ALSO how is prefect!Alan these days, with the recent events from XY&Z? :w (Did he still walk on DADA teacher!Lys and Magical Caretaking!Platane sometimes.)
(AHAHAHA……….DOES THE TRIWIZARD TOURNAMENT SOUND LIKE A LEAGUE EQUIVALENT TO YOU?)
“Don’t worry, he’s still breathing,” professor Lysandre says.
Relief bowls Alan over and fills his head with fog; he leans on the ivy wall for balance, finds his own breath again, and it takes him a moment to realize that the professor has not approached Ash’s body, is not doing anything to help either of them calm down, has no reason to be here at the centre of the maze at all.
The clouds in his brain part.
“It was you,” he says, with fang-sharp clarity. “You put my name in the Goblet of Fire.”
Professor Lysandre smiles. “You honoured my expectations. I only had to help you a little to find those Mega Evolution stones, and you figured out how to use them yourself. I did not expect you to win the first task.”
That’s a punch in Alan’s gut.
Professor Lysandre is the reason why Ash is lying on the ground right now, why Mairin has been in the infirmary for weeks, why Steven’s boyfriend’s almost drowned in the lake, why Alan went through all these insanely dangerous tasks — that hurts, that’s impossible to believe, to accept, but it’s not a slap in the face as much as the thought that the person who did all that is also the one who gave him Charizard’s help back then.
He’s shaking.
“Does professor Sycamore know?”
“Oh, dear, no. Although his knowledge was a lot of help as well. Look,” he says, and Alan recognizes the small crumpled items he takes out of his pocket instantly: the professor’s Garchomp’s torn-off fin, his Charizard’s broken claw.
“Did you know the ritual to awaken the Great Earth Dragon requires the pain of other dragons?”
The ground shakes under Alan’s feet — splits, and the professor smiles.
