Peculiar Journey

All I recall are bright flashes of light, several wands pointed at us as we were ripped apart from space, surrounded by wizards, donned in black suits. Somehow, they had intercepted the apparition. Ephyl disappeared the moment he laid eyes on the wands, leaving me alone encircled, dazed and confused. (A/N: Dazed and confused xd)

"Get your hands in the air NOW!." A booming voice shouted through to me.

Luckily, before I panicked, a familiar face surfaced through the crowd as the wands faced me down.

Staring me down, was a women I faintly recall meeting. She had changed a lot through these years since I first met her. But it was surely her.

With her wand trained on me, she shuffled closer her boots dragging across the floor, slightly apprehensive.

The silence echoed in the air, as beads of sweat dropped from my forehead.

"Wands down." a crisp voice resounded as she creeped closer and pecked my head with her wand.

The wizards holding me at wandpoint seemingly relaxed their postures and lowered their weapons, scattering away from the circle, but anxiously lingered around the two of us. (A/N: Wandpoint lmao)

Dark purple hair, a black patch covering her left eye and pearl brown skin, this was the Raina I had met years ago. (A/N: Reread chapter 13 to remember who she is.)

"How did you get here?" She hastily questioned.

"I don't know, I was simply apparating back .... then I was suddenly pulled along.."

Releasing an exasperated sigh as she rubbed her forehead, out of slight frustration she replied

"It was a trap setup for any form of magical creature running wild. You've triggered every alarm inside our wards, what were you thinking apparating through here." She fiercely condemned.

I couldn't quite retort, as I had no say in where we appeared, but it awfully seemed like I had ruined her plans so the wisest option was to just stay quiet and not agitate her further...

Ephyl that sly bastard, surely he knew....

Gulping down my complaints, I awaited her judgement, but after getting scolded for a few minutes, she had me escorted inside the bunker surrounded by her people.

Descending down into the bunker, I almost felt like a prisoner, surrounded by a guard at every angle. The atmosphere downstairs was quite surprisingly peaceful.

It felt like a cozy posh mansion, but instead, every corner of each room was piled to the brim with papers and maps, giving it a slightly war-torn vibe. In exact fashion, I could almost lick the tobacco-pepper in the air as it assaulted my lungs, as it's deep aroma clung to the wooden walls. Clearly, everyone had been smoking wizard pepper to their hearts content.

I was then "politely" escorted to a singled out room with a chair, and told to "patiently" wait there for further instructions. Seeing as I was surrounded and clearly outnumbered, I chose to follow along for now.

Leaning back into the chair, I relaxed a bit and took a deep breath, today was one wild event after another...

However, a few minutes had passed but nothing happened.. Then I suddenly heard a small ruckus outside my room. Slightly curious as to what was going on, I sneaked closer to the shut door, and glanced through the small keyhole.

To my surprise, I caught a glimpse of a group. I would only describe as "ragtag" youngsters, the oldest one would barely be eighteen. Distressed and arguing in a hushed voice with a few senior members.

What were they doing? Besides, I didn't even know they took in members that young...

Just as their small ruckus died down, I heard a few quick paced steps towards my door, and bolted back to the chair.

A few seconds later, the door swung open, and I could see three fresh faces in blue suits gather around me.

"This is the boy? I expected him to look more fierce y'know?" A cackled response came from the bullish man in the middle.

"Enough Dmitry, hold your banter till we finish the task." A quick retort slapped his mouth shut.

The man then glanced towards me, and extended his hand.

"I am Zagreus, and we've been tasked with taking you back from the frontier." I shook his hand and I could feel the magic coursing through him. These three were surely powerful.

"You said frontier? Where exactly are we?"

Zagreus nodded his head along and continued to give a brief explanation.

"The declaration of war was sudden, hence we've excluded and barricaded the areas with high magical beast traffic as frontiers. You are most likely to meet enemies here. The density of creatures here is about tens of times higher than ordinary wizard communities."

As he finished his small snippet, the third man shot him a subtle glance, and Zagreus cut his words short.

Frontiers...that would explain the traps, but to think Ephyl would somehow get caught in these traps. Either it was intentional or these barriers were insanely well constructed to limit magical beast mobility.

The odd man out then stepped towards me and bowed his head, I could tell he wasn't of European descent, perhaps slightly African, he had a reddish skin tone, and a harsh tongue.

"My name is Syed. We shall not be answering anymore of your questions. The task was to bring you along swiftly. Are you ready to go?"

Quite a decisive question, since he wasn't in the mood to chat, I nodded my head and we went off our way outside the bunker. At this point I was being handled like extra luggage, being transported from one point to another.... It was quite sickening.

I had practically resolved myself to learn Apparition as fast as possible. Apparating alongside someone felt like being in the front seat of a roller coaster... The twists and turns were unexpected and almost knocked the wind out of me.

As we reached the exit, Raina stood beside the door and cautioned the three wizards simultaneously.

"Be careful with the barrier, it's a delicate spell" She barked.

"Don't worry, the portkey will take care of it" Dmitry shrugged her off.

As the four of us stepped outside, Syed pulled out a ring that he wore on his index finger. It was a peculiar design, one I had never seen before.

A golden signet ring, with black embroidery.

But as he channeled some magic into it, the pattern came to life, slithering around the ring, as it enveloped us all. The next second, I felt drawn towards the core, and my body slipped into the spell.

My vision faded away, and as I reappeared through the portkey, I could feel slightly nauseous and I felt a hand supporting my shoulder to stand me up.

Looking around, I could vaguely guess that we were in some sort of forest? Certainly not one that I was familiar with.

"I will leave you three here, this is farewell." Syed pocketed the ring and then apparated away swiftly, not allowing me to grasp the situation.

Before I could voice any complaints, Dmitry pulled me by the arm and dragged me to Zagreus, who had already moved quite a few steps away.

"You can't be spacing out like that around here, stick close." His playful manner was coated well beneath a veil of professionalism and harsh instincts.

As I stumbled through the forest floor, I managed to breathlessly make some small talk.

"What...is going, on?"

"No time to explain, we cannot linger around here, they will catch our scent. We have to move quickly." He pressed me along the forest route until we reached a hidden grotto.

Searching through his pockets, Dimitry pulled out a small bag of black ash. It was carefully bundled around in a red velvet cloth which he then tossed to the pond in the grotto.

The water flared up, turning dark...It gave of a murky scent, bubbling and almost moved like oil. Seeing the color change completely, Zagreus stepped forward and without notice, jumped into the boiling pit of tar, leaving me stunned.

I turned towards Dimitry, and he simply raised his eyebrows and nudged me along.

"Wai-." I tried to urge him to stop.

"Stop your whimpering, we haven't got all day."

Not letting me get in a word, he pushed me over the edge. As I submerged in the oil I could feel myself choking, the viscous tar stuck to me, but then I felt an arm yank me out to the other side.

"Are you alright?" Zagreus spoke

I looked around and now we were in a city, looking at my feet, the black pool of oil receded into the concrete, and seeped through, leaving no trace behind. That was.... new.

"Yeah, I am... alright." I replied.

Seeing that I was only slightly discombobulated, Zagreus paced around with me around the city, though I had no idea about our destination.

"Why this intricate plan, could we not have taken the portkey?"

"Had there been a portkey directly to the base, it would be a rare commodity, and definitely a security risk if lost. It would not make sense to create one for this occasion. Besides, every form of transport leaves behind a certain scent, we can't risk exposing our location." He replied.

We paced around through intertwining alleys and a network of mazes, but finally stepped through to the main street. A sight I had not seen for quite a long while... we were currently in the heart of the muggle society, cars zoomed past us, and pedestrians filled the streets.

"Where are we?" I stopped to catch my breath on the sidewalk.

"Welcome to Bucharest. The capital of Romania." Zagreus stood calmly by my side, and showed off the beauty of the city.

Indeed, it deserved to be called the capital. There were huge buildings, and cars at every inch of the road. The streets were lined with greenery and the air felt clean. The city was practically littered with architecture.

"If you're done admiring, we can move on" his voice snapped me out of my daze.

"Yeah, let's go."

Zagreus traced along the sidewalk, and I walked alongside him. We took a few turns here and there, until we ended up faced with a dead end.

But at this point I had already expected what would happen... I didn't watch all those movies for nothing, come on now...

He brisked towards the wall, and pulled out his wand. Tracing a few nodes at the stones, upon which a curved groove etched into the bricks. Zagreus inserted his hand into the gap, and twisted slightly. To my amazement, a section of the wall turned open, revealing a clean elevator waiting for us at the end.

"After you."

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Taking the elevator down was quite an expectation subversion, but still pretty impressive. I could feel the sensation of dropping down underground, as my stomach pulled closer to my heart.

The ride was pretty long, and I had to admit, no one would ever even think of a base completely underground in Bucharest. Dalton was a mad bastard for setting this up.

As I was lost in thought, a slight *ting* took my attention, and the elevator railings opened to give us way.

The place was hustling and bustling, just like the first time I had visited their base. Everyone paced around with stacks of papers and they were busy in their own tasks.

Zagreus escorted me through the wide halls until I reached a final corridor leading to a closed door.

"I will leave you here." He nodded his head, and returned back to his other tasks mingling with his co workers.

I crept closer to the door and gave it a light push, and it opened.

The man I had been waiting to see, sat in his chair across me. Not a lot had changed, but I could see few a few extra wrinkles on his forehead through the years. After learning magic , I understood the power laying dormant inside him, like an instinctual sense telling me that this man was strong...But I had already known that.

"Welcome back." his voice resounded in the room, patiently staring as I closed the door behind me.

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A/N: Hope you liked the chapter... My exams are quite stressful so I haven't been writing all that much. Since I took a day off studying today, I thought I would whip something up for you guys.

Yeah I am not dead.... not yet anyways.