How to Make a Villain - [Sebastian Sallow x F!OC]

[eighteen]

'Why?' said Sebastian wearily, dragging a hand across his stubbled cheek. 'Because I want to help the people I care about?'

'Is that what you call murder and betrayal, is it? Help?'

Too exhausted to deal with another of Ominis' long-winded lectures, Sebastian made to shoulder past him - but Ominis stood firm; somewhere between their fifth and seventh years, the youngest Gaunt had grown taller, stronger. Unmovable.

'Piss off, Gaunt,' snarled Sebastian. 'I wouldn't expect you to understand the concept of sacrifice.'

'Sacrifice?' Ominis' voice cracked with indignation. 'I sacrificed my freedom, my autonomy to call in favours for you!'

'You didn't do it for me, you did it for Anne!'

'Yes! And now she's dead because of you!'

The words hit Sebastian with a force that almost bent him over double. Crack. The fractures in his self control fissured, grew wider - but it was anger, not sadness, that filled the empty spaces his sisters absence had left behind, flooding every crevice, filling every gaping hole, fixing his broken pieces together like glue. Sebastian was always astounded at how deep his stores of anger ran: not even exhaustion of the most acute kind could temper it.

Ominis seized the moment to strike again, as if there hadn't been enough venom in his words the first time around.

'I am in as much my family's debt as you are,' his voice was snake-like again, his pale eyes glowing orange in the firelight, 'and now you're going to ruin it all - the freedom that I bought you, that I paid for with my own - for what? For some girl you don't even know?'

'I know her!' Sebastian's words were rough with the effort it took not to shout them. 'And not just what she can do, I know her! She loves the colour blue, she can't sleep without a light on, she has an affinity with unicorns -'

'Oh, spare me.'

'She doesn't like sweets, she speaks French when she's angry. - And I know that she blames herself for her parents murders! And that she's scared, and alone, and that she trusts me to -'

'Trusts you?' Ominis' nostrils flared. 'The boy who gave his soul to the Dark Arts? The boy who used the torture curse on his best friend for a spell book?'

Sebastian drew himself up; Ominis was taller, but Sebastian was broader - stronger; the only one who'd ever been brave enough to face down a Gaunt.

'I had to use that curse, and you know it,' he said lowly, his eyes locked on the boy whose blindness extended well beyond the realm of vision. 'I did what had to be done to save us.'

'Right, just like killing Solomon in those catacombs had to be done to save Anne!'

'At least I had the guts!' Sebastian grabbed the blind boys' collar. Ominis shoved him back. 'You would have been happy to let us to die down there, just like you were happy to let Anne d-'

'Depulso -'

' - Protego!'

Stumbling back, Sebastian was thrown off-kilter by the unexpected assault. Among the many gifts the House of Gaunt boasted, wandless magic was one of the lesser known - but no less powerful - of the lot.

'Shut up, Sebastian! - Depulso!'

' - Protego! Fuck, Ominis! Stop!'

'Shut the fuck up, Sebastian! Shut up! Shut -'