze directly on Sirius and Esme.
"Which means," Odalie continued softly, "that if you want this child protected, either you are going to live here among the many protected residences or one of us must travel to Britain to do it."
"Can that be arranged?" Esme asked, her eyes fixed steadily on Odalie.
"Well, it can," Odalie replied, her tone lingering on the words with measured, deliberate calm. "However, there are some pressing matters to attend to first."
"What pressing matters?" Sirius asked, his brows drawing tight into a hard, protective line.
Odalie set her porcelain cup onto its saucer with a delicate, deliberate clink, her rings sparkling in the dim ambient light.
"The warding ritual is only a shield, Heir Black. It keeps the uninvited from crossing your threshold, but it does not teach your daughter how to master the storm brewing inside her own mind," Odalie explained smoothly. "The arts of mediumship, spirit-anchoring, and defensive veil-work are sacred. They are family magicks, strictly guarded and preserved through generations of bloodlines. Lyra possesses no such lineage to draw upon. She is an anomaly, a dangerously powerful one, and an unshielded, unanchored child with gifts of that magnitude will inevitably attract the eyes of the wrong people."
She leaned back, her dark eyes glittering as she watched Sirius's jaw tighten.
"Many powerful houses, both here in the States and across the sea, would willingly vie for a true medium," Odalie continued, her Creole lilt softening the cold reality of her words. "Without training, without family secrets to shield her, she is completely vulnerable. Yet no specialized lineage will ever agree to pass down their sacred blood-rites to an outsider."
Sirius's posture went wire-taut, his protective instincts flaring dangerously. "What are you trying to say, Madam Odalie?"
Odalie tilted her head, her smile thinning into something composed and razor-sharp. "I am saying that you need a master of the blood to teach your daughter, Heir Black. But in our world, no one opens their vaults or shares their ancestral magic for free to a non-relative."
She paused, offering what she clearly considered a delicate, pragmatic solution.
"So, why not resolve the dilemma before it begins? How would you like an arrangement, a formal betrothal between your daughter and my son? I believe such things are common practice in your land?"
The entire room went dead, suffocatingly quiet. You could have heard a pin drop.
Isaac froze where he sat, his hand hovering mid-air over his coffee cup. Esme's posture went terrifyingly still, her hand instinctively tightening around sleeping Lyra on her lap.
"What?" The single word tore from Sirius's throat, low, flat, and laced with a lethal, warning heat.
Sirius snapped instantly, burning away any remaining politeness he had managed to maintain.
Among nobility, political marriages and betrothals had been the poison that warped generations of his family, binding children to contracts before they could even walk. It was a suffocating, archaic tradition that Sirius and Esme had silently vowed never to inflict upon their own children. They believed fiercely that their sons and daughter should grow up to make their own choices, to love and marry or not, entirely of their own free will.
To have this foreign matriarch casually attempt to auction off his four-year-old daughter's future like a piece of property crossed a line Sirius was not willing to let stand.
Sirius surged to his feet so fast that the sofa scraped violently against the floorboards, the harsh sound ringing through the quiet room. His wand was in his hand in a heartbeat, a low, dangerous hum of magic sparking at its tip as his eyes locked onto Odalie with unmitigated fury.
"Let me make this abundantly clear, Madam Delacroix," Sirius growled, his voice dropping into a lethal, quiet register that made even the two stoic bodyguards shift their weight and tense their hands near their holsters. "My daughter is four years old. She is not a bargaining chip, she is not an alliance to be bartered in your ledger, and she is never entering into a betrothal."
Beside him, Esme didn't flinch, though her posture radiated a cold, absolute frost. She stroked Lyra's hair protectively, her gaze fixed on Odalie with the razor-sharp disdain of a mother ready to tear apart anyone threatening her child.
Odalie, to her credit, did not blink. She merely tilted her head, her rings clicking softly as she rested her chin on her steepled fingers, unimpressed by the display of aristocratic temper.
"Heir Black, temper your wand," Odalie said smoothly, her voice completely unruffled by Sirius's sudden flare of protective fury. "It is not an insult; it is a necessity. A betrothal is the only legal and magical binding recognized by our bloodlines that allows family secrets to be shared across houses. Without that tether, my family cannot grant Lyra access to our ancestral magicks. And without those rites to anchor her core, nothing will protect your daughter the moment you walk out that door."
Sirius stepped forward, his shadow falling heavily over Odalie's seat, his wand still raised with a low, dangerous spark at its tip.
"Is that a threat, Madam Delacroix?" Sirius growled.
"If you wish to take the cold truth as a threat, Heir Black, then so be it," Odalie replied without a flicker of fear.
Before Sirius's magic could ignite, Isaac surged to his feet, stepping directly into the space between Sirius and Odalie's bodyguards, holding his hands up in a firm, mediating gesture.
"Sirius, wait, hold on," Isaac urged quietly, casting a warning look at his former colleague before turning respectfully toward Odalie. "I would like to apologize, Madam Delacroix, for the sudden display. I understand the cultural weight and logic of what you are proposing... but as you can see, the parents do not agree with a betrothal."
Odalie let out a soft, exasperated sigh, her gold bangles clinking together as she shook her head slowly.
"Heir Black, Lady Black... I beg of you to consider this pragmatically," Odalie insisted, her tone carrying an urgent, almost pleading weight. "Look at your child! You do not have the luxury of pride right now. There is no one else in this country, or across the ocean, who has the blood, the willingness, or the power to teach a four-year-old medium. If you walk away now, you are leaving her completely defenseless against the Veil."
Esme stood up smoothly beside Sirius, holding the sleeping Lyra securely against her chest. Her posture radiated an absolute, impenetrable frost.
"Our answer is non, Madam Delacroix," Esme said, her voice sharp as glass and completely unyielding. "We will find another way to shield our daughter. We are done here."
"We're leaving," Sirius spat, lowering his wand just enough to usher Esme and Isaac toward the exit, keeping his shoulder squared toward Odalie and her bodyguards as they backed out of the room.
"Heir Black, think of the child!" Odalie called out after them, taking a step forward with her hand extended in a final, desperate plea. "You cannot save her on your own!"
Sirius didn't answer. He pulled the heavy wooden door shut, the latch clicking with a sharp, decisive echo.
Inside the quiet room, the lingering warmth in Odalie's face evaporated instantly.
She stood frozen near the coffee table, her hand slowly dropping back to her side. Her jaw clenched tight, her dark eyes narrowing into cold, furious slits. The composed, maternal concern she had been projecting crumbled completely, leaving behind the dark, resentful glare of someone who had just watched a priceless trophy snatched away right from under her nose.
*****
Sirius didn't stop moving until they reached the room the three of them had been renting since they arrived. He went in first, wand drawn, and swept the room before he let anyone else cross the threshold. A detection charm for curses and tampering. A check of the wards on the door and windows. Homenum Revelio for anyone lurking in the corners. It was the same routine he had run in a hundred rooms as an auror, and every sweep came back clean.
It did nothing to calm him.
"That woman... how bloody dare she!" Sirius snarled, pacing the length of the carpet like a caged predator. His chest heaved with residual adrenaline, his jaw clamped tight as he ran a frantic hand through his dark, tangled hair.
"Calm down, Sirius," Isaac said softly, stepping into the room and shutting the heavy oak door behind them. He ran a hand over his face, looking noticeably drained. "I... I want to apologize to both of you. Truly. If I had known Odalie would try to corner you into something so abhorrent, I never would have arranged the meeting in the first place."
"It's not your fault, Isaac," Sirius spat, though his tone softened slightly as he looked at his former boss. "None of us expected her to turn out to be a vulture in silk. She wasn't even expected anyway."
Esme sat down carefully on the edge of the bed, gently laying the sleeping Lyra down and tucking a soft blanket around her small shoulders. Silence stretched across the room, heavy and suffocating, until Esme broke it softly.
"...But is she right?" Esme asked, staring down at her daughter's pale face.
Sirius stopped pacing, turning toward Esme in disbelief. "About what? Bartering our four-year-old daughter like livestock?"
"No," Esme murmured, her voice laced with quiet dread as she looked up. "About her training. We have searched for months, Sirius. Nobody is willing to teach Lyra unless something substantial is given in return, and in their world, access to ancestral magic requires family blood. If no lineage will teach an outsider, how are we supposed to protect her?"
"Then we'll find something else," Sirius said, his tone shifting instantly from fiery anger to a quiet, unbreakable resolve. "We have to. For Lyra."
He crossed the small room in two long strides, dropping down beside Esme on the edge of the bed. He wrapped his hand warmly over hers, squeezing it with a fierce, grounding pressure.
Esme let out a shaky breath, her thumb brushing over the back of his hand as she leaned into his touch for a fraction of a second, drawing strength from him just as he drew strength from her. They were in uncharted, terrifying waters, with no map and no one to guide them through.
Isaac watched the exchange quietly from across the room, his expression heavy with regret, before clearing his throat to bring them back to reality.
Isaac sighed heavily, leaning against the wooden dresser. "That isn't my only concern, Esme. I'm also deeply worried that news of your daughter being an unanchored medium will spread now. People might covet her."
"What do you mean?" Esme asked, her eyes narrowing.
"Sadly, an unshielded child with a gift of this magnitude is a rare, dangerous prize," Isaac explained grimly. "I worry that word reaching the wrong ears in the bayou will attract the worst kind of people: opportunists, dark practitioners, or collectors looking to exploit an open conduit."
"Then we leave," Sirius said instantly, his voice leaving no room for argument. "Tonight."
A faint whimpering sound came from the bed. Lyra stirred restlessly, her little brow furrowing into a tight frown as she let out a quiet groan in her sleep.
The sight immediately sparked a memory in Esme's mind. "Wait... didn't Madam Delacroix say that the spell she cast was only temporary? And that it was tied specifically to the room she cast it in?"
Isaac's eyes widened slightly as the realization hit him. "That means the spirits she banished from the other room are likely already gathering around this one. The moment her magic wears off entirely, they will flood right back to Lyra."
Sirius swore under his breath, looking around the dim room as if the shadows themselves were closing in. "We should never have crossed the Atlantic. We shouldn't have come here."
"I'm sorry, Sirius," Isaac offered quietly, guilt evident in his eyes.
"Don't be," Sirius replied, shaking his head curtly. "You were trying to help us save our daughter. No one could have predicted this setup."
Sirius turned to Esme, sweeping his wand out to summon their traveling trunks into the center of the room.
"Pack everything," Sirius instructed, his focus shifting into pure survival mode. "Isaac, see if you can secure an emergency international portkey back to Europe immediately. I don't care what it costs. We are getting our daughter out of MACUSA territory before the sun comes up."
"Already sent word. I will do a follow—" Isaac began, but his words cut off abruptly. He stumbled backward, his feet tangling as if the floor had suddenly turned to mud. His eyes went wide with confusion before his knees buckled entirely.
"Isaac, what's—"
Sirius stepped forward to catch him, but a violent wave of nausea rushed through his head. A dark, buzzing lightheadedness swept over his vision, making the entire room tilt on its axis. What...?
Thud.
Sirius whipped his head around just in time to see Esme collapse off the side of the mattress, landing heavily on the rug. Her hand weakly reached out toward the bed, toward Lyra, but her fingers twitched, unable to grasp the blanket.
"Esme!"
Sirius tried to surge toward her, but the second he put weight on his right leg, his limbs turned to lead. His vision swam as numbness raced up his spine. He hit the floorboards hard, his wand slipping from his trembling fingers and rolling just out of reach under the nightstand.
He couldn't understand it. Poison? None of them had touched anything since the meeting. And he had swept this room himself, every charm clean. Isaac had gone down first, mid-sentence, before anyone had moved.
Then he caught it. Beneath the damp, mildewed air of the room was something faintly sweet, like sugar left to burn on a stove. It had been there the whole time, he realized. He just hadn't noticed it until now.
The room itself was doing this to them.
BANG!
The wooden door exploded inward, splintering off its hinges. Three tall men in dark clothing and bone-white masks poured into the room, their wands drawn.
"Grab the child!" the lead one barked, stepping over the threshold. "Quickly, before the curse takes full effect!"
"No!" Sirius roared through gritted teeth, dragging his useless legs across the floor as he clawed at the bedpost, trying to haul himself up with sheer brute strength.
Suddenly, a bright crimson flare cut through the gloom.
"Flipendo! Confringo!"
The lead intruder screamed as a concussive force blasted him backward into the corridor, his mask shattering against the doorframe. Esme, fighting the dark magic paralyzing her limbs with pure maternal fury, was propped against the bed on one elbow, her wand shaking but aimed dead-on.
"Shit, she's still awake? How is she still functioning?!" one of the masked men yelled, ducking behind the wardrobe as plaster rained down.
"You stay... away from my daughter!" Esme gasped out, her eyes blazing through the heavy fog of the hex.
"Get on with it! Take the girl!"
"Depulso!" the second attacker snarled, slashing his wand sideways.
The banishing charm struck Esme square in the chest. Her body was lifted off the floor and slammed violently against the far wall, hitting the stone with a sickening crack before she crumpled onto the rug, cold and motionless.
"Esme!" Sirius screamed, his voice raw with agony.
"Maman? Papa?" A tiny, frightened voice whimpered from the bed. Lyra sat up, rubbing her sleepy eyes, her small hands clutching her blanket. "No! Go away! Maman! Papa!"
Lyra's terror pierced the air as one of the men snatched her off the mattress, wrapping her tightly in a dark cloak to muffle her screams.
"PAPA!"
Who were these people? How had they targeted them so quickly?
Adrenaline burned through the dark curse in Sirius's veins. Crawling like a wounded beast, he lunged across the floorboards and locked his hands in a vice-like grip around the mercenary's ankle, yanking with all the strength left in his upper body.
"What the—get off me!" the man cursed, stumbling backward as Sirius nearly dragged him down.
Sirius held on with white-knuckled desperation, his eyes fixed on the man holding his screaming daughter. "Give her... back..."
The mercenary kicked his heavy leather boot brutally across Sirius's temple.
Pain exploded in Sirius's skull. His grip loosened, his arms giving out as the world spun wildly out of control. The desperate cries of his four-year-old daughter faded into a distant, muffled ring, and the room swallowed him into total darkness.