All Magic Comes With a Price (Percy Jackson AU)

Jason

I'm gonna blame my not updating on the play and working on my costume, okay?
And writers block.
Lots of writers block.

::

Jason should've been panicking.

Lightning sliced through the dark sky, slashing through the clouds. A large booming sound shattered the sky immediately after, as grey rain poured from the sky above. Jason hovered above the ground, his feet dissipating into nothingness as they neared the grass.

He could feel the panic at the back of his thoughts, brewing behind a blank feeling that seemed to wipe over his mind.

His body was crumbled beside him, robes splayed in every direction, and cuts sliced across his face, the blood being washed off with the rain. His blonde hair was wet, stuck across his face, and darkened with red.

Lightning struck across the sky again, lighting up the glazed, dead look in Jason's eyes. Like drums, the thunder rang after, shaking Jason's form, causing wispy white tendrils to drift off his body and dissolve into the air.

Fear seized Jason, a hand that gripped around his throat and caused his head to go light and his stomach to go heavy. Jason reached out his hand towards his body, white tendrils licking off his form as he did so, dissolving into the air.

As his hand got closer, it started to dissolve into large white tendrils of thick smoke. Jason drew his hand back at once, fear sinking in his chest. Moving away from his body didn't seem to help; his other hand started to dissolve into thick white clouds of smoke that billowed up in the rain.

Jason held up his hands, not they he had any. The tendrils were dissolving off his flickering form, and he had dissolved up to his elbows. Near the ground his feet started to dissolve, and Jason found himself standing in a thick white cloud.

Fear climbed up his throat as his body burned away to smoke, and Jason's throat stung as he screamed, dissolving into nothingness.

::

Jason was still shaken up several hours later at breakfast. His hands shook when he picked up his fork with his right, and pumpkin juice threatened to slosh out of the bronze goblet in his left.

Attempting, yet again, to regain his composure Jason took in a deep, but shaky, breath. He breathes out, nice and long, steadying out his breathing. Though that did nothing to help with the cold feeling in his chest.

When the post owls filled the ceiling overhead, Jason didn't notice, his fingers were tightly wrapped around the goblet at this point, and slowly turning dangerously white. However when a brown, tawny owl landed in front of him, bearing the crest of the ministry no less, Jason spilled the contents of the goblet over the table.

Hastily mopping up the mess with a nearby napkin, Jason removed the letter from the owl with shaking hands. Immediately after Jason removed the twine connecting the letter to the owl's leg, it took off. Circling amongst the others before disappearing from view.

Leaving Jason and his letter, it was folded inside a thick parchment envelope that had been sealed shut with dark green wax, and stamped with the letter M.

Shakily, Jason slid his finger underneath the flap of the envelope, cringing slightly at the crack that broke the seal. He slid the letter out, and slowly unfolded it, a sense of heavy dread tightening his chest.

Dear Jason Grace,

Firstly, allow me to congratulate you on the recovery of your sister. After five years in a coma after defeating the dark lord, it is a pleasure to have the hero of the century up on her feet once more.

Now, as you know Jason, we at the ministry have been helping you since you received your illness at the age of two. And as you also know, we are evaluating currently during your time at Hogwarts if you can keep the body we procured for you, for the rest of your life, as, after being bitten by a storm spirit one's body does not continue to exist in a physical form, and eventually blows away into nothingness, stealing away the life of the afflicted person. And we've done the best we could for you, seeing as this affliction is such a rare one. (At this point, Jason was wondering exactly why the ministry was reminding him of his ailments. And he wasn't feeling good about it)

And with your considerable education and decipline performance these past years, we should think that you should certainly be able to move into the wizarding world in this body after Hogwarts. And as long as you continue to follow under the rules of the Hogwarts High Inquisitor, your Professor Hera, I should think that you'll be on your way to be a fully functioning wizard after school.

With regards, and a Merry Christmas,

The Minister of Magic,
Zeus

Jason folded the letter back up, and set it down in front of him.

They were blackmailing him. With his own life. Bringing it up how they helped him, how generous they were to help him. To not let him die. Tell him how great his life is going to be, as long as he follows every stupid and harmful rule that Hera has pushed on the student body.

But Jason had to, that's what he told himself, he had to. Only it was much more difficult to believe that when his sister was comforting a small first year half way down the table who's hand was torn up and swollen red.

Merry Christmas indeed.

::

Jason stood still as Piper flew down the corridor, briefly turning her hand backwards towards him and the other guy, who gave a half hearted wave back. The guy turned to Jason gave an awkward sort of smile, before shuffling down the corridor, his hands in his pockets.

Jason turned around again, finding several other students were starting to crowd around the degree, several turned red with anger, and others lost the color in their cheeks. Some people looked as if they might faint.

Feeling sick in his stomach, Jason turned away from the Educational Degree. Hastily straightening his stack of textbooks, he started to make his way down the corridor towards the library.

Everyone was spilling around him in the halls, and Jason assumed they were all gathering in front of the educational degree, to see the latest horrors.

His face and chest felt hot, and Jason forced himself not to look back at the degree. For now, he had to suffer loosing his morale, so that he might have a chance to live. Jason thought it didn't sound so selfish when he put it that way, but that still didn't help the fact that his stomach was churning. Finally breaking out into a free corridor, Jason paused for a moment to steady his breathing, and then turned the corner.

For the second time that day, the second time in that hour, Jason slammed into someone, and his stack of textbooks sprawled all over the ground as he collided with a mass. Finding himself flat on the ground, Jason hastily scrambled to his feet and started to pick up his textbooks.

"Oh, Merlin." Cursed Jason, tucking textbooks under his arm. Suddenly remembering the person he bumped into, he quickly apologized, "Oh god, I'm so sorry! I didn't see you, well I guess that much was obvious."

"Yeah, no kidding." The boy was a Slytherin, with a slim, pale face that reminded Jason of a ghoul. His robes hung off his frame in an unhealthy manner, and Jason noticed that he couldn't have been older than thirteen. When the third year stood up, Jason's eyes flicked to the silver skull ring on his finger, but quickly looked back up again. Looking at the Slytherin again, something clicked in his head.

"Weren't you just over there looking at the degree?" If it were possible, what little color remained in his face drained away, and he swept off down the hall, past Jason, disappearing to the crowd that shuffled down the corridor.

Staring after him for a moment, Jason sighed, and picked up another textbook. "Merry Christmas." He mumbled, before walking down the corridor and into the library.