Continued from Away Mission (https://absitomen.com/index.php?topic=20474)
With a crack, the Ministry atrium had blurred and shifted into the damp gray-green of the Scottish countryside, and they were left staring up at a two-story house built out of cool gray stone. The remains of fading red sparks, slowly disappearing against the gray sky overhead, reflected off of the wet grass by the edge of the path.
A half-second later, it registered that a high-pitched voice was screaming inside the safe house.
Jaw set, Kurby started forward. With a hard jerk of his wand, he wrenched the front door open with an invisible spell, slamming the heavy wood back hard enough against the stone wall that it nearly bounced off its hinges.
The werewolf safe houses that dotted the countryside were Ministry-sanctioned and regulated, although they weren’t normally the subject of much attention. Their locations were supposed to be unknown to the average witch or wizard, situated far enough from high-density Muggle areas that there was a low likelihood of accidents, even if the numerous other safeguards placed on them failed. But their locations were publicized to werewolves. If Tawse wanted to sneak one of his direwolves into a safe house to let it run rampant the following morning when the staff came to let it out of its locked room, there would have been few precautions in place to stop him.
Next to him, the shape of Tessa Fenneken was quickly shrinking, losing height quickly as she transformed into her second form as a red-brown fox. Kurby pulled the silver chainmail hood up over his head as he moved past her and entered the stone building, his wand raised and at the ready.
There was no rush of teeth and fur to greet them; no metallic scent of blood; no sign of a direwolf here on the ground floor. Just the normal interior of the safe house: the main desk that had the look of a roadside inn, as if the creatures spending the night there were merely checking in on holiday, with a stairwell just past it. The source of the screaming was a young girl sprawled on the ground in front of what looked to be an open closet, her face streaked with tears. He could see the boots of someone else half-hidden behind the counter, just out of sight.
Keeping his wand raised, Kurby stepped around the side of the counter, dark eyes quickly scanning the interior of the room. As he came around the edge of the counter, he refocused on the two figures laying on the ground.
Suddenly, he stopped short enough that the small red-brown fox slammed into the back of his leg.
”Figaro?” he asked incredulously, doing a hard double-take at the blond youth laying on the floor.