— continued from here // @devillain .
The barrier had fallen and freedom had tasted a lot like blood and fire as Auradon’s nightmares were unleashed. Harry hadn’t cared. He had his Captain, and his crew. He had the horizon and the sea, and the freedom to make their enemies quake wherever they went. Let the Boradon know fear and hunger and violence, it was about time they remembered the taste, but the triumph didn’t last as long as Harry had hoped it would. Faces were missing. Crewmates, siblings, allies. Some stolen away by oppressive parents, others abandoned, marooned, spirited away. Carlos had been one of them and as Harry approached the curled up lump in the corner of the place at the end of his long search, he knew it had taken too long to find him.
Harry was still when Carlos moved like a ghoul. He looked starved, worse than he had ever looked on the Isle, nails cracked and chipped to sharp edges, caked in dirt. Carlos grabbed hold of him and when he spoke, his words made him sick. It seemed to be an unspoken rule among those raised on the Isle, that unless explicit permission was given, parents were off limits. Carlos had clung to that unspoken rule for years. Carlos was the sole reason Harry hadn’t already gone after the old hag for the stocks but this — this deserved an answer.
Harry reached out as Carlos let go of his arm, fingers brushing over the clasp of the collar around his neck with a disturbing calm. “You think you could stop me?” Harry asked in a voice that didn’t quite match the rage trapped like twin red pin pricks within pale blue eyes.
“I can fix this. Why won’t you let me fix it?” It would be easy, he would not feel guilt or remorse, he had no attachment to Cruella, no question of what she could have been once or before. If Carlos couldn’t do it, Harry was more than willing.
“I could do it quick. She wouldn’t even know.” Harry pressed, and there was a desperate edge to the way he made the promise. Killing her would be easy, killing her would mean it would be over, forever. She would never cause trouble again, she would simply be gone. “You’d be safe. I can make it so you’re safe.”