It was silent, only the faint flicker of the torches burned like fireflies in the long corridor. I watched him dart to the left out of the corner of my eye. I looked at Regulus who looked at Severus who gave the thumbs up.
‘Where did the dirty Mudblood go?’ I asked myself, creeping down the dark corridor, feeling my breath catch in my throat. I had done this countless times- tracking down my prey like an owl following a lone mouse. But this time was different and I couldn’t tell how.
“Oh Tamsin! Come out, come out wherever you are!” Regulus called, his dark lips curling up at the whimpers echoing through the corridor.
It always surprised me- the authority taking over his usually calm and eloquent voice. He spoke with such fluidness it was hard to believe he was only 15.
Severus motioned at the empty classroom down the corridor and all three of us slid in. There he was- little Tamsin Abbott, with his thick striped jumper and stark blonde hair, curled up in a little ball in the corner.
“Awe, does poor wee Abbott need his mummy to come and save him?” I cooed, all three of us moving closer.
“Obscuro!” I cackled and watched Abbott struggle as a blindfold appeared over his eyes.
We snickered at his attempts to get up and run away.
“Incarcerous!” Regulus giggled as ropes sprung around Abbott and he tumbled to the stone floor.
“What now?” Severus asked, staring at the struggling Hufflepuff and looking paler than usual.
“I say we leave him here and make him wait ’til the morning to be saved.” I laughed.
“No, no, that’s too easy,” Regulus whispered, his eyes seemingly glowing red. “Cruciatus curse.”
“Are you mad!?” I screeched, “We’ll get caught! We’ll be expelled!”
“What? Are you scared?” he mimicked, raising his wand at the whimpering boy.
“Reg, no!” I gasped.
“You can't do it!” Severus pleaded, “You’ll be done for. We all will.”
“I can do whatever I want. I’m a Black.” he said proudly, “Whose side are you two on anyways? Gone and turned into filthy blood-traitors, you two have.”
“We have not!” Severus exclaimed.
“You know that’s not true!” I pleaded.
What is he told my parents I was sticking up for a Mudblood? My father… my mother, I would be disowned, never allowed to see my brother again. Not that I saw him much. He was always off on a mission- how many people he had killed couldn’t be counted on two hands. It was only a matter of time until his luck ran out. I didn't want the same fate. Azkaban- Dementors- no it wasn’t worth it. But Regulus wasn’t backing down, I could tell, and there was no use in trying to stop him any longer.
“Fine, do it, but I’m not going to be here when you do.” I said, and turned to walk toward the door.
“And you?” Regulus asked Severus.
“I’m leaving,” he muttered and followed me out of the door.
We both ran as fast as we could in the abandon corridor, hoping to not hear him torture the boy, but just as we reached the stairs, we heard poor Tamsin Abbott let out a bloodcurdling scream.
I didn’t want to wait up for Regulus, but something in me wouldn’t let me walk myself up the stair and into my dormitory. It was the stupid magnetic pull, something I decided 4th year about Reg and I. I couldn't stay away from him no matter how nasty he was being or how belligerent he was acting. Why? I couldn't figure out. So I sat there. All night. Waiting to see the slight, black-haired boy walk through the portrait hole. Finally, two hours and a Charms essay later, he walked in and sat down on the ground next to my chair.
“So,” I began, feeling awkward and ashamed that I had ran away- that I had completely gone against my upbringing.
“So, what?” he scoffed, clearly angry with me.
“How is he?”
“Knew it,” he muttered, “blood-traitor.”
“I am not!” I yelled, “I just want need to know… in case someone asks. I can cover for you.”
I had jinxed and hexed people before, but never had it gone this far and I was scared.
“I don’t need you to cover for me. I have it handled.”
“What did you do?” I asked meekly.
“He’ll be fine.” Regulus said simply, picking up my Charms essay.
“What if he tells, Reg- Reg what if he tells and you get expelled… and Severus and I.”
“Abbott isn’t going to talk.” he said.
“How can you be sure?” I asked, feeling more frightened of my future than I ever had before. Always, after a letter from home, did he act like this. It was terrifying and I felt my future becoming bleaker. He was my future- sitting right next to me held my next 50 plus years. I was told so my third year at the dining room table. They told me so casually they could have been talking about the weather or the new flavour of ice cream at Florean Fortescue’s.
“We have something to share with you, Violetta,” my father said from the head of the table. “Your mother and I have picked him.”
“Him?” I asked.
“Well,” my mother began, “I was at the Three Broomsticks the other day with Walburga Black, and she was talking about her sons… you know Sirius and Regulus.”
I nodded my head. I had met them many times, our parents had dinners frequently together and were always invited to the same gatherings when we were younger, and I was now in the same year as Sirius. I didn’t usually speak to him, he was sorted into Gryffindor and associate with Mudbloods and blood-traitors. Regulus was a year younger than I, but I was around him, Bellatrix and Narcissa Black most of the time.
“She is worried about Sirius, her oldest.” she probed, “says she fears what his future holds for him. He’s incredibly defiant toward their father Orion and is friends with such filth. I mean a
“He’s the one who you will spend your future with,” my father concluded.
Potter
, dear.” she scoffed. “But her youngest, Regulus, is wonderful- aspires to be a follower of the Dark Lord. He’s a fine young man with outstanding upbringing and a high respect for the Pureblood community.”
And that was it. Three years ago my future had been laid out for me right at our ordinate dining room table, and I had spent every minute of my time with Regulus ever since. No turning back- no refusing. I was to one day marry Regulus Black, and marry him I would as soon as I was to leave Hogwarts. It was hard to believe, as a sixth year, my life was in the hands of a 15 year old boy. He was nice, sweet, and caring most of the time. But he was a boy obsessed. Not with me, I rather got the feeling he didn’t love me like he so declared, but I took it in strides and knew that it didn’t really matter. It was, after all, an arranged marriage. His obsession was for the one we all feared, the one with the name that no one spoke, not even my father or my brother. It was for the Dark Lord, and it was a scary and powerful obsession.
“I just know,” he smiled, then tossed my Charms essay back into my lap, “Fourth paragraph is rubbish,” he muttered then walked up to his dormitory.
I sighed, wondering how much we would all pay for leaving him alone with Abbott.
It had been a week and still, I had not come across Abbott. But I knew I’d see him today at breakfast, because stupid me sat at the front of the table with out thinking. I’d see everyone that walked into the Great Hall. The first being the juvenile Gryffindors that called themselves ’The Marauders’. They always came in a cluster. Each seemingly too thick to be without the other. First, Remus Lupin, an odd boy with scars and tattered clothing, James Potter, a highly known son of a Pureblood family gone rotten with their affiliations with Mudbloods, Peter Pettigrew, a lump of nothing, then my future husband’s brother, Sirius Black. He had it all, looks, money, and charm, and he threw it all away for what he called his ‘morals’. He ran away and was disowned by Walburga and Orion. Regulus acted like it didn’t bother him, but I could tell it did.
“Shut up, Bella,” I heard Severus mutter from across from me.
Bellatrix was apparently taunting Severus about his hair, which always hung like dark curtains around his pale white face. Bellatrix never liked Severus, knowing that he used to be close friends with Lily Evans- a known Mudblood in Gryffindor.
“What is it the blood-traitor calls you?” she cooed, “Snivellus?”
I watched his face turn a deep red, then he buried his head in his book. There was no use in trying to stick up for him, we all knew Bellatrix was unstoppable.
To my left, I watched Regulus turn to Rodolphus, “Any word from back home?”
Rodolphus, who was a seventh year, smiled, “I’ll speak with you later.”
I wondered idly over my toast and jam about what they could be talking about, and settle on the fact that I would probably never know. Everyone was secretive in Slytherin, even I. No one really knew each other fully. It was like a constant guessing game that I wasn’t ever in the mood to play.
Suddenly, I felt a trainer jab me in the knee. I looked up, ready to curse Severus for kicking me, then I saw his eyes turned towards the entrance. There wasn’t a need for guessing, because there he was- poor Tamsin Abbott, walking into the Great Hall. His face was sallow and gaunt. A startled look took over his limp expression as he scanned over our table and spotted Regulus. He sped by, clutching his wand so tight, his knuckles began to turn white.
Severus shot Regulus a worried look, which he was too busy talking to Bellatrix to see, then went back to his reading.
We all finished our breakfast right when the bell chimed, and I got up with Regulus to leave the Great Hall. When everyone was out of earshot I turned to him, “What did you do to him?”
We both stopped, seeing as we were going to different classes- I, to 6th year Potions, and Regulus to 5th year Herbology.
“To who?” he asked, waving goodbye to Rabastan Lestrange who was in the same year as him.
“To Abbott, what’d you do?”
“Bloody hell, you’re still on that?” he grimaced.
“I-I just want to know… and what were you and Rodolphus going on about?” I asked, knowing full well I wouldn’t get an answer.
His face dropped, and his eyes grew dark, “I feel it happening,” he muttered in a disgruntled voice, “Soon, I know it.”
“What is that suppose to mean?” I asked.
It felt as if a dark cloud was hanging over us lately. A dark rainy cloud that held despair. I didn’t know what he was fearing, but I knew it was bad.
“Nothing, I need to go to class,” he muttered, kissed me on the cheek, then stocked off.
I didn’t dare follow him or even try to understand him. There was no use, so I walked off to Potions silently, picturing my future with him, a secretive, cruel future. I had just taken a seat when Professor Slughorn walked in.
“Good morning, 6th years!” he said, jollily rubbing his enormous belly. “Today I will be pairing you up.”
There was a general groan from everyone in the dungeon room as Slughorn began to pair.
“Potter, Longbottom”
“Snape, Rosier”
“Bulstrode, Meadowes”
“Bellatrix Black, Melifulia”
“McKinnion, Prewett”
“Mulciber, Lupin”
“Pettigrew, MacDougal”
“MacMillian, Dolohav”
“Evans, Smith”
“And last but certaintly not least, Black and Blishwick”
What Slughorn was thinking by pairing Slytherins with Gryffindors, I’m not sure. Maybe to create unity? Whatever the reason, I was thoroughly unhappy with my partner.
I walked to Black’s table and was already annoyed by his mere presence. He looked the same as ever- long black hair that I knew his mother always hated, his mother’s grey eyes, and an earring. He looked the same as Regulus, but somehow completely different. It was hard to explain. Their exterior was the same- both with black hair, low cheek bones and dark, if not purple lips. It was the interior that made them set so far apart. Like their insides told a story that their faces wouldn’t. Whatever it was, it was surely unsettling.
Slughorn magiked the directions onto the board and instructed us to begin. It was already almost halfway through the year so I knew the Potion would be difficult. And I wasn’t disappointed. It was instructions to make an Everlasting Elixir. We began the potion as soon as I sat down and it wasn’t until half an hour passed did Black and I converse.
“Violetta, right?” he asked, though I knew he already knew my name. A large chunk of our childhood was spent in the company of one another. “You’re dating my brother, Regulus.”
“Yeah, what’s it you?” I snuffed, feeling infected with filth by just standing next to him.
“How is he? Is he getting his school things done? Staying out of trouble?” he asked, forced casualness drenching his raspy voice.
“Why would you care?” I sneered.
“Because he’s my brother,” Sirius said, his grey eyes swimming in despair.
“You abandoned them,” I said, “I’m not an owl. If you want to know, asking him yourself. Oh, that’s right- you can’t. How pathetic do you have to be to leave your own family? What? Did you get scared?”
“Shut up! You don’t know what you‘re talking about.” he muttered darkly.
We had both leaped out of our seats now and had our wands out.
“If there a problem here?” Antonin Dolohov asked.
“Get out of here, Dolohov, this doesn’t concern you,” Sirius warned.
“Stop acting so childish, the lot of you,” Lily Evans scoffed behind us.
“No one asked you, Mudblood,” I hissed.
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched James Potter rise from his seat. “Take that back, Blishwick,” he growled.
“Awe, how sweet,” I laughed, “Potter why don’t you tell your girlfriend that if I wanted her opinion I’d curse it out of her!”
The other half of the dungeon was just noticing the commotion, when Slughorn walked in from his office.
“Hand in your Elixirs!” he said, “You lot first.”
No one on our side had finished resulting in all making a Poor.
“I blame this on you, Black.” I muttered, walking out of the dungeon.
“I talked to your brother today,” I causally said to Regulus that night.
I was laying on his bed petting his rabbit Twinkle while he was reading a letter from home he had received at lunch.
“Why,” he scoffed, folding the letter in half and placing it back in the black envelope embezzled with the words “Toujour pur”.
“Slughorn partnered us… he was asking about you.” I started, “It got pretty nasty.”
Regulus’s head shot up, “Is he okay?”
“No- it was just an argument of sorts. Dolohov tried to get involved. Then Potter and Evans.”
“
Potter,” he seethed.
I knew he wholeheartedly blamed Potter for his brother’s rebellion. Before Sirius became friends with him, everything was fine and Reg and his brother were close. I also knew he wasn’t going to go deeper into the subject of his brother, always weary of sharing his feelings, so I bid him a goodnight and went to my bed dreaming about little Marlene McKinnon and her dead parents, and Tamsin in a dark room alone with my soon to be husband.
Thank you all to who are reading. I hope you enjoyed it! If you have an kind of feedback it would be greatly appreciated. (:
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