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shyamanuensis · 22 hours ago

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Welcome to your life - Pt 3:

It's My Own Design Ch 1:

Summary:

Ominis fought to control his expression, to keep his hands from trembling. Five years. Five years since he'd seen his parents, and this. This was the reason they'd given him the honour of their time? This was the reason they'd sought him out at Hogwarts?

The bitterness welling up within him was thick enough to gag on.

New year, new allies, new responsibilities, new avenues of revenue, and new aspects of their own Ancient Magic to explore. As the Keeper and their partners enter their last year at Hogwarts, it remains to be seen if the new school year will bring with it new problems or adversaries, but they are confident in the strength of their relationship with Sebastian and Ominis. The three of them would endure, no matter what befell them.

And if they were wrong?

What a joke, they would suffer no alternative.

Warnings: Sebastian x MC x Ominis! Drug Addiction! Spoilers! Slow-burn corruption! Dark content! Fucked up 1800s orphanages! MC has no love for Anne or Solomon! Dubious happy ending (it's happy for MC, Seb and Ominis at least).

You can also read on AO3! (chapter specific warnings below)

Notes:

Whoo! Part Three here we go! This prologuey chapter is a, pretty short but hopefully good, opening into the third major arc, and our kids’ last year at Hogwarts! Part One and Two were mostly character building and establishing dynamics. This part Three, is where I'll begin setting up more plot-heavy things for the intense fourth and final major arc. That last arc is gonna be crazy =D (Also, first smut scene is Chapter 4 and it's rather BDSM flavoured)

I will, however, be changing my upload schedule to once every two weeks, because as much as I love writing this, once a week is starting to chafe, especially since I've been writing longer and longer chapters x’)

I've literally been spending every free moment writing, and I miss actually playing games, I haven't even had time to play Tears of the Kingdom despite having it since it launched- TvT

Plus, my beta and beloved boyfriend has been running himself ragged trying to keep up with my pace and I feel really bad about that, so I wanna give him more breathing room-

So, the next upload will be the same day, same time, every second Sat noon PST, just like, skipping one weekend upload. Basically alternating my upload day, hope you don't mind! ><

Now, without further ado, let the curtains rise on our Third Act!

A soft pop echoed through the Elves’ Quarters, as Tibsy appeared in the doorway, just a few metres away from the small wooden desk that Tynx was seated at, logging the resources spent for the day in his report journal.

“Tibsy, how's Master's guests?” Tynx greeted without turning around as the young elf made her way through the room's lower floor, dwarfed by the two large trays of empty cutlery in her arms.

Her small shoes tapped softly against the brown brick floor of the lower half of the room, shuffling past the ladder that led up to the upper portion where their small beds were placed, with curtains that they could draw around the beds for a semblance of privacy. She carefully weaved her way through the space between two small, comfortable beige armchairs and a quaint wooden tea-table, past two cabinets placed against the wall, also made from wood, as well as Tynx's desk, and into the elves’ small sized kitchen.

She then bypassed the short cast iron wood stove, that was placed against the wall and used for cooking as well as warming, along with a long stone counter in the middle of the room that was used both for preparing ingredients as well as serving as their dining table. Before passing another three wood cabinets, one containing kitchen tools, another for storing seasonings, herbs, and spices, and the third for raw ingredients, as well as several wooden barrels of grains and such.

Finally, she stopped by the sink and set down the two trays in the sink with a sigh.

“Tibsy is seeing Brown-hair still coughing blood.” Tibsy replied after a moment, snapping her fingers, and making the soapy sponge begin scrubbing the dirty dishes. “But he is eating the foods Tibsy is bringing him.”

“That's good, Sir Ominis did say he'd continue coughing for a while because he isn't healing the boy regularly.” Tynx nodded absently, rifling through his desk drawer, and withdrawing a sheet of parchment.

He'd been recording the boy's recovery progress over the last month, for the Master's partner, and he quickly jotted down Tibsy's report as she shuffled over to his desk.

“What is it, Tibsy?” Tynx asked after a moment, seeing her shift nervously as she stood silently beside him. “Did one of them try to hurt you again?”

“...no, Tibsy is-” She wrung her hands anxiously. “Tibsy is... being not sure how to feel.”

Tynx set down his quill and turned to sit sideways in his chair, facing her. “About what?”

“Master's guests... lady guest was hurt a lot, and Tibsy knows Black-hair's fingers was being cut for trying to hurt Tibsy... but..." Tibsy trailed off, pausing for a few moments, before continuing. “Is it really okay for Master to be hurting peoples?”

Tynx sighed, now that he thought about it, he supposed it should have been expected. Tibsy's old master was a kindly old lady, she wasn't used to seeing injured humans.

“Tibsy.” Tynx began, raising his hands. “My old master cut off three of my fingers with his carving knife. One for leaving a crease in his shirt, another because his tea was too hot and the third for giving his daughter food while he was punishing her.”

Tynx lowered his hands to his lap solemnly. “Our master is not a nice person, but they are nice to us, they take care of us, and they defend us. They don't hurt us, and they don't make us hurt others. Anything else Master does is not for us to judge.”

Tibsy stared at the gaps between his remaining fingers with wide eyes for a few moments, before nodding silently.

“If it helps, I think these people are Master's guests because they all hurt Master before.” Tynx added and Tibsy's eyes widened. “I don't know if it will always be like that, but we should just be glad it's not us in there.”

“Our master gave us an actual space in their home to live in, rather than something temporary, like an expansion charmed barrel. They gave us the money and freedom to design and decorate our living space to our size and comfort, even before building their own.” Tynx smiled wryly and Tibsy's eyes skimmed over their warm and comfortable home.

He placed a hand on her shoulder. “Our life here is good, better than with most masters, try to focus on that.”

“...okay.” Tibsy nodded firmly.

Tynx smiled, relieved that she understood, it would hurt if their Master killed her for doing something stupid like trying to free a guest. Their Master was a good master, but not a nice or kind person and he knew from their eyes that they wouldn't hesitate to execute their servants for disloyalty or betrayal.

“Good.” Tynx glanced at the clock on his desk. “Now, you should probably go feed Master's snakes, we'll need to welcome them back from school in a few hours.”

“Oh, yes! Tibsy will go catch small fishys for snakeys!” Tibsy's expression brightened and Tynx nodded approvingly as she bounced to the side, grabbed a bucket from under the sink and popped away.

The young elf did seem to like the job of caring for their Master's pets. Perhaps he'd take over duties directly involving the Master's guests to make things easier for her. Tynx thought to himself as he returned to writing his report, he would need to finish logging everything before their master returned to Feldcroft in the evening.

At least he could report that the foundations were ready to be built upon as they'd hoped. Anything that kept their Master happy and satisfied with them was good.

“Gotcha!” Tibsy exclaimed, snapping her fingers, and levitating a small flopping fish from the clear lake water.

With a swish of her fingers, the fish floated through the air, and was dropped into her water filled bucket. Or, at least that was supposed to happen, but as the fish flailed and thrashed violently, its tail hit the rim of the bucket and the fish propelled itself to the side, landing on the floor outside the bucket instead.

“Oh no, fishy! You're supposed to go into the bucket!” Tibsy shuffled over quickly, trying to scoop the fish from the floor with her hands.

The fish, however, was having none of that, and struggled relentlessly to flop to freedom. Tibsy pursued the slippery thing for a few minutes, grabbing for it repeatedly, until finally she managed to catch the small fish securely in her hands.

“There!” Tibsy gave an exasperated sigh, eyeing the fish critically. “Why'd fishy have to struggle so much?”

As she heard her own words, Tibsy paused. Of course, because the fishy didn't want to die. She stared at the thrashing fish. After all, she was about to feed it to Master's pets. The weight of her own actions, the weekly chore that she hadn't put much thought into before, was suddenly feeling uncomfortable in her hands.

“But... if fishy doesn’t die, Master's snakeys will die.” Tibsy bit her lip, thinking of the cute two-headed snake that she had been taking care of for the last few months.

The funny way they wiggled around and the greeting hisses they'd give her when she visited them in her free time. Sir Ominis was very nice and helped her talk with them a few times and she thought the twins were really sweet, she couldn't imagine making them starve for a fish she didn't know.

If Tibsy could speak with this fishy, maybe Tibsy might choose the fishy over the snakeys.

But that wasn't the case now, was it?

It was the snakes that she cared about more. And so, she would sacrifice the fish for the snakes, consigning the fish to a painful death.

Tibsy dropped the fish into the bucket solemnly. Such a simple yet heavy action, now that she was thinking about it.

As Tibsy collected the bucket and apparated back to the castle's greenhouses, she wondered if her master faced similar decisions.

She wondered if their guests were fishes.

“Welcome home, Master.”

Tibsy followed Tynx's bow, as the Keeper and their partners entered the Feldcroft cottage.

“Tynx, Tibsy.” The Master's voice was even as always, their expression stoic as ever, and Tibsy found herself scrutinising their face as she and Tynx straightened from their bow. “Your report?”

Tibsy stood silently behind Tynx as he began to give his usual report, watching the Keeper curiously, while their partners began to unpack their luggage. The Keeper's expression didn't change as Tynx spoke, summarising the elves’ progress with the castle and the condition of their guests, before handing the Keeper several pages from his journal, which they tucked away in their pocket.

“The two of you can begin preparations for building the castle. Sebastian and I will join you tomorrow to begin work on it if the weather is favourable.” The Keeper instructed, before surprising Tibsy with a small smile. “Well done, both of you.”

“Thank you, Master.” Tynx replied smoothly, bowing once again and Tibsy hastened to follow.

“T- thank yous, Master!” She squeaked, dropping into a bow as well, the Master's words making her feel warm inside.

She was a little surprised that the Keeper had praised her as well, considering that they normally spent more time instructing and discussing with Tynx, since Tynx was more capable, and did all the planning while she just did her best to follow instructions and not break something again. It did mean that she sometimes felt a little lost though.

“Oh, and Tynx, about the bulbs, how much did we get for those?" The Keeper's attention quickly returned to him.

Tynx checked his notes for a moment before replying. “Just enough to cover the cost of the list of tools you specified. The owner of Slug and Jigger's Apothecary paid a total of..."

“Tibsy.” She blinked as the master's blind partner approached her from the side.

“Yes, Sir Ominis?” Tibsy asked, turning to him at attention.

Ominis gave her a kind smile. “I wanted to ask how the girls are doing.”

“Oh, Sir Ominis’ snakeys are doing good! Tibsy fed them a small fishy before coming to greet masters!” She nodded eagerly. “Snakeys have a little bump of food inside now!”

“Thank you, Tibsy.” Ominis smiled, and Tibsy was surprised when he reached a hand forward and petted her softly on the head. “For taking care of them for us.”

His hand was big, warm, and gentle, and Tibsy felt that warmth inside again. Tynx was right, life was good here, with masters that were nice to her and made her feel happy.

All she had to do was follow instructions.

Notes:

The elves in Hogwarts apparently live in barrels with expansion charms on them, I think it's kinda cool and also kinda oof. House elves are apparently preserved food. I feel like Tynx who was disposable with his last master, would value having a real physical space that says “hey, I don't plan on getting rid of you in a disposable expanded garbage bag”.

I also wanted to touch on how, despite me pushing for the whole “hey, Ominis, if you want to change something and have the power to, but tell yourself that you're helpless so you don’t feel guilty for not taking the risk, that's just being wilfully ignorant. I understand that you were genuinely helpless when younger so it's very very understandable to have this issue but you gotta at least try, now that you're not helpless and alone anymore”, which he has been doing, even in the original game, going after Sebastian in the catacombs, even though he gave up halfway, and I love him for trying even though it was hard.

Despite that stance, I also think that, if a person is (or was) genuinely helpless and powerless to change something, if they can’t escape their circumstances, they shouldn't feel shame or guilt, they should just focus on being as happy as possible, recovering and coping.

I hate victim blaming and often people underestimate the sheer amount of strength required to cling to some semblance of sanity under abuse. Victims of abuse are victims because of that strength. Sick freaks target these strong people because the fuckers know these victims won't break under their fist.

So, in Tibsy's situation, where she physically cannot disobey orders due to binding magic, where she can potentially be killed for disloyalty, I believe that she should not feel bad for what the Keeper is doing.

#a brilliant read

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