Creevie looked like he was having some kind of episode. Deus eyed him suspiciously, a faint frown on his features as the man once again cycled through looking like a shifty, nervous wreck to looking like a cat with canary feathers about to burst from his lips. Deus sighed. Something was up, and that something wasn't good.

The pair of them were standing on the edge of nowhere. The air, even in July, had a bite to it, enough that Deus was glad for the robes that wrapped his arms in warmth. He was fairly certain they were still in Scotland—not too far from Kearvaig, if he was guessing right about the cliffs. He scanned the mists anxiously. Karrow should have sent a signal already.  It was Kelpie policy: whenever a deal went down, you had a witch on watch. Or wizard, in the case of Karrow. The people the Lazy Kelpie crew tended to deal with weren't usually the most reputable or respectable sorts, and having someone to hex from a distance had saved their skins—and deals—more than once. And they always—always sent an 'all-clear' signal spell.

Nothing.

"Ah donnae like this, Creevie.  Karrow ain't given us th' clear an' we only got a few minutes 'till the Bavlies get 'ere." Deus observed, curling his fingers around the comforting warmth of his wand as he watched the distant brooms get closer and closer. Sure, he'd never actually been a major player in one of these deals—Pa usually let him hang out with the watcher and see how things went down from a distance, and this was the first time he was on this end of it, but he was fairly certain it wasn't just first time jitters that had his hackles up. His frown deepened. There were seven brooms coming up—there should have only been two.  "Creevie, Ah think sommat's up…maybe we should jes…" He saw Creevie visibly wince, and realization hit Deus like a sack of bricks. His behavior, Karrow's silence, the whole sense that something sure as heck wasn't right. Creevie saw the boy's sharp eyes widen and raised his hands in almost panicked defense.

"Look, kid, I didn't know, okay? I didn't think Pa'd send you—you're a, you're a f---ing kid. I'm sorry, okay? The money was too good, and I—"

"Ye…ye fecking moron, ye—shit" Deus, know aware that Creevie'd double-crossed Pa Quigley and the Lazy Kelpie—and that Karrow was probably dead at worst and disabled at best, didn't even hesitate, he turned heel, fully intending to sprint as far the hell away from here as possible, he straddled his broom mid-run and hit sky. License or not, he'd have disapparated in a heartbeat, but the whole deal ground was spelled with an Anti-Apparation Jinx to prevent either side from taking the goods and getting gone. Protection. F--- that.  Creevie may have been stupid enough to try and make a deal with the Belvie brothers, but Deus knew what those seven brooms meant, and knew damn well there was no way they'd hold to their end of it, and he wanted no part of it.

He wasn't quite fast enough. The first hex whizzed past his ear and he dove into a tumbling roll over the rocky, slippery surface of the cliffs, a shower of gravel and splinters spraying inches from his head. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Creevie, grinning like a used cars salesman and offering a hand to a man on a broomstick, and getting hit squarely in the chest with what Deus figured was an Imperius curse. Too busy to pay more attention, Deus stayed crouched and fired a revulsion jinx first, sending his attacker tumbling off his broom. He hit the ground top-half first, and was slow enough getting up that Deus hit him with a stunning spell before he could retaliate. He heard Creevie stuttering, rattling off the location and code to the lock on the safe where the box containing the object of the deal was being kept. Deus hissed in furious frustration. Stupid, STUPID Creevie—how the man hadn't seen this coming was beyond Deus.

Deus dove again, dodging another hex from a second attacker, but the third one, fired from the fourth member of the gang caught him square in the shoulder of his non-wand arm.  Deus responded with a nasty hex that left the witch screaming and trying to put her burning hair out. "Brings out th' light in yer eyes, lassi—F---! Protego!" The shield went up just in time, but the force of the three spells headed his direction t once cracked it, and Deus threw his injured arm up as two of the weakened spells exploded past him, the third wrapping around his hand like a thorny vine, tightening, ripping and tearing.

He heard Creevie screaming bloody murder about going back on the deal and getting double crossed and Deus, too busy to roll his eyes, grit his teeth and kept firing jinxes. Smart, Creevie was not, but stubborn-minded as hell, yes. He disarmed the witch with the burning hair, chucking her captured wand over the edge of the cliffs, but the first stunned wizard was finally getting up. Deus tossed another spell at him, and the fabric of the man's robe began to strangle him as Deus turned to disarm another large, beefy wizard. The flashes of light from Creevie's direction told him the idiot was holding his own, and Deus began to think there was a chance they'd get out of this.  Deus's next hex missed its target, but the rock behind his attacker exploded in a shower of sparks, forcing the attacker to duck, and the "Affligo!" Deus followed it with hit him, slamming his head into the remains of the boulder and knocking the fellow out.

His shoulder ached, and it smelled faintly like burning steak, and the edges of the tears made by the vine hex were turning black. Dimly, Deus realized he needed to get his back against wall. He threw another hex and hit something solid with his back. Unfortunately, it was a person. The beefy wizard he'd disarmed got the boy in a full nelson and the skinny witch—now missing a large chunk of hair—dove for one of her unconscious peers' wands while Deus wriggled and swung to escape the grip he was in, knowing if he could just lift his arm a bit, he'd slip out of his robes and get out of the grip. Unfortunately, the arm in question was the injured one, and it was desperately hard to think through the hazy agony. Clearly pissed, the witch hurled a snarled "Sectumsempra" in Deus's direction. Deus dropped from his robes, and the curse caught him in the upper chest, but it was the beefy wizard who caught the brunt of it. He bellowed in pain and the witch shrieked. The wizard slipped and tumbled over the side of the cliff, but a broom went diving after him.

In the same moment, Deus saw a brilliant flash of green from one of the Belvie brothers' wands hit Creevie in the throat, and he fell soundlessly backwards, crumpling with eyes still open as slid silently over the edge of the cliff, wand tumbling before him as it slid from slack fingers. Survival the only thing processing in the moment, Deus fired a curse at the traitor's waist, where he knew the man kept decent amount of Peruvian Darkness Powder. The spell hit true, and a lightless, black cloud of engulfed the area. "Vulnera Sanentur, Vulnera Sanentur" Deus chanted desperately, the shaky spells slowing the damage from the witch's spell, but his inability to fully focus from the pain hindering their effectiveness. The bleeding slowed to a sluggish crawl, but the wounds wouldn't close. Hearing the yells around him, the call to get together and hex in all directions, Deus closed his brilliant eyes, thinking fast.

Life was a gamble, and Deus was an addict, and he sure as hell wasn't going to be able to fight out the rest of this. He rapidly cast a duplicating charm on the blood over his robes, shaking violently from the injuries, and raised his wand tip square even with his own chest. "Petrificus Totalus."

Time to play possum.


Did you get him?
Of course I got him, he ain't moving, is he?
Don't mean he's dead.
Ain't no one can lay possum still with them kinda injuries, they'd be twitchin' like a fish onna line.
Aye ya, and lookit—bleedin' like a dead man. No gushin' or nothin'— means 'is 'eart ain't beatin'. 
Well 'e could still—
Jacoby, enough. Get Mackers and Loren. Where's Kelchers?
Creevie got 'er. Deader'n'a'doornail.
Son of a bitch!
F---!
Well, bring what's left of her along and move out.


Deus drifted. Hazy and sick, disoriented.

He couldn't feel anything below his shoulder, which he supposed he should be grateful for, from the look of it, but he suspected the numbness wasn't a good sign. He wiggled his toes in exhaustion as the self-inflicted curse began to wear off. And sure enough, he was twitching, violently, as each small movement disrupted something that hurt.

All this. All this over a stupid rock no bigger than a sickle.

Deus groaned as sitting up hurt, and went to work casting the healing spells he knew. You didn't grow up around his foster family without learning some serious first aid, and fast. He fished in his pockets—charmed to hold more than they should—for some of the basic necessities to hold himself together (literally, he reflected with some humor) until he could get back.

The pain-induced haze over his eyes and mind cleared somewhat and Deus tried very hard not to think about the still-blackening hand on the end of his arm. He could feel the fingers—he was just going to hope he could fix the rest.  But that was going to require some help. Deus stumbled over to his smoking robes, fishing around in them for a small round glass. He left the robes there, shivering in his t-shirt but not trusting the greenish hue they were turning. He flicked his wrist, and his wand expanded into a large stick that he used to pick up the robes and toss them over the cliff. The Bevlie gang had turned their brooms into splinters, and as Deus muttered the password and necessary code over the glass, he began trudging in the direction of the reserve brooms.

In few seconds, Pa Quigley's whiskery face loomed in the glass. He looked faintly surprised, which wasn't lost on Deus. "Deus. My boy, what's the holdup?"

"No deal," it was hard to say—an admission of failure. "Creevie turned, Karrow was compromised. Bevlies sent an ambush." Deus, who had a sinking suspicion, watched Pa's face carefully. It didn't change, except for the faintest glint of light in his eyes. Deus had grown up with this man always around, watched him closer than a caseworker in the way only a kid could. And that glint was all he needed.

"Ye knew, ye…ye filthy, feckin' piece a' shite, ye knew ye were sendin' me intae a deat' trap." Deus spluttered. It took a lot to shatter his calm. Deus was a ordinarily a pretty mellow sort of fellow, and he took things more or less in stride—including backstabbing, which was something of a way of life in his pseudo family. But not to this extent. He felt cold in the pit of his stomach, hot fury warring with something unfamiliarly icy as he glared in rage at the calm face of the man who had more or less raised him for the last thirteen years, and had tossed him to the wolves as surely as Deus had just tossed his robes over a cliff.

Pa remained silent.

Deus spat, "They sent seven, SEVEN, Pa. What th' fehckin kinda chance did Ah 'ave? If ye knew Creevie turned, ye knew Karrow'd be more 'n useless, ahn," Deus trailed off, swallowing hard as he remembered Karrow, footsteps pausing for only a minute before resuming. "Did, ah…did Karrow check in?"

"Apparently a decent one." Pa responded, massive, bushy eyebrows raising imperturbably in response to Deus's rhetorical question. "And nae, 'e didnae. You know yer responsibilities on cleanup."

Deus turned a little green but he kept his expression hard. Pa was referring to the general disposal of bodies employed by the Kelpie crew when things went south. He'd never done it himself, and he didn't want to start now. He felt the unfamiliar feeling of desperate panic spiraling up from his gut, feeling young and overwhelmed and sick all at once. Anger lost out, and something very like disgusted sadness kicked in. "All this over a feckin' rock, Pa? Over a stupid rock no bigger'n a sickle that calms ye down?"

"Serenity stone, lad. Have you ever seen one?"

Deus scowled. "Ye wouldnae let meh see it when ye got it in." It was the absolute truth, but Deus carefully avoided answering the actual question. What Pa forbid and what Deus actually did were drastically different things.

"Inside that sickle-sized rock's the equivalent of a planetary storm, lad. The most beautiful light show ye've ever seen—chaos in a crystal. The calm ahn th'warmth's only a side effect. Ye cannae make 'em, they're a devil tae find, and if ye crack 'em, they'll set off an anarchy spell that'll cover miles. They're rarer'n a pheonix's tears and worth just as much. That little rock, lad, is worth thousands."

"Shit. Ahn now the Bevlie brothers 'ave one? " A predatory smile pulled the corners of Pa's whiskery walrus beard upwards, and he said nothing. Deus gave a tired laugh, reading the expression perfectly. "Ye gave 'em a fake. Ye knew they'd off Creevie ahn then assume 'e double-crossed them once they got to th' vault."

"There's a smart lad."
 
Something caught his attention and he turned. It was Karrow—spread-eagled and staring blankly into space. His face was untouched, but the body was in ribbons that Deus recognized as the full impact of a sectumsempra hitting its mark. His hands began to shake. "Ye—ye feckin crazy son of a feckin bitch, ye—" Deus was yelling now, but Pa merely snorted and cut him off, and the glass went dark. Deus hit his knees, hands catching himself at the last minute. He didn't retch. God he wanted to. His body wanted to, it shuddered in convulsions, but Deus swallowed and swallowed, forcing the contents back into his stomach, and felt every inch the sixteen year old that he was.

Deus chucked the glass against a rock, feeling somewhat vindicated as it shattered with a sad hiss of sparks.

Creevie was dead because he was a traitor and too stupid to figure out that double-crossers get double-crossed. Karrow was dead because by setting up the drop and letting the Bevlie brothers, Pa didn't have to deal with a traitor himself. Deus was almost dead for the same reason. Life as usual at the Lazy Kelpie. F--- that. F---. That.

Deus wiped his mouth, spitting out the last of the bile. He knew he was supposed to transfigure the body, turn it into a rock or a plant, it was his duty as the survivor of a south deal but…

He reached in his pocket again and pulled out two knuts. He closed the man's eyes, and laid the coins over them, and then turned on his heel and started trudging to the edge of the unplottable spell. The reserve broom hadn't been where it was supposed to be. F--- Creevie.

As he walked, footstep in front of footstep, Deus began to snicker, just a little a bit. The sad, desperate chuckle turned into a full blown roar of laughter as he slipped his hand into the back pocket of his jeans, wrapping his fingers around the small, smooth stone there. Instantly, warmth roared through his bones and sunk into them, serenity from chaos, settling deeper than bone and finally, finally allowing his shoulders to relax. The Bevlie brothers would blame their fake stone on the double-crossing Creevie. Pa, if Deus had done his work right, would do the same. And Creevie was dead and dealt with, unable to defend himself from the accusations or divulge where the real stone was--it was lost to all of them.

And Deus, well, he rather thought he'd finally found a good birthday present for Livi.