Flames

Chapter 6

A/N:

Enjoy this chapter, guys!

"I need you to write a letter," the voice in the back of his head said.

It had been a week since he received the one-of-a-kind bracelet from the Blacks, and a day since they had found that Hydrus was betrothed to no one.

"Al-Alright," he stammered. His handwriting was a bit worse for wear.

"Not by yourself, you dimwit. Get a self-writing quill, and a pot of the finest black ink. You'll need some wax and the stamp with the Malfoy insignia. Hurry."

Hydrus pushed open the door to his room, and stuck his head slowly into the hallway.

It was dark outside, sometime near midnight. With luck, Lucius would be asleep and wouldn't hear his quick scampering.

There were plenty of bits of parchment that littered across the manor, but not many places where special quills could be found. Self-writing quills, especially, were frowned upon, and only really used in verbal reports.

But then an idea came to him suddenly, as he crept along the second floor, hardly daring a quick breath.

Abraxas Malfoy's study.

With slow, careful hands, Hydrus opened the well-oiled door, breathing in the sweet, orange-like fumes Aldebaran's tea sometimes left.

He looked behind, careful to make sure no one saw him, though, if they did, Hydrus was already done for. There would be no good trying to explain why he desperately needed a quill at such an hour.

Taking deep breaths, trying desperately to quell the sudden rise in adrenaline, his hands fumbled for the knobs of drawers, opening them one at a time, doing a slow deliberate search of its contents.

One of them contained an odd assortment of stamp, with everything from the Crabbe insignia to the long-dead family of the Selwyns. With a deep sigh of relief, Hydrus found the Malfoy stamp, and closed the drawer carefully, doing his absolute best to leave everything as it was, even though he knew almost no one but him and Aldebaran came to this desolate study.

On the right side of the desk, he found parchments of all different colours, and inking pots with different shades of purples, reds and blues. An especially nice silver one Hydrus took.

It would work nicely for his signature, if it really was a letter the voice wanted him to write.

The drawer underneath, he finally found an assortment of quills.

Some were majestic owl feathers of mottled brown and white, others were even more elegant peacock feathers that seemed to glow blue and green. There were some others in there, a long black one, perhaps from a raven, and a fluffy one, pearl white that shone in the moonlight.

A feather from a swan.

"You incompetent fool," the voice hissed, and pain suddenly flared in Hydrus' hands, making him immediately drop the feather.

Thankfully, feathers were light and produced no sound when it hit the floor.

Hydrus let loose a whimper, and bit his lip resolutely, fighting against the tears that swam in his eyes.

"Self-writing quills are golden and white. Put that useless chicken feather back and hurry up."

He did as he was told, and fumbled from a couple dozens of quills, before, at the very back, he found a feather of a marbled golden and white colour.