Remus would be on his way soon, Adrian just had to find his way back to the stop he was at before the Harpy found him. And fend off the curious vampires that would almost certainly be attracted to the smell of blood.
"One step at a time," Adrian mumbled to himself, taking a limping stumbling step out towards the main openway of the alleyway.
He figured he must have looked terrible. The few people he saw walking past only glancing at him briefly before they hurried down the path to wherever they were trying to go.
Adrian kept his wand on him at all time, clutched tightly in his shaking grip. An emaciated dog ran up to him, growling lowly and sniffing him from a distance.
"Go away," Adrian grunted, his face already numb along the left side and his vision tinting badly, "Go away." He snapped at the dog.
It paused, then snarled and took a closer step.
Adrian closed his eyes with a sigh, clutching the pipe he was holding to remain stable on his feet.
Lutain would comment about how if he was a noble kind, he could scare the dog with a single hiss.
He was a noble kind.
Adrian's eyes flashed open and his lips curled back in a feral hiss.
He waited one second, not feeling the shifting of bones or flesh. He almost sighed at how he failed his Animagus transformation yet again, but some of it must have transferred properly. That or he just looked scary. The dog stiffened, eyes widening and its tail tucking between its legs. It made a loud yip before running off suddenly.
Adrian's eyes stung like he forgot to blink for the longest time.
"You lost?" A low croaking voice asked, a man with vibrant purple eyes and translucent skin, "What is someone like you doing-"
"Go away," Adrian clipped sourly, blinking to try and removing the itchy feeling, "I'm fine."
The man chuckled lowly, smiling to reveal two rows of teeth, and what looked to be a black tongue. "I don't think so..."
Adrian felt his magic prickle, surging beneath his skin but for some difficult reason, it was struggling to pull itself to the surface. Resilient and resisting, similar to the Fury only being singed.
He felt nauseous, like something was writhing in my stomach.
It reached out, it had an extra digit on its hand. If Adrian was thinking, or if he could through the pounding of his head, he could have named the exact species of the humanoid.
"Go away," Adrian warned, pointing his wand at the man, "Your last warning."
It didn't even blink, and Adrian hissed out the first curse that came to mind.
"Abrumpo!" Adrian hissed, gagging as the sudden surge of his magic at the movement.
Adrian slid to the ground, his legs too weak to support him. His eyes blurred, warmth and pleasant sparks illuminating his blood and permitting him to relax.
No, no he couldn't. It wasn't the time.
Yet, his blood sang and tickled, a contrasting feel against the stinging burn of his skin. His senses were flaring out in confusion, and he felt himself groan somewhere between bliss and agony.
Adrian panted, eyes barely able to focus as he saw the other creature collapse to the ground. It screamed inhuman angry shrieks as it fumbled across its chest to stop blue silvery blood from staining its clothing. He hit it then, good.
"Oh," Adrian slurred, smiling breathlessly as the euphoric sensations washed aside the pain of his skin, still leaving him twitching and spasming on the ground. "You're mermish."
The creature glugged angrily. Its bright eyes filled with fury, glazing through its savage blood loss. It reached out again, the extra digit on its hand suddenly made sense, it was a fin.
"You!" It gasped, its voice was wet and thick. "You- you-"
No, a mermish didn't make sense. Adrian blinked, barely aware he was talking out loud through the heavy feeling and the ringing in his ears, "A siren? Mermish don't eat humans."
It shrieked in anger, unhinging its second set of teeth to make a serrated cavern of hungry bone. It was kind of pretty.
A black dog slammed into the creature, knocking it to the ground where it had barely managed to rise. It glugged angrily, blood splashing onto the ground.
Had the dog from before come back?
Adrian finally was able to hear the other voices, the persistent horrified shouting that was growing closer.
Ah, no. It was a different dog, one that was big and shaggy and a startling shade of black.
Something popped in his ear, a bubble that had been blocking his hearing. The shouts suddenly made much more sense.
"Remus?" Adrian gasped, waving with one hand intently as the pleasant sensations of darker magic and the pain really dimmed his thinking. "Remus? You..."
Hands coddled Adrian, searching over him with feather light touches. Golden eyes were wide in unmistakable horror as they took in Adrian's face, focusing on something below his eyes.
"Adrian," Remus sighed, looking on the verge of tears, "I'm so sorry-"
"Oh," Adrian blinked sluggishly, seeing a circling white spec in the sky above. "Hedwig found you?"
Sirius Black appeared, looking around carefully with his wand drawn. He kept his back to the two, leaving some semblance of privacy.
"Moony," Sirius grunted, scanning the road and the corpse, "That him?"
Remus exhaled shakily, pushing back Adrian's hair to look over his face and exposed skin better, "Yes- yeah. James has a few already- lemme send him notice." Sirius sent his wand moving, the shimmering fog of an obvious patronus shot out and vanished before Adrian could tell what it was.
....
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