Vincent Crabbe Sr., a hulking monolith of crude muscle and stunted intellect, was staggering through the cobblestone gloom, his gait betrayed by a surplus of firewhisky. Crabbe walked with a loud, clumsy confidence, his heavy footsteps echoing with a rhythmic stupidity in the early morning silence. Clearly pre-intoxicated before the big wedding in a few hours. Then, from the lightless gut of the alley, a low, resonant voice emanated.
*Crabbe.*
Vincent Crabbe halted, his rudimentary instincts misidentifying the sound as the jitters of his own debauchery. He squinted into the suffocating dark. Nothing.
*Vincent Crabbe.* The voice resonated again, closer now, seeming to bleed from the very soot of the bricks.
Suspicion, a rare but powerful instinct, finally took root. Crabbe lowered his hand to his pocket, fumbling for his wand—a blunt length of oak—and stepped off the thoroughfare. Driven by a monumental lack of foresight, he entered the alleyway. As he moved deeper into the shadows, the echoing voice grew stronger, closer, seeming to wrap around him like a noose.
"Who's there?" Crabbe demanded, his voice a low, nervous rumble. He attempted to project a facade of authority, but the silence that followed was saturated with fear. There was no reply, only the thickening cold and the unnatural stillness of the air.
Eventually, he reached the terminal point of the alley: a moss-choked brick wall. He spat a curse, dismissing the encounter as a trick of the drink. He pivoted to retreat, his mind already discarding the anomaly as a pathetic prank. That was when the voice returned, not as an echo, but as a dry, freezing whisper directly against his ear.
*Hello, Vincent.*
Crabbe whirled, his wand hand trembling, but the trap was already sprung. Before him was a flicker of liquid shadow, briefly coalescing into a demonic, angular visage with teeth like needle shards and eyes of predatory yellow light. The sight was too sudden for his brain to process. The panic was absolute, and before he could register the shock, a wave of frigid, silent magic slammed into his core. Everything vanished into a terminal black.
Crabbe's eyes snapped open to a reality of profound disorientation. He first registered a wooden ceiling, a cartography of cobwebs and dusty burlap sacks. Then, he saw the face of Echo, inverted and serene. Echo sat cross-legged upon a dirt floor, methodically stirring a small, black copper cauldron with a stick. His features, illuminated by the volatile maroon radiance of his hair, were set in an expression of detached, clinical amusement.
"Well, well," Echo murmured, his voice cold and smooth. He glanced up, his lips twisting into a dangerous half-smile. "Good morning, sleeping beauty. I had anticipated a few more hours of silence, but I suppose the transition to consciousness cannot be helped, can it?"
Crabbe attempted to struggle, to surge upward, but the world tilted sickeningly, and he realized he was surgically bound. Thick, non-magical hempen ropes were cinched around his ankles and wrists, the fibers biting into his flesh. Panic flared, triggering a frantic, useless thrashing.
"Echo?" Crabbe shrieked, the blood pooling painfully in his skull. "What is this? Where in the bloody hell am I, and why are you hanging from the earth like a bat?"
Echo withdrew the stick from the cauldron and delivered a single, patronizing tap to Crabbe's forehead with the sodden tip.
"Primarily, you are my prisoner—that is the irreducible truth of your presence here," Echo explained with a chilling casualness. "Secondly, we are within a derelict shed in the countryside. And thirdly, I'm not the one who is upside down, you imbecile. Look up. Or, in your case, down."
Crabbe's gaze dropped, confirming the visceral horror. He was suspended from the rafters by enchanted ropes secured around his ankles, his hands bound tightly at the small of his back. The floor was an impossible distance above his head, the pressure behind his eyes becoming an agonizing thrum.
"What the bloody hell is going on?" Crabbe bellowed, the rage finally breaching the fog of his confusion, though the physical trauma of his inversion muffled the sound. "Is that even you, Echo? You look… different."
Echo, the maroon in his hair pulsing with a cold, flickering radiance, rose from his crouch by the cauldron, allowing the sodden stirring stick to fall unceremoniously into the dirt. He straightened the shimmering dark green folds of his dragon-scale robes, his eyes fixed with a predatory focus upon Crabbe's inverted, bloated visage. A sudden, almost manic luminescence ignited within his gaze, a sharp regression into the theatrical, chaotic facade he wielded as both shield and weapon.
"That's right," Echo murmured, his voice laced with a lethal, theatrical sass that resonated with an unnerving dissonance in the hovel. "A blast from your past with that sass and shota-kun ass. Am I… desu enough for ya?"
Crabbe, suspended awkwardly like a side of spoiled meat, stared at him as if Echo had undergone a spontaneous, demonic bisection. The blood, pooling relentlessly in his skull, rendered his features a distorted, empurpled mass. "What in the bloody hell are you prattling about?" he bellowed, his thick limbs thrashing uselessly against the non-magical hemp.
Echo exhaled a slow, weary sigh, discarding the whimsical mask with a clinical abruptness. He knelt once more, his fingers closing with a practiced indifference around the stick to agitate the simmering, obsidian draught. "Oh for the love of–," he continued, his tone dry and utterly dismissive. "Yes, it's me. I got a bit older, a bit taller, though admittedly not by much. I got a new style, some new tricks, a lot meaner and a whole lot more trauma!"
Crabbe persisted in his frantic struggle, the ropes biting with a visible cruelty into his swollen ankles. "Sever these bonds, Echo, or I'll have your head! And why does this shed reek of a dead horse?"
Before Echo could offer an articulation, a blur of iridescent, silvery fur erupted from the shadows adjacent to his shoulder. Shimmer materialized with a sudden, jarring visibility, his gargantuan dark eyes incinerating with a protective, visceral fury. The Demiguise launched himself directly toward Crabbe's empurpled face and unleashed an ear-splitting, malignant screech.
Crabbe recoiled as far as his suspension allowed, his corded neck straining, his eyes wide with a primitive shock at the sudden, spectral assault.
"Stand down, Shimmer," Echo commanded, his voice a low, sharp blade of authority. "We need him. For the time being."
Shimmer, his hackles remaining a rigid forest of silver, emitted a final, rasping hiss directed at the tethered wizard before yielding. He bestowed one final, lethal glare upon Crabbe, then retreated, settling with a fluid grace upon the dark green dragon-scale of Echo's shoulder.
Echo regarded Crabbe with a cold, predatory half-smile. "Your memory isn't so far gone that you've forgotten Shimmer, is it, Vincent? Because he certainly remembers you. He remembers exactly how much he loathes you."
Shimmer hissed in response, a low, guttural vibration of absolute, visceral affirmation.
"And as for the smell, you moron," Echo continued, his eyes twin points of lightless violet fire. "Can't you see the Thestral?"
Crabbe squinted frantically through the thrumming blood pressure, his gaze sweeping the lightless perimeter of the shed. "What Thestral? There is nothing there!"
Echo glanced over his shoulder toward the corner where the massive, skeletal silhouette of the Thestral sat, patiently masticating old straw. He turned back, his expression a mask of flat, clinical indifference. "So you remain blind to him. How… characteristic."
Crabbe, his confusion momentarily yielding to a surge of impotent rage, snarled, "The moment I get my wand and break free, you are a dead man, Echo!"
Echo chuckled, a dry, metallic sound utterly devoid of mirth. He reached within the folds of his dark green robes and withdrew the blunt length of oak he had confiscated. He toyed with it, waggling the wood before Crabbe's engorged face.
"You mean this wand?" Echo then thrust the confiscated oak wand into a specialized compartment of his magic satchel, the latch clicking shut with a crisp, surgical finality. "It shall serve as a fitting addition to my burgeoning collection of wands from other wannabe dark wizards and poachers." He leaned forward, his face a mere heartbeat from Crabbe's empurpled features, his expression shifting into something lethal, dark, and entirely devoid of mercy.
"And beyond that," Echo whispered, the sound a low, freezing rasp that seemed to drain the heat from the room, "should you truly be taking such a tone with me?"
The query, delivered with such absolute, lightless menace, achieved what the hempen ropes and the physical trauma could not: it incinerated Crabbe's bravado, leaving him suspended in a state of terminal, terrified silence. Echo held the cold, furious silence for a beat too long, letting the raw fear in Crabbe's eyes become absolute. Then, he smiled—a cold, thin line that promised ruin.
"That's what I thought," Echo murmured, the sound deceptively soft, the maroon in his hair flickering with satisfaction. "But don't worry. As much as I find you to be an abhorrent hog who's better used as dragon meal, I have far more use for you alive than dead. In fact, I very much need you alive, or the potion won't work."
Crabbe, still swinging slightly from his ankles, swallowed hard, the blood pounding painfully behind his eyes. "What potion?" he stammered, his voice choked. "And why are you doing this?"
Echo returned to the small cauldron, stirring the dark liquid with a focused intensity. "Oh, you'll see in a bit," he replied, his tone conversational, yet carrying the weight of a death sentence. He glanced back at the inverted figure. "And as for why… You should know the answer. After all, you were part of the larger problem."
Echo stood, gesturing loosely with the stirring stick, his voice rising from a cold murmur to a furious pitch. "Trying to bully me in school, defaming me, and ruining my reputation for years to come. Oh, and let's not forget that you and that other meathead Goyle destroyed the Pensieve, holding all the proof of Lucius's wrongdoings to put him into Azkaban as the dark wizard I know he is!" He yelled the last part, the sheer, sudden force of the sound echoing off the bare walls of the shed. He inhaled a sharp, ragged breath, instantly calming himself, the maroon in his hair snapping back into rigid focus. "All that I could forget. Heck, maybe even forgive given time. But your little ringleader, Lucius, decided to keep on pushing me. And now, I'm not teetering off the edge, Vincent. I've fully jumped off it."
Echo's expression was an unsettling blend of cold fury and manic insanity, widening Crabbe's eyes in terror. Crabbe stammered desperately, "I—I really don't know what you're talking about! It was Lucius! We just—"
"Silence," Echo commanded, the word sharp and final. "I can well imagine. And you're right, Crabbe. My rage isn't for you." Echo gestured toward the far-off wedding location. "It's for Lucius. And I intend to drown him in it."
He walked slowly toward the suspended man, raising a hand. Crabbe flinched violently, his body recoiling away from the looming threat. Echo stopped, amused, and watched him jerk. He then reached out with cold, clinical precision, plucking a single, thick hair from Crabbe's forehead. Crabbe yelped—a pathetic, choked sound of pain and fear.
"Stop being such a wuss, Crabbe," Echo scoffed, examining the hair. "That didn't hurt."
Echo turned back to the cauldron, dropping the single hair into the simmering black liquid. He stirred the mixture a few times, a final, dark enchantment settling over the brew. He then brought his face close to the pot and inhaled deeply, letting the rising fumes fill his lungs.
"It's ready," he declared, his voice a low, satisfied hiss.
With a final, clean motion, he scooped the potion into a bottle and corked it with a tight thwip, simultaneously making the small cauldron vanish with a silent pop.
Crabbe, watching the process, instantly recognized the subtle magic, despite his disorientation. "A Polyjuice Potion," he exclaimed, his voice laced with confusion. "What are you doing with that?"
Echo clipped the vial to a hidden loop inside his new green robes. "So, you're not as dumb as you look. Yes, it is a Polyjuice Potion. Can't exactly walk into a wedding with my own face now, can I?"
He stood up fully, pulling the green hood over his head, allowing the vibrant maroon of his hair to be completely swallowed by shadow. He walked to the shed door and threw it open. The Thestral, which had been resting patiently inside with him, immediately slipped through the opening.
"Hey! Wait! Don't leave me here, you lunatic!" Crabbe screamed, his voice strained from the unnatural position.
Echo paused, standing in the doorway, the darkness of the shed framed by the warm afternoon sun outside. "Don't you worry, Crabbe. This part of the country sees a lot of foot traffic at this time of day. So long as you yell, someone is bound to find you before the twelve-hour mark."
Crabbe's panicked screaming intensified. "What happens at twelve hours?"
Echo turned his head, the shadow of his hood hiding his face, though the chilling edge of his smile was audible in his voice. "That's how long a human body can remain upside down before things get fatal." He adjusted the hood with a slow, deliberate movement, his eyes, twin points of cold malice, visible for a final, terrifying moment. "Don't you worry. I'll be sure to tell the groom you said hello."
Echo closed the door behind him with a final, heavy CLANG, and a cold, manic laugh echoed through the quiet countryside, leaving Crabbe suspended in absolute, paralyzing shadow.
Echo stepped away from the heavy door, the metallic echo of the latch still vibrating in the air. He didn't look back at the shed; his mind was already miles away, locked onto the coordinates of the Malfoy-Black union. He turned to the Thestral, its skeletal frame a shimmering heat-haze in the afternoon sun. With a fluid, practiced motion, he vaulted onto its back, his dark green dragon-scale robes rustling like dry leaves.
"Shimmer, the veil," Echo commanded, his voice a low, clinical blade.
The Demiguise on his shoulder didn't hesitate. He let out a soft, rhythmic trill, and a wave of distortion rippled outward from his small frame. In a heartbeat, Echo and the saddle-less space on the Thestral's back vanished from the visible spectrum. To any onlooker, the Thestral would appear to be flying alone—a skeletal, spectral horse navigating the winds. To most, who remained blind to the creatures of death, there would be nothing but the empty sky and the occasional rustle of displaced air.
The Thestral launched upward, its massive wings beating with a silent, terrifying power. They climbed high above the patchwork of the countryside, the wind whipping Echo's hood. He looked down at the world, a miniature theater of oblivious lives, and felt a cold, surgical detachment. They were invisible, a phantom on a ghost, racing toward a reckoning.
As the sun began to dip lower, painting the horizon in bruised purples and golds, the distant, opulent spires of the wedding hall came into view. Echo signaled the Thestral, and the creature banked sharply, descending toward a dense thicket of ancient oaks a mile from the primary estate. They landed with a muffled thud in the loam. The moment the creature's hooves settled, the invisibility field collapsed, and Echo materialized, sliding off the leathery spine.
He reached into his robes and withdrew the vial of Polyjuice Potion. The liquid inside was a thick, bubbling, mud-brown, smelling of unwashed feet and stale stagnant water. Echo stared at it for a fleeting second, his jaw tightening, then downed the swill in three violent gulps. The reaction was instantaneous and agonizing. His skin felt like hot pincers were peeling it away; his bones groaned as they thickened and shortened, and his features melted and reformed with a sickening, wet elasticity.
He doubled over, gagging as the transformation finalized. When he finally straightened, the lithe, gaunt frame of Echo was gone, replaced by the hulking, blunt-featured silhouette of Vincent Crabbe Sr. Echo looked at his hands—thick, calloused, and clumsy—and let out a shaky breath.
"Wow, this is weird," he murmured. He immediately slapped a hand over his mouth, his eyes widening. The voice that had emerged was a low, gravelly bray—Crabbe's voice. It felt like gravel in his throat.
Shimmer, who had retreated to a nearby branch during the transformation, let out a series of unsure, distressed chirps. He approached the large man with visible hesitation, his eyes searching for the boy he knew beneath the bully's mask.
"I'm not crazy about it either, buddy," Echo—now Crabbe—rasped, his new chest heaving. He looked down at his shimmering green robes, which were now straining and bursting at the seams of his much larger frame. With a sharp flick of his twisted wand, he cast a series of surgical transfigurations. The dragon-scale fabric shifted, darkening and expanding until it took the form of Crabbe's expensive, ill-fitting wedding suit. "As it stands, I can't walk in wearing my own face, or the plan implodes before it starts."
He turned his gaze to the Demiguise, his expression serious despite the unfamiliar face. "Shimmer, stay on my shoulders. Stay quiet, and stay invisible. You may look like any ordinary Demiguise to these fools, but Lucius... he'll recognize you instantly. He remembers the things he's tried to break."
Shimmer nodded once, a grave understanding in his eyes, and vanished, his weight a familiar warmth on Echo's broader shoulders. Echo then turned to the Thestral. "Go. Meet me at the extraction point. Don't be late." The creature huffed, its white eyes blinking once, before taking flight and disappearing into the canopy.
Echo reached into his magic satchel and pulled out a large, ostentatiously wrapped box—the wedding gift he'd liberated from Crabbe. He then raised his wand, holding the tip to his lips like a flute. He didn't speak; he blew a sharp, silent breath into the wood, casting the Dragon Whistle spell. The vibration was inaudible to human ears, but he knew that miles away, in the dark heart of the forest, Wick would hear the call. Soon, the dragon would arrive, and the real fun could begin.
He tucked his wand deep into the suit's interior pocket, ensuring no part of the twisted black wood was visible. He took one long, stabilizing breath, settling into the clumsy, arrogant gait of the man he was portraying. Clutching the gift to his chest, Echo stepped out from the thicket and began the long walk toward the brightly lit wedding hall, a wolf in the most hideous of sheep's clothing.
Echo walked into the wedding hall with the lumbering gait of a man who believed his presence was a favor. No one stopped him or questioned him; he was, after all, Vincent Crabbe, and the plan was working perfectly. He tossed the wedding present—a heavy, awkwardly wrapped parcel he'd taken from Crabbe's satchel—onto a growing pile of gifts without looking, not caring what trivial trinket he was offering to the Malfoy union. He swaggered through the opulent hall, a space filled with the cream of pure-blood nobility and high political figures, letting his new persona shield him. He was just Vincent Crabbe, an unremarkable and slightly dull fixture of the inner circle. A few guests glanced his way, but most ignored him completely.
Needing a moment to ground himself and steady the furious chaotic energy beneath the Crabbe exterior, Echo grabbed a glass of alcohol from a passing server. He drank the liquid down fast, the sudden, fiery rush providing the necessary liquid courage to face the true test. Then came Lucius.
Lucius Malfoy spotted him from across the crowded room and began marching over with an expression that was far from festive. He was immaculate in his suit, his silver-tipped cane ticking a sharp, rhythmic beat on the marble floor—a cane he seemed to rely on more now, Echo noted with grim satisfaction.
"You're late, Crabbe," Lucius said, his voice a cold, measured reprimand.
Echo had to restrain the immediate, primal urge to grab the man's throat and choke the words back into his chest. He forced a slack, apologetic expression onto the Polyjuice-enhanced face and shifted fully into the required persona.
"So sorry about that, Lucius," Echo drawled, his voice thick and clumsy, "but I had the jitters."
Lucius looked at him with an incredulous frown. "Jitters? I'm the one getting married, not you."
"Yes, but social events always stress me out, you know this," Echo insisted, pushing the familiar, weak excuse.
Lucius sighed, the sound laced with weary contempt. "Unfortunately, I do know that all too well."
Echo leaned in conspiratorially, adding a new layer to the Crabbe persona: strained eagerness. "I wanted to make sure the present I got you was the very best, after all. Today was a day all about you and your beautiful bride, so why not celebrate like it was your last?"
He said the final word with a dark, underlining tone, a promise of doom that Lucius, self-absorbed and oblivious, didn't catch.
Lucius looked back at him, studying his face with sudden scrutiny. "Are you alright, Vincent? You look... off."
Echo put the empty glass down on a nearby table. He reached out and grabbed Lucius by the shoulder, his grip a bit too tight, a bit too strong for the Crabbe Lucius knew.
"I'm fine, Lucius," Echo assured him, the effort costing him dearly. "Just excited to celebrate this momentous occasion for you and your beautiful bride." Echo had to forcibly repress the urge to vomit after saying the words "beautiful bride."
Lucius Malfoy winced at the unexpected force of the grip and instinctively pulled his shoulder free, rubbing the spot where Echo had squeezed him. The silver-tipped cane ticked softly as he straightened his suit.
"You are being remarkably… physical, Vincent," Lucius drawled, his voice a low, cold whisper. "And while I appreciate the sentiment, you look utterly unwell. Are you certain you haven't had a touch too much firewhisky already?"
Echo pulled his Crabbe-face into a sickly, sheepish mask. "Just a bit... overwhelmed. I'll… find some canapés. Settle my stomach."
Lucius watched him with narrowed, suspicious eyes. But before he could press the issue, he was pulled away by another guest, and the issue was dropped. Once he was gon,e a subtle, peculiar vibration passed through the floor that only Echo could feel and hear. It was a high-pitched sound, a faint, reedy, almost musical noise that resonated deep in Echo's chest, barely cutting through the surrounding chatter. It was the dragon whistle. Wick was on her way. A dangerous, manic grin that was decidedly not Crabbe's flashed across Echo's face before he could repress it, and he turned away to hide it in a corner of the room, pretending to be someone overwhelmed with emotions, but not the right ones for the situation. Everything was going perfectly, and soon it would all come to a head.
The wedding ceremony was ready to begin in the open-air courtyard, bathed in the soft glow of enchanted lanterns strung between rose arches. The assembled guests, a sea of pure-blood nobility and Ministry officials, settled into the rows of gilded chairs. The music swelled, a pompous, orchestrated affair that heralded the entrance of the groom and his bride.
Lucius Malfoy, arm-in-arm with Narcissa, began his measured walk down the long, flower-lined aisle. His face was set in a mask of austere pride, but the moment his eyes swept the rows of guests, his composure faltered. He couldn't help but turn his head, his gaze drawn by an unnatural, chilling presence.
He saw Echo, still wearing Vincent Crabbe's thick, dull face, seated halfway down the aisle. But this was not the vacant Crabbe of moments ago. Echo was smiling—coldly, darkly—his eyes locked on Lucius, following his every movement with predatory focus. The look was one of absolute, lethal certainty, like a falcon watching its prey from the heights. Lucius felt a sudden, suffocating sense of dread, a cold wash of sickness that had nothing to do with the day's stress. He pulled his eyes away, overwhelmed, and tightened his grip on Narcissa's arm, hurrying her slightly toward the podium.
Once they reached the front, the priest, a solemn-looking wizard in ceremonial robes, began the standard, tedious liturgy. He droned through the history of ancient houses and the vows of fidelity until he reached the final, critical question, his voice booming slightly on the amplification charm.
"If anyone here present knows of any reason why these two people should not be joined in holy matrimony, let them speak now, or forever hold their peace."
The silence that followed was heavy and absolute, broken only by the chirping of enchanted birds in the rose bushes. Then, Echo struck.
He rose slowly from his seat, the movement deliberate, every eye in the courtyard snapping toward him. "I would like to say something," he announced, his voice still bearing Crabbe's clumsy tone, but carrying a sharp, unnatural resonance.
A small, collective gasp went around the crowd. Lucius Malfoy, standing stiffly at the podium, looked ready to burst a vein in his forehead. Narcissa's hand immediately moved to the hidden wand beneath her sleeve.
Echo clarified, stepping into the center aisle and planting his feet firmly. "It's not an objection, per se," he said, waving a dismissive hand. "More of a small speech for the bride and groom."
Lucius hissed through his teeth, barely containing his fury. "What are you doing, Vincent?"
Echo ignored him. He met Lucius's glare and, with a subtle, wordless flex of his core magic, he extended his palm. A nearby glass of alcohol, resting on a silver platter held by a petrified server, instantly shot through the air, pulled by an invisible force, and settled neatly into Echo's hand. Lucius felt a cold spike of unease. Crabbe was barely capable of a Lumos, much less wordless, wandless parlor tricks. Something was profoundly, terrifyingly wrong with the man standing in his aisle.
Before Echo could continue, a plump, red-faced pureblood—likely a minor Ministry official seeking to earn favor—lumbered forward. "See here, you lout!" the man snapped, reaching out to grab Echo's arm. "You're ruining the ceremony! Get out of here!"
Echo was having none of it. The Crabbe persona dissolved instantly, replaced by the raw, dangerous focus of the Dark Beast. Before the pureblood could connect, Echo delivered one swift, back-handed motion with his fist. It was a terrifying, inhuman blow that struck the man's jaw with a sound like a hammer hitting stone. The pureblood went flying backward with impossible force, tumbling over two rows of chairs before crumpling on the flagstone floor in a motionless heap. Silence reigned for a terrified instant, then panic rose in a surging wave. Guests shrieked, some scrambling out of their seats, wands already appearing in trembling hands.
Echo, standing over the fallen man, adjusted his suit jacket, not even breathing hard. He took a sip of the drink he'd magically summoned. "As I was saying," he continued, his voice calm and terrible amidst the rising panic, "before I was so rudely interrupted... a momentum for the bride and groom."
Narcissa Malfoy, trained since birth to manage pure-blood hysteria, stepped forward, her face a pale mask of brittle control.
"Vincent, this is hardly the time for your anxieties to run rampant," Narcissa hissed, projecting calm even as her body trembled slightly beneath her silver robes. "The ceremony is about to commence. I suggest you return to your seat and compose yourself before Lucius calls for the Aurors."
Echo turned his head slowly, meeting her eyes. The mask of Crabbe's face was beginning to twist and contort, the Polyjuice Potion fighting a losing battle against the raw, chaotic magic churning beneath it. He held up the miraculously appearing glass, his grip iron-tight.
"Oh, I think this really is the time, Narcissa," Echo replied, his voice a cold, dangerous baritone that made her freeze. He leaned in conspiratorially, his eyes twin points of focused, murderous intent, and spoke the next phrase almost directly into the glass, allowing the sound to resonate chillingly. "After all, it may be the last thing you two ever hear."
He took a slow, deliberate sip of the forgotten alcohol, never breaking eye contact with the petrified bride, the implied threat hanging heavy and absolute in the silence. Echo then raised the empty glass high above his head in a mock toast. His voice, now booming with the unhinged clarity of pure contempt, cut through the rapidly mounting panic of the surrounding guests.
"To the Malfoys and the entire Black family tree, a moment of celebratory honesty!" he shouted, the sound echoing off the vaulted ceiling. "You are all nothing more than inbred snobs, clinging to the rotting illusion of blood purity like the rest of this pathetic kennel club!"
He spun in a slow, sweeping circle, gesturing to the pure-blood nobility—the political figures and ancient families—who watched him in stunned horror.
"I denounce everything you stand for!" Echo roared, his crimson hair beginning to crackle with untamed energy. "How utterly ridiculous it is that two awful people from two equally awful families have finally come together to breed more awful children in this rotten world—a world the idiocy of pure-bloods has kept strong for hundreds of years! You are all hags and has-beens living in a past that has long since died out, clinging to it by following the Dark Lord, a man who most likely sees all of you as less than dirt!" He paused, lowering the glass toward the furious, stricken figures of Lucius and Narcissa. "So here's to you and your awful selves. May your union be just as short-lived and horrible as you made mine."
In the agonizing, charged silence, Echo finished his toast by slamming the glass down onto the courtyard's polished flagstones. It shattered with a violent CRASH, the sound echoing the destruction of the ceremony.
Echo wiped a streak of sweat and residual Polyjuice Potion from his face. "I gotta admit, I hate these snobbish, high-brow parties," he said, the dangerous grin splitting his face wide. He spread his arms out in a grand, theatrical show. "So, let's get things really excited and light this place a blaze with excitement!"
As if commanded by the very words, a guttural, terrifying ROAR tore from the sky, closer and louder than before. All heads—those of the frozen guests, the enraged Lucius, and the furious Narcissa—snapped upward. Wick burst from the clouds, her massive black silhouette wreathed in the sun, malignant glow of unnatural fire. She flew down at an impossible speed, spitting a continuous line of red-hot fire across the center of the open courtyard.
Panic and chaos erupted in a tidal wave. People shrieked and scrambled, running in every direction as the dragon made a tight U-turn and breathed another sweeping stream of fire. Some tried to take out their wands, aiming attacks at Echo or the descending dragon, but Shimmer, the invisible Demiguise, was already at work. He jumped around the scrambling guests, silently knocking wands free from trembling hands and tripping people onto the floor, ensuring their magic couldn't interrupt the show.
Echo whipped out his own wand, the action fluid and lethal. The Locket of Slytherin, which had been concealed beneath his shirt, finally came loose, hanging against his chest. Using the raw, ancient magic channeled through the Locket, Echo let out a wordless snarl. The earth beneath the courtyard instantly surged upward, the flagstones cracking and splitting. Sharp, jagged points of stone sprang up, creating a twisting, impenetrable fence that snaked through the courtyard, successfully separating the front rows from the rear exits. The fence erupted backward, slamming violently into the building where the wedding party was supposed to be held, just as Wick flew by and coated the structure in a massive, roaring stream of fire. The building instantly became an inferno, sending massive plumes of black smoke into the day and sparking renewed, deafening panic.
Echo, standing untouched amid the chaos, threw his head back and laughed—a wild, raw, magnificent sound of pure, victorious anarchy.
Lucius Malfoy, having managed to throw a protective shield around himself and Narcissa to deflect a piece of flying stone, surged forward, his face contorted with outrage. He covered the distance in three long strides, grabbing Echo by his collar with a desperate, furious grip.
"What madness has overtaken you, Crabbe?!" Lucius yelled, shaking the boy violently.
Echo looked directly at him, his face now settling into a cold, terrifying mask of pure malevolence. The last remnants of the Polyjuice Potion dissolved entirely, leaving his hair a blazing crimson and his chaotic violet eyes fixed on Lucius.
"Oh, you should know very well where my madness came from, Pound Shop Legolas," Echo replied, his voice a low, hard whisper.
Lucius was rendered both confused and deeply scared. The words were a nonsensical insult, but the chilling certainty in the voice and the creative disrespect of the nickname—something only one specific person would ever level at him—finally caused the full, horrific truth to dawn on him. This was not Crabbe.
"W-what did you say?" Lucius stammered, his mind reeling.
Echo didn't answer with words. He focused his inner strength, channeling his Beast Magic. With a sudden, silent poof of air, a beautiful, bronze-plumed Diricawl materialized by his feet. Echo instantly slammed the magical link into the bird, pulling its innate magic into his command. He grabbed Lucius's collar with one hand, his grip crushing.
"Let go and have a private chat, shall we?" Echo said, before channeling the Diricawl's power.
With a final, desperate POP of displaced air, Echo, the dragon's roar ringing in the night, vanished from the flaming courtyard, dragging the terrified, confused Lucius Malfoy with him into the abyss of teleportation.
The air POPped with a deafening, concussive force several miles away from the wedding venue, in a wide, lonely field surrounded by low, dark hills. Echo and Lucius Malfoy tumbled out of the space-time rift, landing heavily on the damp, yielding earth. Echo, still wearing the too-tight skin of Vincent Crabbe, recovered instantly, rolling to his feet. He hauled the stunned Lucius up with a single hand, the man's silver-tipped cane skittering away uselessly across the grass. With a grunt, Echo put all his residual adrenaline and fury into the throw.
Lucius flew several yards through the air before slamming against a massive, moss-covered granite boulder. The impact knocked the wind clean out of him, leaving him gasping for air in short, pathetic wheezes. He slumped, his head hitting the unforgiving stone, sending a jolt of pain and instant, dizzying vertigo through his skull. He sat there, dazed and disoriented, clutching his ribs, trying to orient himself as the smell of damp earth and the ringing in his ears gradually subsided.
Echo stood a short distance away, his chest heaving, recovering from the powerful, uncontrolled teleportation. The sheer effort of the magic had left him shaking, and the final threads of the Polyjuice Potion were already failing, pulling at his skin. As Lucius came to his senses, he looked up at the looming figure of "Crabbe" approaching him, still heavy-set, still furious. The older wizard squinted through the vertigo, his voice a dry, ragged whisper.
"Why are you doing this, Crabbe?" Lucius managed to ask, the name feeling like a betrayal on his tongue.
Echo stopped, a cold, predatory smile splitting his face. "You wanna know why?" He didn't wait for a reply, the raw energy of the moment overriding the need for patience. "You did invite me, Lucius, so I decided to CRASH!"
As he delivered the final, spitting word, Echo waved his hand in a short, decisive arc over his body, a silent, powerful dismissal charm. The thick, bovine features of Vincent Crabbe instantly twisted, collapsing inward and dissolving like wet clay. The borrowed suit melted away, snapping back into the dark, sleek dragon-scale robe and suit that Echo always favored, a chaotic violet flickering through the material.
The sight of the man beneath the mask—the blazing crimson hair, the chaotic violet eyes, the cold, powerful face—made Lucius gasp. He recoiled violently against the stone, his eyes wide and vacant with shock.
"Echo," Lucius stammered out, the name a broken syllable of utter disbelief and dawning horror.
Echo walked the final few feet, leaning down until his face was inches from the defeated, aristocratic features of Lucius Malfoy. The crimson of his hair pulsed with cold, vengeful light. "Hello, Becky," Echo purred, his voice low, cold, and utterly lethal. "Good to see you again."