Ch82. Sending a message.

Done with his group, Tom had returned to the part of the forest where Natasha fought, only to find it half-wrecked with many trees broken in half, a few unmoving bodies lying here and there, one of which was even half-buried under a broken tree trunk, and in the middle of all this carnage was Natasha, aiming her pistol at two whimpering and cowering wizards clad in the death eater garbs, both missing everything below their elbow of their wand arm as they knelt near yet another, older wizard who was already unconscious due to how brutalized he was.

That one's wounds were something even Tom winced at so it was probably lucky for him to not be conscious right about now anyway. Natasha certainly didn't coddle these poor schmucks just because most of them were barely adults.

As Tom slowly walked towards her, Natasha finally spotted him and gave him a wry smile, which he returned but he wondered why the long face. She seemed to have the situation well in hand from what he was seeing.

"What's up, Natalia?" Tom asked with a small worry when he finally reached her, fully ignoring the two sniveling wizards.

Natasha slightly grimaced, "I let three of them run away." She sullenly admitted in an apologetic tone.

Tom raised his eyebrow at that, realizing why she was looking so sheepish and downtrodden behind her usual facade of calmness. She probably thought it to be a failure but Tom had seen it differently. He really couldn't care less.

"Let me guess. They caught you off guard by suddenly teleporting away, no?" He amusedly asked, enjoying how Natasha looked at him in veiled surprise.

"Yes." She replied, but her tone betrayed her desire to ask the unasked question.

Tom chuckled, finding it cute how she tried to keep up the appearance of a subordinate in front of strangers.

"I totally forgot they would all have emergency portkeys too and two of my batch managed to run away." He continued, answering her silent question despite her not asking before he tried to comfort her a bit, "Don't beat yourself up because of it. It doesn't matter."

Natasha gave Tom a small smile at that, but he could see she was still a bit uncomfortable with this 'failure' of hers. Unfortunately, Tom knew there was nothing he could do that would make it better for her so he decided to give her space and let her deal with it by herself.

"So, what do you want to do with these two?" Natasha asked, trying to not-so-subtly redirect the topic.

The second the two were mentioned they started to pleadly look up but didn't speak, making a silent testament to how scared they were of Natasha. Just one narrowed look from her and the two just whimpered before they returned to cradling their now missing wand arms in their lap.

Still, they didn't stop throwing hopeful glances at Tom who could be said to hold their life and death in their hands now.

But as they were looking up at him, his brown eyes suddenly gleamed, creating quite an imposing image with the moon shining behind him and the remnants of the carnage in the background reminding them of what happened just a few minutes ago.

"Just make them gather their unconscious and wounded allies into a pile and let them use their portkey." Tom uncaringly shrugged, "That's what I did with my group. After all, if they don't return home in their current state, our whole hard work would have been wasted." His tone was light and amused but its ruthless undertone sent a shiver down the spines of the two still-conscious captives.

Natasha turned towards the two and nodded with her head to the side, "You heard the bossman. Move it, boys."

The two young Death-Eater-wannabes were both relieved and dumbfounded as they slowly and wobbly stood up, inwardly happy beyond themselves that they would get out of here alive.

Alas, they still didn't realize the bleak future that awaited them, believing that the Wizarding medicine could heal literally anything. They were in for a very rude awakening in the following days.

But for them, these were worries for the future. Right now, they had one immediate problem.

How the heck were they supposed to pile up their 'friends' with both of them missing one hand?

"What are you dilly-dallying for? Do you want me to make a few more holes into you to properly motivate you?" Natasha harshly and coldly reprimanded them.

Needless to say, their injury quickly ceased to be a problem when the weapon that blew off their arms was pointed at them once again.

...

"So, why did we let them go and why not just kill them?" Natasha asked as she and Tom slowly strolled through the forest towards their portkey area, taking their sweet time and enjoying the nightly breeze.

It took barely five minutes for the two cripples to somehow drag their incapacitated allies into a big pile while moaning in pain... which was promptly ignored by both Natasha and Tom. They didn't feel very charitable, considering these guys were sent to kill them.

The only problem was the guy whose legs were trapped under a tree trunk but Tom made short work of that and with a quick spell, he uncaringly severed both of the guy's legs right in front of the horrified eyes of the two gaping wizards.

His subsequent nonchalant, "There, problem solved, now drag him away." as the two looked at him as if he was their Dark Lord himself was something Natasha would be inwardly chuckling at for quite some time.

Now that the earlier excitement was over and all their crippled would-be ambushers were safely sent home in pieces, yet, alive, Natasha was naturally curious.

She was smart enough to realize these wizards were left alive as a sort of message but she didn't know much about the wizarding politics or factions in it. That was frankly Tom's thing so she wanted a bit of context and explanation.

Not because she cared about the politics and factions in the Wizarding World, but because she didn't want to make the same mistake as she did with the Jasin family. As much as she didn't like it, she had to get a bit informed about politics if only to know which annoyance she could and which she couldn't safely kill.

Hearing Natasha's question, Tom hummed in acknowledgment, his lips curling in a small involuntary and amused smile as he remembered what the guy he had interrogated told him, "These scrubs were sent by Lucius Malfoy. The man obviously has more balls than I gave him credit for. Just a pity he is missing the most important part of his manly equipment if this pathetic attempt is to go by."

Despite his mocking words, Tom inwardly thought it was a good attempt. Lucius simply worked based on assumptions they were on the same level as an average wizard. In which case, this ambush would be their end on nine out of ten occasions.

Natasha snorted and only her agility and reflexes saved her from tripping at Tom's light-hearted remark.

"Are we going to deal with him?" She asked, trying not to laugh at the childish and crude joke that caught her off guard.

Seeing the mood become light again, Tom was inwardly satisfied.

"No." He shook his head as if he found the idea of retaliating ridiculous, "Why would he do that?"

Natasha turned her head and gave him a deadpan look at that but Tom nonchalantly ignored it and continued speaking.

"Lucius tried to find out about us ever since our little verbal exchange at the Gringotts. Apparently, he was very salty at being shown his place by some unknown foreigner in front of goblins." Tom innocently said as if it was not his fault, making Natasha roll her green eyes at him.

"Obviously, he didn't find anything and after his second verbal spanking by yours truly," Tom waved his hand in front of him to gesture at himself, "Lucius got so mad he told these guys who were already planning to wreck the event to look for us and get rid of us in the chaos. He literally said, 'We can't let some filthy foreigners walk around our lands!' or something."

Tom didn't appreciate that sentence but he found it exceedingly funny to hear something like that from a guy with a French surname.

Shaking his head in amusement, Tom continued, "The problem with the Dark Faction is that they had never faced any direct resistance from their opponents. Their enemies almost never shot lethal spells back at them. Sending these kids home crippled for life, some even missing wand arms should curb a bit of that arrogance. Next time they will think twice before sending someone to kill us."

Well, not exactly. The real reason why they would think twice about it was the fact that two of them had just manhandled twenty adult wizards. It didn't matter that their opponents were barely adults. They graduated from Hogwarts and were considered full-fledged wizards.

The sheer fact Tom and Natasha, two foreigners who were supposed to be easy pickings, came out of these odds unscathed while their enemies were almost all crippled beyond repair would make the Dark Faction scared shitless.

This was the kind of prowess and brutality because of which they followed their own Dark Lord and that simple fact would put a stop to the further plans.

"And if they don't?" Natasha doubtfully asked. She knew their type. They would not just stop. Not after the first failure. Tom's reasoning seemed very naive to her.

"I have never said they will stop trying to get rid of us, dear Natalia." Tom smiled at her, finding her doubtful expression cute, "I just said they won't try to send someone to kill us again."

Natasha sighed as she realized Tom's meaning. This battle will be further fought through schemes, plots, and politics. Not her favorite thing but, oh, well.

She knew Tom preferred it this way rather than having to get directly violent so she would simply let him have his fun. He would tell her when it was her time to shine anyway.

Just like that, the whole thing left Natasha's mind.

But then she had a stray thought. A new perspective on Tom's actions appeared in her mind and her lips quirked up into a teasing smirk.

"You did this because of Hermione, didn't you?" She asked, giving Tom a knowing look.

They could protect themselves just fine but the girl was vulnerable. She could be said to be their weak point once her relation to Tom is known.

So, to destroy any nefarious ideas before they could even be born, Tom showed just what kind of retaliation they could expect if they pissed him off. Natasha realized this wasn't really different from what Voldemort was doing during his war and she at the very least knew how effective that was.

Natasha had no idea how effective their small take on his tactics would be but... well, it was the effort that counted, no?

"I have no idea what you are talking about." Tom nonchalantly said and promptly ignored her further prodding.

"You are blushing." Natasha remarked with a grin.

"No, I am not." Tom vehemently denied it, manly ignoring the burning feeling on his cheeks.

Natasha's grin just widened, "Heeeh~. How cute."