The next morn, William appears at the dining table for the first meal appearing as if he has indulged in one too many tankards of ale the night a'fore.

Hermione intently watches him from the seat she has already taken at the end of the table in her customary place, carving an apple freshly picked from the orchards beyond the castle walls into small wedges.

"A busy night, brother," Charles greets him with a nod.

"Aye, and it has made me ravenous," William admits, reaching for a hunk of bread and breaking it without prayer, wolfing it down. With an imperious wave, he summons a servant to bring him his meal. A bowl of fresh stew is laid before him moments later and he falls upon it like a starving man.

Hermione and the other Weasley brothers watch, partaking only of the wine, bread, and cheese set before them, as she has instructed them. Percival frowns at his sibling's ill-manners.

It is only when his bowl is mostly empty that William looks up at them. "What news has silenced your mouths this fine day, my brothers?" he asks, noting the tension with narrowed eyes.

Percival, Frederick, and George all look to Charles to answer for them.

Charles knocks back his ale and sets the tankard aside. "Your son and heir, brother mine, is dead. Your waiting-woman has delivered unto us the news only this morn: Louis has succumbed to the flux."

The Baron Cranmere goes still and his face turns as white as freshly fallen snow at first, then quickly red as the heart of a fire with rage. "Why was I not informed of this tragedy earlier?"

He sounds remarkédly controlled for so melancholy a message.

Percival musters a disapproving tut. "Your recent...activities...seemed to have left you too exhausted to be easily roused, brother."

"And unable to be found in your own bed again," Frederick adds with a snarl, and tosses back his ale. The dark cloak of night had allowed him to slip his bride away the eve before, as Hermione had planned, but he has bravely returned for this final battle. He stares with undisguised hatred at his eldest sibling now.

"You slept as one of the dead," Hermione calmly explains to her Baron lover, continuing to cut her apple into parchment-thin slices, "which is, perhaps, a state you will prefer after I inform you of my treachery, m'lord. For you see, it is my aim today to free myself, our son, and your brothers from your tyranny, William, one way or the other."

William huffs his disdain. "What do you say, mad woman? Speak plainly."

She ignores her lord and instead turns to his brothers. "For the sake of your immortal souls, I beg of you all to leave this hall and see not the fate I intend for your Lord and brother."

Charles sits further back into his high-backed chair. "I speak not for the others, my lady, but it is my intention to stay and bear witness to your great justice. I pray God forgive me my wicked curiosity."

Across the table, Percival gives a stiff nod. "For Ronald, I must not waver in this course," he states and he, too, stays put in his seat.

The twins are silent and unanimous, glaring at William with a matching hatred. They seek revenge for the wrong done to Frederick and Angelina, for Ronald and Louis, and for Fleur, too.

Hermione sighs. "As you wish, great sirs." She turns her head then and looks to her lover with contempt as he sits like a King upon his throne at the head of the table. "You shall sit as observers of Hecate's revenge upon the Deceiver. Mother Moon will punish a wolf this day."

As quick as a serpent, William's eyes dart from brother to brother. "What do you all here? What lunacy is this that comes from the mouth of this wench?"

"If I have been made a wench, it has been at your evil hands," Hermione accuses him. "All here know it to be true."

He scoffs and waves in her direction, speaking to his brothers. "Do you give her your loyalty now, this whore of Babylon? Do you take her side over that of blood?"

When there is no response from Charles, Percival, Frederick, and George, the answer is made obvious. This enrages William and he pounds his chest with a fist and slams it upon the table. Sweat dots his forehead and upper lip, and his eyes bulge, as if he is suddenly in the grips of a catching fever.

"I am your Lord! You would betray me?"

"It is you who betrayed us!" Frederick declares, shouting loud enough for John Lackland to hear, should he be listening from his bower in London. "You steal your brother's wives, breed them, take their wealth into your coffers, and kill your own blood to keep what you have taken! You allow your firstborn to rot in an ill-kept nursery while you slake your lust on the innocent and pure! You break God's laws and dare to call yourself a Soldier for Christ! It is blasphemy!"

"You dare!" William roars.

"'Tis true, you have not been the same since returning from Crusade, William," Charles insists. "Your attack by wolves in the wilds of Hungary has made you kindred to them. You are more beast now than man. Satan's hand rests upon your soul."

Percival looks with pity upon his eldest sibling. "You have become the rabid dog, William."

"And you will be brought low," George states, firm in his conviction.

Abruptly, William stands to face his accusers. Beads of perspiration roll down his face and his hands shake. "'Tis treason you speak of!" He weaves on his feet, staggers a step to the side, and blinks as if his body begins to yield to illness. Wiping his brow, he looks at his hand, confused. "What evil is done upon me?"

"You do not see it yet, my Lord?" Hermione taunts, setting her apple and her knife aside as her paring is done. "Look harder."

He does, and she laughs with joy inside her heart the moment he becomes enlightened. He picks up his stew bowl, sniffs it once, and then tosses it to the floor with a look of distaste. Its small remaining contents splatter across the stone, the gravy staining the hall rushes. "Poison?" he hisses, and moves to draw his sword, but his arm seems not to obey him. It flops uselessly, too weak to do as bid. "You have killed me!"

"In a manner of speaking," Hermione confesses. "Tell me, my Lord, do you recall the story of Lycaon, the King of Arcadia? Do you remember his fate for daring to consider himself equal to a god?"

William's blue-gold eyes flare with fear, but the change begins to take him then, and he hunches forward, gripping his belly in pain. "Bitch!" he snarls at her with a voice garbled and bloody as his teeth elongate and his jaw breaks. "My son! My Louis! You...fed me... Traitoress bitch!"

He screams and falls to his knees, gripping his head with hands that grow long like hair, its nails becoming pointed and sharp as a great animal's. He hunches, and beneath the table, none can see, but all can hear the change that o'ertakes him. Bones break, skin snaps. William shrieks with agony as he becomes the beast outside that is mirrored within.

The Deceiver receives his due.

Hermione's mother, Angelina, Lady Weasley, and Ginevra run to the hallway from their apartments. They look on in horror as Hermione's curse comes to fruition, and they cross themselves and ward against evil.

When it is done, with a wolf's howl of pain and fear, William leaps up on deformed feet and rushes towards the door to freedom, towards the wild. No one prevents his fleeing, for all know the hunt will be called tonight after the villagers see the monster roaming among them.

There is no escape for the wicked.

It is quiet in the hall thereafter, aside from Lady Weasley's weeping. Percival takes his mother into his arms and consoles her, while Frederick does the same for his wife and George his sister. Hermione uses precious energia to erase the evidence of her misdeed. The spilled bowl of stew disappears, as if the Almighty Hecate has swept it away. With a thought directed towards the kitchen, the stew there vanishes as well.

She says a silent prayer for poor Louis. In a moment, she will make her excuses to attend to his final rites, and tonight, she will return to the hall before the hunt to tell all that she burned the child's bones like the heathen children of old and set his ashes to the winds, in honour of the traditional Celtic ceremonies that his father so respected. She will pay the village priest a tithe for a mass to be said in the boy's name. None will be the wiser, as she has already disposed of the incriminating book containing Lycaon's tale.

Her mother cautiously approaches her. "What have you done, childe?"

"That which was necessary," Hermione replies in a low, pitiless tone. "My body is again my own, Angelina's terror executed, Louis' suffering ended, an' all wrongs are avenged and honour appeased."

"Ye have doomed your soul in the doing!" the woman warns and crosses herself again.

Hermione laughs, untroubled by the thought. She leans forward, pressing her lips to her mother's ear and lovingly whispers, "Beware my wrath does not fall elsewhere, dear Mother Mine."

Lowering her mud-coloured eyes in fear, her mother submits, and Hermione knows from this day forward, nothing will ever be the same between them.

The others now turn to Charles for leadership, confused in the absence of a Lord and Master. The good soldier sheathes his sword, drawn out of fear of William's earlier wroth, and moves towards the head of the table, accepting the mantle of authority. He sends runners out into the village with a warning not to chase the man-beast that runs rampant through their roads and fields, and calls for volunteers for tonight's hunt. The men see their new Capetanus in an instant and move to do his bidding without hesitation.

Charles is an excellent choice, despite his earlier reservations. Hermione sees through Hecate's third eye that he will rule as Baron Cranmere fairly and without challenge for years to come, accepting her as his wife and fostering her son until Hugo reaches his manhood to adopt his birthing title, his 'God-given' title, according to the crown.

Silently, she smiles at that, for it was not God this day that served her justice, but a pagan goddess, instead.

Slowly, tiredly, Hermione makes to retire, taking with her the apple she has sliced into an offering. She tosses its pieces into the great hall's roaring hearth, along with a pouch of cinnamon and ground walnuts she earlier skived from the kitchen, letting the scents fill the air and sanctify the hall.

Beneath her fingertips, her magic blooms and tingles, letting her know Hecate has accepted her late Samhain offering.

A free woman at long last, she raises her voice to the heavens to sing:

"Y wawr yn torri
Mae'r tyndra yn esgyn
Fy nghyned yn aros
Rwy'n barod i'r siwrne

Henuriaid yn galw
O fore tan nos
Maen't yn aros am yr aberth
A fydd i'w rhoi rhyddhad

Yn gynnar yn y bore
Lleisiau yn fy ngalw
Yr amser wedi cyrraedd
Ac mae'n rhaid i'm fynd

Wedi treilio amryw flwyddyn
Paratoi am yr eiliad hon
Er mwyn rhoi fy nghorff mewn offrwm
I'r Derwyddon."

.

~FIN~

Author's Final Notes:

And so we come to the end of this dark tale of rape, murder, and revenge. No sequel planned - I like it just as it is. Please let me know what your thoughts!

XOXO,

- RZZMG