[ AC: untitled (HP crossover) ]
Fandom: Assassin's Creed
Characters: Altair Ibn'La-Ahad, Malik Al-Sayf
Rating: G
Warnings: An expansion of the Like Pillars Four (HP Crossover) universe. Continued from The Three Unforgivables, detailing more of Altair's backstory. Altair is currently under a modified form of the Imperius spell.
The world washes gray and cold. All the warmth floods out of everything he touches and when he puts his hands up to the common room fire, his skin never grows warm. It remains cool, then burns.
He has not seen Al Mualim for weeks now, but the impact the professor has left him with scores its mark in his mind like the searing of a brand. Altair hears his voice all the time now, finds himself thinking, What would the professor think? before every course of action. His conscience has molded itself to the pitch and timber of the professor’s voice. It urges him to be strict in his motions, sure and swift in carrying them out. He grows less wary of pain and retribution, emboldened by the mettle being shaped inside him.
It is only a matter of time before Altair wins a starting position on the Quidditch team - there is no one on the team who will fly quite as high as he will, who will dive from quite as far. They are only human and they afraid of breaking their legs and snapping their arms, Skele-Grow or not. His housemates grow quiet in awe of his tenacity and it is so much better than their jealous scorn that he performs dangerous maneuver after maneuver when he reaches for the Snitch, growing ever bolder when he comes out unscathed.
He is powerful; he is strong. He is only a third-year but he can out-fly the seventh-years. He knows the Unforgivables and he knows how to perform them, practiced them alone in the quiet of the night on ceiling spiders and dungeon rodents- a three-beat waltz of Imperio, Crucio, and a quick death before it suffers too much.
Not that it matters, says his conscience, but it doesn’t stop Altair from slowing his hand.
Maybe this is what being a great wizard is like, he thinks. Maybe all the magic inside of him is so great and volatile that it churns like a terrible storm inside of his body. It brews up such a terrifying ruckus and heat that everything outside must turn cold in comparison, like a fever boiling in his blood. And he is a great wizard, he knows, so great that his classmates don’t dare talk about him behind his back anymore, so fearsome that they lower their eyes as soon as they catch his gaze.
“They are afraid because I am so much stronger than them,” Altair muses, staring down at the carcasses of insects and rats, eyes glowing gold in the dark.
Yes, they are, says his conscience.
The Ravenclaw Seeker is a young boy with undeniable talent, built broad and strong but quick as a wisp on his broom. This is not relevant information, however, until the Ravenclaw Seeker grows just a little too brave and attempts to compete with Altair in a risky dive, hurtling toward the grassy ground at breakneck speeds. The crowd roars to cheer him on; they’ve never been given such a show, and Altair feels indignation nip at his neck, sink its teeth into his skin.
Give them the show they want, then.
He spins downward through the air, spiralling at an angle just severe enough to jab into the other boy’s line of flight. The boy is sturdy like a wall - he falls like one too upon unexpectedly colliding into the obstruction in his path. He loses his grip on his broom - Altair sees the exact moment the tension in his fingers snap - and careens towards the ground even faster than the Snitch can fly, bypassing the flitting golden ball until his back hits the earth with a meaty ‘thud’, his limbs sprawled about him in a way reminiscent of dead spiders and mice.
Someone yells from the sky.
“What is wrong with you?” snarls Malik, long legs tangling in the bristles of his broom in his haste to get to his fallen brother. Ultimately, he kicks away the expensive piece of equipment, sending it spinning into the dust, and falls to his knees to gingerly cradle the back of the Ravenclaw Seeker’s head with his hand, lifting it off the ground just as the younger boy gives a hacking wet cough that makes his entire body shudder. Altair hears blood in it, smells it in the air above the pungent fresh-cut grass and suffocating silence that has since fallen over the court.
"Kadar! Kadar!" calls Malik into the quiet and only the quiet responds.
The look Malik gives him when he looks up is nothing short of murderous even as the coach, the nurse and professors alike pull him up to his feet and back from his brother, shouting panicked, quick instructions for someone to fetch the stretcher, hurry, don’t idle! It burns, Altair realizes, taking a stunned step backwards, unable to drop his eyes, his fist loosening around the struggling Snitch. Its tiny metal wings beat against the inside of his palm but all he can feel is the sudden heat flaring up his neck from his gut.
It burns like fire, shame.
“You’ll pay, you bastard,” Malik hisses, shoving Altair back with a forceful hand, every hit resounding in the hollow in his chest and pounding back against the beating of his heart. He throws a punch, but Altair ducks it, moving with such reflexive quickness that it startles Altair himself, makes him feel like he’s being jerked into motion like a puppet on a string. A blue-clad teammate flies down and holds Malik back by the arms, pulling him back as his heels kick up dirt in resistance. “You’ll pay for that, you arrogant, pompous, good-for-nothing show-off!”
“It was an accident,” Altair hears himself say, even though he knows it wasn’t, even though he hadn’t wanted to make an excuse for himself like that. The words come unbidden; they sound like something a professor would coach him to say to diffuse the situation.
“I don’t care!” shouts Malik, struggling against his friends. “I don’t care, I’m going to get you for that! And no one will care when I do either! They’ll thank me for getting rid of a curse like you! I bet I’ll even earn House points! All the other houses will be tripping over themselves to give them to me! Gryffindor included!”
“I’m not cursed,” Altair spits out, fighting against the way his jaw locks up, trying to grind the words to a halt, trying to stop the situation from exacerbating.
Malik barks out a cruel, furious laugh. “Yes, you are! That’s who you are,” he answers, and just like that, everything dims back into monotone, the blue of the sky fading gray, the fire under his skin sputtering to ash. Malik’s eyes are wild and frantic, one part fear and many parts accusation and anger. “That’s who you are,” he repeats, finally allowing his teammates to hold him still, feet bolted to the ground. Malik sticks his neck out, bares his teeth. “Altair Ibn’La-Ahad, the Cursed Boy!”
The Snitch breaks free of his hold and flutters away.
Characters: Altair Ibn'La-Ahad, Malik Al-Sayf
Rating: G
Warnings: An expansion of the Like Pillars Four (HP Crossover) universe. Continued from The Three Unforgivables, detailing more of Altair's backstory. Altair is currently under a modified form of the Imperius spell.
The world washes gray and cold. All the warmth floods out of everything he touches and when he puts his hands up to the common room fire, his skin never grows warm. It remains cool, then burns.
He has not seen Al Mualim for weeks now, but the impact the professor has left him with scores its mark in his mind like the searing of a brand. Altair hears his voice all the time now, finds himself thinking, What would the professor think? before every course of action. His conscience has molded itself to the pitch and timber of the professor’s voice. It urges him to be strict in his motions, sure and swift in carrying them out. He grows less wary of pain and retribution, emboldened by the mettle being shaped inside him.
It is only a matter of time before Altair wins a starting position on the Quidditch team - there is no one on the team who will fly quite as high as he will, who will dive from quite as far. They are only human and they afraid of breaking their legs and snapping their arms, Skele-Grow or not. His housemates grow quiet in awe of his tenacity and it is so much better than their jealous scorn that he performs dangerous maneuver after maneuver when he reaches for the Snitch, growing ever bolder when he comes out unscathed.
He is powerful; he is strong. He is only a third-year but he can out-fly the seventh-years. He knows the Unforgivables and he knows how to perform them, practiced them alone in the quiet of the night on ceiling spiders and dungeon rodents- a three-beat waltz of Imperio, Crucio, and a quick death before it suffers too much.
Not that it matters, says his conscience, but it doesn’t stop Altair from slowing his hand.
Maybe this is what being a great wizard is like, he thinks. Maybe all the magic inside of him is so great and volatile that it churns like a terrible storm inside of his body. It brews up such a terrifying ruckus and heat that everything outside must turn cold in comparison, like a fever boiling in his blood. And he is a great wizard, he knows, so great that his classmates don’t dare talk about him behind his back anymore, so fearsome that they lower their eyes as soon as they catch his gaze.
“They are afraid because I am so much stronger than them,” Altair muses, staring down at the carcasses of insects and rats, eyes glowing gold in the dark.
Yes, they are, says his conscience.
The Ravenclaw Seeker is a young boy with undeniable talent, built broad and strong but quick as a wisp on his broom. This is not relevant information, however, until the Ravenclaw Seeker grows just a little too brave and attempts to compete with Altair in a risky dive, hurtling toward the grassy ground at breakneck speeds. The crowd roars to cheer him on; they’ve never been given such a show, and Altair feels indignation nip at his neck, sink its teeth into his skin.
Give them the show they want, then.
He spins downward through the air, spiralling at an angle just severe enough to jab into the other boy’s line of flight. The boy is sturdy like a wall - he falls like one too upon unexpectedly colliding into the obstruction in his path. He loses his grip on his broom - Altair sees the exact moment the tension in his fingers snap - and careens towards the ground even faster than the Snitch can fly, bypassing the flitting golden ball until his back hits the earth with a meaty ‘thud’, his limbs sprawled about him in a way reminiscent of dead spiders and mice.
Someone yells from the sky.
“What is wrong with you?” snarls Malik, long legs tangling in the bristles of his broom in his haste to get to his fallen brother. Ultimately, he kicks away the expensive piece of equipment, sending it spinning into the dust, and falls to his knees to gingerly cradle the back of the Ravenclaw Seeker’s head with his hand, lifting it off the ground just as the younger boy gives a hacking wet cough that makes his entire body shudder. Altair hears blood in it, smells it in the air above the pungent fresh-cut grass and suffocating silence that has since fallen over the court.
"Kadar! Kadar!" calls Malik into the quiet and only the quiet responds.
The look Malik gives him when he looks up is nothing short of murderous even as the coach, the nurse and professors alike pull him up to his feet and back from his brother, shouting panicked, quick instructions for someone to fetch the stretcher, hurry, don’t idle! It burns, Altair realizes, taking a stunned step backwards, unable to drop his eyes, his fist loosening around the struggling Snitch. Its tiny metal wings beat against the inside of his palm but all he can feel is the sudden heat flaring up his neck from his gut.
It burns like fire, shame.
“You’ll pay, you bastard,” Malik hisses, shoving Altair back with a forceful hand, every hit resounding in the hollow in his chest and pounding back against the beating of his heart. He throws a punch, but Altair ducks it, moving with such reflexive quickness that it startles Altair himself, makes him feel like he’s being jerked into motion like a puppet on a string. A blue-clad teammate flies down and holds Malik back by the arms, pulling him back as his heels kick up dirt in resistance. “You’ll pay for that, you arrogant, pompous, good-for-nothing show-off!”
“It was an accident,” Altair hears himself say, even though he knows it wasn’t, even though he hadn’t wanted to make an excuse for himself like that. The words come unbidden; they sound like something a professor would coach him to say to diffuse the situation.
“I don’t care!” shouts Malik, struggling against his friends. “I don’t care, I’m going to get you for that! And no one will care when I do either! They’ll thank me for getting rid of a curse like you! I bet I’ll even earn House points! All the other houses will be tripping over themselves to give them to me! Gryffindor included!”
“I’m not cursed,” Altair spits out, fighting against the way his jaw locks up, trying to grind the words to a halt, trying to stop the situation from exacerbating.
Malik barks out a cruel, furious laugh. “Yes, you are! That’s who you are,” he answers, and just like that, everything dims back into monotone, the blue of the sky fading gray, the fire under his skin sputtering to ash. Malik’s eyes are wild and frantic, one part fear and many parts accusation and anger. “That’s who you are,” he repeats, finally allowing his teammates to hold him still, feet bolted to the ground. Malik sticks his neck out, bares his teeth. “Altair Ibn’La-Ahad, the Cursed Boy!”
The Snitch breaks free of his hold and flutters away.