Conflict of Interest

"Now do you understand? There is no place for you in this world if you don't fit in …!"

Wailon Wrath, the feared director and warden of the Imperial Conformatorium of the Boiling Isles, loomed darkly over one of his newest "patients". This one, a female witchling with blue hair, had a hobby of drawing residents of the Boiling Isles with streamlined proportions and, even worse, exaggerated, shining eyes.

Wrath tilted his head down, leveling his avian-insectoid mask to have the beak curve less than an inch from her skin, forcing the prisoner to look into the dark lenses that hid his eyes. "You will not leave this place until you understand … conformity to the will of His Majesty the Emperor is the only way to live …!"

Wrath revelled in the trembling of his patient, and even more so in the naked fear he could feel radiating off of her. He needed no magic to do so; he had long-mastered the skill to sense fear in his victims. The menacing aura he had spent the last hour cultivating was burrowing deep into this witchling's psyche and impressing his mantra into her mind.

"Warden Wrath, you have a visitor."

Wrath kept himself carefully controlled, even as he felt his infamous temper rising from his belly to the very outer layers of his skin. With six words, a mere three-second phrase, his assistant had nullified an hour of work. He could feel the tension in the room popped like a balloon and his victim began to ever-so-slowly calm down.

With slow, disciplined movements he placed a single finger on the reply switch. "Not now," he growled, the switch creaking under his strength. His rage was only very slightly tempered by the whimper his patient let slip at the sound of his voice.

"Sir, I really think you should-" His assistant's thoughts on the matter were cut off by the reinforced iron door of Wrath's workspace being blown clean off its hinges and flying to smash a crater into the opposing wall, leaving a fog of debris and dust in its wake that obscured the doorway.

"How dare you?!" Wrath thundered, unconsciously forming his right hand into a scythe blade. "Who dares to interrupt my art?!" The distinct clack-clack of high-heeled boots echoed for a moment before a familiar and unwanted voice answered his demand.

"Good evening, Wrath."

The dust parted to reveal a tall, slim witch with waist-length black hair that contrasted her alabaster skin and complimented her piercing, mint-green eyes. She was dressed in a charcoal-black, simple-yet-formal dress that covered everything but her face and hands, her long, pointed nails painted as black as her lips. A blue gem was embedded into her sternum below her collarbone in a manner Wrath had only seen on one other person.

"Madame Lilith," Wrath growled, his tone just respectful enough to avoid conflict. "To what do I owe this unexpected visit?"

"Recent events," Lilith answered coldly, "led me to believe it was high time for an inspection of your facilities," Lilith answered.

"By 'recent events', you no doubt mean the small incident a few weeks ago," he replied.

"If by 'small incident' you mean a full-scale riot and the escape of more than one patient, then you are correct," Lilith said scornfully. "And to top off this embarrassment to the good Emperor's administration, you had my sister in your grasp and let her escape with hardly a scratch."

Wrath growled, his frame trembling with the effort of holding back his temper. As Head of the Emperor's Coven, Lilith Clawthorne was one of the few on the Boiling Isles who out-ranked him, at least outside the Conformatorium. And while he had all-but-unlimited influence within his domain, she reported directly to the Emperor. And the Emperor would not likely favor disrespect to one of his highest vassals.

"The Owl Lady was aided by her … companions, who assaulted me with weapons no doubt native the Human Realm," Wrath explained, even if he knew she had probably read his formal report of the incident.

"And your shame somehow grows ever greater," Lilith commented. "You were defeated by a mere human, a weak specimen possessed of no magic." Lilith drew a small, pale-blue spell circle in the air that unlocked the restraints on Wrath's patient. "Take the girl back to her cell," she said, gesturing to one of the Conformatorium guards who had snuck in behind her. The guard nodded and grabbed the girl's arm to drag her away, not at all hampered by her clear desire to be as far from the two powerful figures as possible.

"You dare to interfere with my work?" Wrath growled, the flesh of his hands and forearms writhing with the repressed urge to shift into weapons.

"I believe I have made that quite clear," Lilith snarked.

Wrath was utterly still for a total of three seconds before he struck. Quickly shifting his left arm into a mass of binding tentacles, he lashed them forward and captured Lilith in their coils, making sure to bind her wrists and fingers as well as her arms and legs to prevent an escape by magic.

"You dare to come into my domain and insult my abilities when you yourself have had even less success?" he asked, gutturally and rhetorically. "I hear much from those who enter these gates, and they all speak of the Owl Lady who almost routinely avoids capture by your vaunted agents." He tightened his grip and drew her closer as he shifted his other hand into a scythe. "Perhaps the Owl Lady would return willingly to save her younger sister."

Lilith, who's expression had hardly changed since her capture, huffed before she burst into a wisp of blue fire before reforming outside his grasp — a maneuver known as the Fire Step. Her staff, a length of ivory wood topped with a pale raven appeared in her hand before she spun it in a smooth circle, the staff trailing blue fire to form a large spell circle. She lunged with the head of her staff, sending a lance of the flames at Wrath.

"Did you hear that Madam Lilith arrived earlier?" one of the Conformatorium guards asked his partner.

"Whoa, the head honcho of the Emperor's Coven herself," the other replied. "Think this is about what happened with the Owl Lady and her friends?"

"Can't see what else it could be," the first said. "I just hope the boss comes out alright."

Both guards looked up at the sound of shattering stone to find Warden Wrath falling toward them with several chunks of masonry. They screamed and ran for it, leaving their superior to smash into the courtyard. The warden growled viciously and looked up through the shattered lenses of his mask to see Lilith floating high above, sitting side saddle on her staff and frowning at him with what could only be disappointment.

With another growl he removed his mask to bear his true visage, that of a fang-filled mouth and tiny eyes. He crushed the mask into a ball of twisted metal and inhaled deeply to — with a fearsome roar of unhinged fury — unleash a torrent of flames up at her.

Lilith, on her part, merely conjured a medium-sized spell circle that sent a lance of wind to burrow into the pillar of flames and disperse it, with enough force left over to pummel against Wrath. It wasn't a fearsome offensive, but it was enough to make him curl in on himself to avoid being blown back. And distraction had been half the point of that spell.

Lilith mentally instructed her palisman, Bianca, to descend sharply, only pulling up at the last moment to allow Lilith to leap off and land lightly on the cobblestone ground. If word of this battle got out, which it certainly would given the number of guards and other personnel gathering at the windows and doors of the main building, she wanted them to know she had defeated Wrath without the benefit of higher ground.

Wrath snarled and shifted his hands again, one into a double-sided scythe and the other into a war hammer. He charged for the comparatively small woman and swung his hammer with all of his considerable might, only to have her Fire Step away again to reform behind him. Charging her staff with magic, she swung and struck Wrath from behind to fly across the courtyard and into one of the walls of the institution.

Wrath had to catch his breath before extracting himself from the rubble, shaking his head like a dog to regain his senses. Just as he did, a whip of blue magic wrapped around his chest to jerk him off of his feet and back toward Lilith. As he flew at her with a cry of surprise, she spun the head of her staff to form a spell circle and slammed the butt of it to the cobblestones. Just before the warden impacted with her, a thick pillar of stone rose from the ground to send him careening into the sky with a sickening crunch and a wail of pain.

"And now for the coup de grace," she whispered, spinning her staff above her head to form a final massive spell circle. Black clouds formed above the courtyard, flickering with white light. And as Warden Wrath reached the apex of his ascent, all of that power struck and wove into a lance of lightning that drove into him and sent him hurtling back toward the ground to shatter even more of the cobblestones.

After a few long minutes, it was all the warden could do to drag himself out of the rubble, whimpering with agony. Agony that grew only greater as bindings of magic enveloped him and twisted his body backward until his spine threatened to shatter, his arms wrenched backward until the backs of his hands touched their opposing shoulders.

"You should know, Wrath," Lilith said with a dangerously calm tone, hardly a hair out of place in the wake of their battle, "that I spoke to several of your guards before I visited you personally. And they mentioned you had a certain unprofessional interest in my sister." The magic surrounding him stretched to constrict his windpipe, choking him into even further submission. "They claimed you tried to force her into some twisted romance."

The magic freed his throat, allowing him to cough raggedly. "Go to hell, Clawthorne," he spat gravely.

Lilith was an experienced interrogator, and to her his words were a backhanded confession. She reinforced the magic binding his body and lashed further bindings around his mouth before lighting her illusory binds on fire. The gag restricted him from screaming in pain, but that did not stop him from trying.

After a few moments of this, Lilith released the spell and let him collapse back to the ground to curl in on himself and weep in agony. She leaned close to the side of his head and whispered into his ear. "Soon enough, my sister will be here under your … watchful eye. And if I find out that you have tried to force anything upon her that does not strictly abide by our Emperor's standards of Conformation, I will return and tear you asunder."

Lilith stood up and cast a small spell to amplify her voice. "It is my official belief that the warden's unprofessional conduct has warranted an extensive review of this facility," she proclaimed. "As such, a contingent of agents of the Emperor's Coven will be stationed in the Conformatorium indefinitely. They will act as they see fit with the will of the Emperor." Lilith formed a small circle that shot sparks into the air, alerting the aforementioned team that appeared beside her in wreaths of multicolored smoke.

"Gentlemen, you may begin your inspection immediately," Lilith said with a faint smirk. The trio of agents, clothed in the standard white cloaks and curved avian masks, saluted and entered the Conformatorium in strict formation. For her part, the head of the coven cast one last glance at the fallen warden and gestured for the facility's guards to come and escort him to the infirmary. And she kept the satisfied smirk from her features as they tried to do their duty while staying as far away from her as possible.

Good. Very good. No doubt these men would be gossiping tonight, and her reputation would be further bolstered.

Later that night in the privacy of her own home, Lilith reviewed her actions at the Conformatorium as she poured over reports from her subordinates. In retrospect, perhaps she had gone a bit … overboard. Granted, she had been well within her rights to dispatch Warden Wrath as she had seen fit, as he had attacked her first while on official business for the Emperor's Coven. But the extent with which she had … handled the incident was a mite excessive.

And that was unlike her.

So why? Why had she so thoroughly beaten, even broken, the warden? She was self-aware enough to know her conflicted feelings over her sister were the cause of this, but to what end?

Did Lilith still care about Edalyn? Of course she did. Edalyn, for all her stubbornness and rebellion and criminality, was still her big sister. She was still the Eda who had summoned an army of abominations to reclaim Lilith's stolen lunch money — even if that had led to a much more dire circumstance that forced the sisters to work together to put down that very army.

She was still the Eda who had helped Lilith to master each potion she had been given in school. Lilith prided herself on her wide skills in magic, but potions had never been her strong suit. Eda, though, had a true gift. She, unsurprisingly, had rejected standardized potion recipes and devised her own, producing brews and tonics that often worked even better than traditional potions. And though Lilith followed the school's methods, Eda had always been happy to help her get the hang of the discipline.

She was still the Eda who freed her from-

… Ah. There it is.

Lilith thought back to an incident from their school years.

YEARS AGO

"C'mon, Lilith. Just one date. My parents' restaurant serves the best cockatrice nuggets on the Boiling Isles."

Lilith couldn't help but wrinkle her nose at the offer from one Brick Clay, a star on the grudgeby team. A brutish boy who hailed from the Beastkeeper track, his lank brown hair hung low to cover the second pair of eyes on his forehead, but not near low enough to cover his other two, much less his greasy skin and smattering of pimples. But far more than any of that was the lecherous gleam in his eyes that turned Lilith's stomach.

"For the last time, Brick, the answer is no," she said, clutching her books to her chest. "And it won't change."

The gleam in Brick's eye turned angry and he slammed his open palms to the lockers on either side of Lilith's head. "Lilith, you're not being very nice," he said lowly, teeth gnashing. "All I'm asking for is one date."

"She said no, troll," a new voice said, one Lilith knew all too well. Brick yelped as he was pulled away from Lilith, his arm twisted behind his back before he was slammed face-first into the row of lockers. Behind him stood Lilith's older sister Eda in all her redheaded, rebellious glory. "Now you're gonna walk away and not look at my lil sister again. Got it?" Eda's voice was jovial, but a deaf man could have picked up the menace behind it.

"Y-yeah, I got it," Brick stammered before Eda pulled him from the lockers and shoved him further down the hall to stumble and then run away. Eda smirked and looked to her little sister, who seemed less than amused.

"I could have handled that," she said icily.

"I know you could have," Eda grinned. "But I couldn't pass up the opportunity to stir things up with a perfectly valid excuse of protecting my baby sister." She ruffled Lilith's hair semi-affectionately, to which Lilith batted her hand away and just left.

A week passed before Brick seemed to forget his lesson and approached Lilith again. It played out just as it had before, up until Lilith's reaction that shocked Eda to the core. "Get off of him, Edalyn!" Lilith shouted, pushing her away before wrapping an embrace around the very arm that Eda had previously twisted behind Brick's back.

"So, is that a yes?" Brick asked with a crooked grin.

Lilith blushed and giggled. "Sure, Brick, why not?" Brick's grin only grew wider and he winked at her before smirking at Eda and walking away.

"What the hell was that?" Eda demanded, picking herself up off of the floor.

"That was manners, Eda," Lilith said pointedly, though the usual sharpness of her tone was downplayed by the longing gaze she still cast down the hall and the long lock of dark hair she was twirling around one of her fingers.

"Lily, are you feeling alright?" Eda asked, a horrifying suspicion taking root in her mind.

"I feel amazing, Eda," Lilith replied, her anger seeming to evaporate with a hearty sigh. "I have a date, and with a strong, dashing boy, too."

Eda's eye twitched as her suspicion grew even more. "Really? 'Cause last week you said you'd rather date a giraffe than date Brick Clay," she commented.

Lilith sighed dreamily. "Yeah. It's amazing how fast feelings can turn around, right?"

That did it. There was no other explanation. But a situation this delicate could erupt into devastation if Eda didn't approach it with extreme caution — sadly, something that was not her forte. But what Eda had in spades was cleverness; not to mention a deep understanding of her sister. So it was time to be a little crafty.

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised," Eda said, carefully masking the derision attempting to leak into her tone. "You've always been pretty and any guy would have to be an idiot not to want to ask you out." Time to set the trap. "Ah, I remember the day before my first date," she said, rubbing her knuckle against her chin. "I was a freakin' bundle of nerves. Could barely keep my food down, I was so nervous." She laughed, secretly at the fact that it was true. "Hope you don't have any of that today, sis," she added.

Lilith's dreamy smile had evaporated into a wide-eyed look of discomfort, her complexion almost green. "Ooh," she groaned, clutching her stomach. Hook.

"Oh, man. You don't look so good, Lily," Eda commented. She smiled as reassuringly as possible and placed a hand on her sister's shoulder to gently steer her toward the potions lab. "Why don't I whip you up something for that. It'll help settle your stomach and let you focus on your date, eh?" Line.

Lilith tensed and stopped walking. "How do I know this isn't some kind of trick to embarrass me in front of Brick?" she asked suspiciously.

Time for sincerity. Eda turned Lilith to face her and met her eyes, gold meeting green. "Lily, I swear that everything I will do for the rest of the day is for your own good. And I swear that when it's all said and done, you will thank me from the bottom of your heart."

Lilith blinked owlishly at the genuineness in her older sister's eyes. As good an actress as she could be, honed from years of avoiding punishments for her infamous pranks and scams, Lilith had always been able to tell when she was being untruthful. And right now, Eda was telling the whole truth. "Okay," she said. "I trust you." Sinker.

Eda smiled gratefully and gently steered Lilith again toward the potions lab, empty at this time of day. It took her no time at all to whip up the potion she needed, having made a fair amount of snails brewing it for the student body from time to time. After less than an hour, Eda handed her sister a vial of dark green fluid and nodded in encouragement.

Lilith smiled and downed the potion, grimacing at the bitter flavor before getting that dreamy smile again. A smile that slowly crumbled as the potion took effect. "What happened?" she asked.

"You were under the effects of a love potion," Eda said blankly, clearly furious underneath her calm mask.

"How?" Lilith asked. How did this happen? How did Eda know? How did she fix it?

"I've seen enough of those damn things used to see the signs," Eda remarked. "Sudden turnarounds in feelings, a hazy stupor, general suggestibility, mood swings; you name it, it can happen." She pointed to the vial loosely clasped in Lilith's fingers. "That was a combination test and antidote. If you weren't under the effects, nothing would have happened. But since you were, the effects were countered and dissipated."

Lilith took a few minutes to digest this information, a maelstrom of emotions swirling through her head and fighting for supremacy. Eventually, she settled on the strongest one: pure anger. Lilith threw the vial at the wall, uncaring that it was school property and stood to stomp toward the door, find Brick, and hex him into next week.

"Whoa, Lily, take it easy," Eda said, holding her shoulder to slow her down.

"He tried to take advantage of me!" Lilith shrieked. "You're not going to stop me from making him pay!"

"I never wanted to stop you," Eda said with a wicked grin. "I just have a suggestion to make it more … effective."

As the sun reached its halfway point between noon and the horizon, Brick made his way to the Clawthorne residence. He was dressed in dark clothing, since it supposedly was slimming, and had his hair slicked back with gel to reveal all four of his eyes. Before he knocked, he removed a small vial from his pocket and upended it onto his wrist before smearing the light-pink contents on the other wrist and then to the sides of his neck.

Can't be too careful.

Pocketing the vial, he pulled the toll rope to announce his presence with the deep gong of a bell. He didn't have to wait long before Lilith opened the door, her cheeks attractively pink that contrasted her spring-green sundress and hair ribbon. She smiled and blushed even more, her hands clutched in front of her chest as she looked away in abrupt shyness.

"Hey there, Lilith," Brick said with a smug grin. "Ready to go?"

Lilith took a breath to answer but was cut off by her big sister swinging the door even wider. "Absolutely not!" Eda barked, still in her school uniform. "Our parents are gone for the weekend and I'm in charge! And I say," she stalked forward a few steps and jabbed the beefier boy in the chest, "that Lily is too young to date!"

Before she could continue her tirade, Eda yelped as she was jerked away from her victim. "Leave him alone, Edalyn," Lilith spat. "Go back to your bottles and pranks and let me live my own life! You do stupid things all the time; let me choose for myself what is smart!"

Eda's eyes were wide. "Lily …!"

Lilith turned away, her nose in the air as she gripped the cuff of Brick's sleeve and marched him away. Eda closed the door behind them … and grinned maliciously. She bolted upstairs and changed into a wine-red tunic and grey tights before slipping on a pair of wing-shoes and zipping off into the sky. She fished an enchanted compass fixed with one of Lilith's hairs and formed a small spell circle above it to allow her to track them.

Far below, Brick was guiding Lilith through the outskirts of Bonesborough toward the sea cliffs outside town, his hand on Lilith's lower back. Had he been more observant, he might have noticed that Lilith's smile had morphed into a thin frown, her eyes twitching just a bit from his proximity.

Finally, they made it to a particularly high cliff that jutted out over the water, a rumored common spot for … less-than-chaste activities between students. Brick drew Lilith closer, pointedly tucking her head as close to his neck as possible. Lilith grimaced collectively at the gesture, at his proximity, and at the cloying scent of the potion he was wearing.

"So, Lilith, what d'ya think of the view?" Brick asked.

In any other circumstance, Lilith would have probably enjoyed it. The sun was setting, sinking into the sea and painting the sky with pink flames. But Brick's presence was more than enough to sour it. "It's pretty," she said, forcing her voice to mimic the dreamy sound Eda had coached her in.

"Not as pretty as those lips of yours," he replied suggestively, wriggling his eyebrows for added effect. Lilith swallowed thickly in revulsion, hoping it came across as nerves. She blanched when Brick's eyes closed and he swooped closer for a kiss, Lilith blocking his approach with a finger on his nose.

"Not even if you paid me," she spat before kicking him between the legs and dodging away.

"You bitch!" he snapped, his teeth clenched as he cradled his manhood. "Come back here! You know you want to!"

"Why would I ever want to?" she asked rhetorically. She folded her hands behind her back, carefully concealing a small crystal ball behind her back.

"The love potion! You just had it at lunch; there's no way it could have worn off yet!" Brick shouted, in too much pain to think clearly. "Especially with the scent I'm wearing!"

"You slipped a potion into me?!" Lilith asked with a theatrical gasp — she'd always had a talent for the dramatic.

"During lunch, you-!" Brick paused as his words caught up with him. "Wait, why the hell am I admitting this?"

Lilith smirked. "You're not the only one who can wear a scent of suggestion," she said. "But mine's one of truth, not lust." She held out her hand to reveal the recording crystal she'd been concealing. "And pretty soon, the guards and the Emperor's coven will know exactly what you've been up to."

Brick paled in fear. Love potions and their like, ones that severely compromised the victim's will, were very illegal on the Boiling Isles. Oh sure, there were weak aphrodisiacs that were sold to couples as a way to enhance the mood, but those were easily resistible if you wanted to. And slipping something any stronger, especially without consent, was punishable with a ten-year sentence in the Conformatorium.

"Give me that, you little-!" Brick lunged for Lilith and snatched the crystal. But, used as he was to massively built grudgeby players, he failed to account for how petite Lilith was and she stumbled and fell backward … straight off the cliff. She screamed on the way down, the sound stunning Brick to his core. It took him a few seconds to shake it off before he looked down to find her gone, no doubt carried away by the current for good.

Brick, eyes wider than dinner plates, stumbled back away from the edge and retched. All he'd wanted was a nice time with a pretty girl, not to be a murderer. Sweat beaded his brow as he forced himself not to panic. No one would start looking until tomorrow morning, and no one knew where he's been taking her. And there was no evidence that she'd "disappeared" because of him. Nodding in resolve, Brick pocketed the recording crystal and departed from the cliffs.

As he entered the treeline, a blur shot up from beyond the cliff to arc over and settle gently upon the ground. Eda dropped Lilith from a bridal carry and fished a gem identical to the recording crystal from her pocket. One that was identical not just in appearance, but in contents. She flicked her thumb over the polished crystal.

"The love potion! You just had it at lunch-"

Eda smirked and looked to her sister. "Well?"

Lilith sighed through her nose. "Fine. It was a decent idea." She couldn't help a small smile. "And it was kind of fun."

PRESENT

Lilith couldn't help but smirk at the memory of the following day. After Brick had been stunned senseless by her arrival at school, Eda had "arranged" for the recording of his confession to play over the intercom system. It hadn't taken long for agents of the Emperor's coven to swoop down on the building and arrest him. A further investigation had turned up several other uses of such a potion on various girls in the school.

He'd been sentenced to fifteen years in the Conformatorium for his crimes.

Lilith sighed heavily. She'd owed Eda big time for getting her out of that mess, even if she'd never said it out loud. Who knows what that slimy bastard might have done to her?

Maybe that was why Lilith had been so forceful with Wrath today. The warden had reminded her disturbingly of that piece of filth from her school years; only this time, the danger had been presented to Eda. And if she had been in danger from it, who knew how many inmates of the Conformatorium were, too.

As Lilith returned to her paperwork, her left hand idly stroked the gem embedded in her sternum. She glanced out her study window and to the moon overhead. "I'm sorry, Edalyn. But even that day won't help you."

No matter what, Lilith Clawthorne would do her duty.

Viola! What's up, everyone? I'm happy to present yet another Owl House one-shot!

Fun fact, this originated as two separate ideas, but one of them would have been way too short - so I thought I'd merge them and it made something I really do like.

For any of you who may be wondering: Yes, the flashback was heavily influenced by Harry Potter 6. It's what gave me the idea in the first place - and it gives the opportunity to show Eda as a caring big sister.

Anyway, I hope all of you liked it! Leave a review if you have thoughts. And may your muse never waver!