Author's Note: Written for Round 4 of the QLFC
Team: Pride of Portree
Position: Captain
Captain's Prompt: Write about the Carrow family
Word Count (excluding Author's Note): 2,949
The Call of the Sea
"Wake up, sleepyhead!" Flora shouted, pointing her wand at the blinds. They rolled up with a snap and harsh morning light streamed into the room.
"Ugh, go away and leave me be, Flora." Unlike her sister, Hestia Carrow did not like mornings.
Nu-uh," Flora replied, jumping onto Hestia's waterbed, which pitched and rolled until Hestia began to feel slightly nauseous. "Today's our birthday, and I'm not going to wait down in the kitchen until you finally deign to honor us with your presence."
Hestia gave an exasperated sigh and swung her legs over the side of her bed. Flora was already impeccably dressed in her finest robes.
"Jeez, Hes, you look like Merlin's sweaty-" She was cut off by an expertly-aimed pillow to the face.
"Don't even think about it," Hestia warned, grabbing her wand from the bedside table and pointing it at her furious-looking sister.
Flora slid her wand into the holster hidden in her sleeve and stuck out her tongue. "You're no fun, Hestia. Just like your namesake."
Hestia rolled her eyes and waited for her sister to leave the room before she started getting ready.
Contrary to what most people seemed to think, Hestia liked her namesake. The Hestia of Greek myth and legend was the firstborn goddess, who was so dedicated to denouncing the silliness of romance and marriage that not even Aphrodite's power could sway her. The goddess was considered the symbol of home and hearth; eminently fitting for Hestia Carrow because she was definitely a homebody. Flora, on the other hand, was named after some silly fertility trollop who pranced around naked in the spring.
Much like the Black family, which had a history of naming their children after constellations, the Carrow family also used ancient rites to name their children. Unlike the Blacks, however, the Carrow family's affinity was not with the stars.
Hestia looked out the window as she pulled her robes over her head and fastened them with a quick twist of her wand. She'd been dressing herself with magic using her great grandmother's borrowed wand since she was five years old, after all. At the bottom of the craggy cliff, the steely sea looked deceptively calm.
Perfect, she thought. Today, I shall be deceptively calm as well.
Hestia wasn't worried about receiving a scolding for using magic. It was true that their parents were expected to control any underage usage of magic, but there was little chance of that happening in the Carrow household. In fact, most pure-blooded families generally considered it an advantage for their children to use magic at home because children from Muggle households could not. Magic was everywhere, and it seemed ridiculous to keep children from using it. Like any potentially dangerous object, the idea was to start children young and give them plenty of opportunity to practise. It was honestly insulting how far ahead Hestia had been in her first few years at school. She was bored out of her mind most of the time, which was why she and her sister ended up… getting into to mischief.
Hestia smiled as she stroked one of the fresh roses that the house elves kept in a vase on her table. As she pulled her fingers away, droplets of water in the shape of the rose followed through the air. When she looked back at it, its petals were stiff and dry. With a gentle press of her finger against its center, she infused the rose with water, watching it grow plump and living once more. The rose still looked a bit dry, but Hestia was still proud of herself. Her control over her gift was improving.
If only she did not hunger so much.
Hestia ran her hands over the smooth, shell-encrusted walls as she padded down the well-worn stone stairs. Unlike many other Wizarding families, Hestia's great-grandparents had literally built their home into the craggy cliffs of Norfolk. Her father, Triton Carrow, had inherited it from his parents. The house had been built with magic, stretching over a mile in length and containing a number of hidden underground passages. Her father had told her that when he was very young, the Muggles had tried to blow up the whole world. His family had been forced to live in those tunnels like rats, and he'd never forgotten the experience. Though his younger twin siblings; her Uncle Amycus and Aunt Alecto, had developed an outright hatred for Muggles, Triton had always been more of a fearful and cautious sort. He'd fortified his home so that no one could see, much less enter it, without permission. The fresh sea breeze and cold weather sated some of Hestia's hunger, but the private beach was her refuge. She'd swim in the freezing water until her skin turned blue if she could get away with it.
"Well, well, look who's finally come downstairs!" Hestia blinked in confusion as an unexpected voice breached her reverie.
Seated at the far side of the massive, mother-of-pearl kitchen table, next to a maliciously-grinning Flora, were her Aunt Alecto and Uncle Amycus.
"At this rate, all the pancakes will be gone before you sit down!" Uncle Amycus said with a wink as he stabbed the middle of a sizable stack and shoved them into his mouth. Though he was a right ugly-looking bloke, Hestia liked her uncle. He enjoyed a good wrestling match without a wand, and had taught her to duel when she was only waist-high. He was always pushing her to get better, but he never hurt her. He also had all sorts of magical tattoos on his upper body. Hestia's favourite was the dancing hula girl on his shoulder. They often dove together for shells. Hestia always laughed when he transfigured his head into that of a hammerhead shark and caught fish with his teeth for her amusement.
Aunt Alecto, on the other hand, was a stern woman who seethed silently under a seemingly tranquil exterior. One tiny thing could set her into a rage, often with disastrous results. She was well-named, though. Much like the harpy of the same name, Aunt Alecto enjoyed the chance to draw enemy blood. She sat, rigid as a board in her chair, and sipped her tiny cup of tea while staring coldly at the stove as though it had personally offended her.
Hestia turned to see her mother, Dawn Carrow, standing to the side of the stove instructing a house elf on the recipe for the twins' birthday cake.
There'd been a bit of a scandal when it had come out that her maternal grandfather hadn't been half-blooded at all- he'd been a Muggleborn wizard and flew in the RAF to boot! Even though Hestia knew that her mother wasn't responsible for anything that her own father had done, she did know that her mother had hidden this fact when Triton had been courting her. They'd already been married over a year when Alecto had barged through the door, half-drunk on Firewhiskey and half-mad with the knowledge of it.
Things had been resolved without bloodshed, but Alecto still refused to relax around Dawn, as though the normally cheerful woman was hiding some deeper, darker secret from everyone. The other problem was that, as Uncle Amycus had taken Hestia under his wing, so too had Aunt Alecto done the same for Flora.
"You must admit, they would be excellent additions to our Lord's ranks," Aunt Alecto was saying to Hestia's father, her gaze intense. Though Triton Carrow was fiercely loyal to his family and had gone so far as to hide his siblings after they'd come out on the wrong side of the war, his cautiousness always won out over any other instinct.
"They're only just sixteen today, Alecto," he replied calmly, but Hestia saw the tendons in his neck tightening involuntarily.
"We were barely seventeen when we took the Mark," Alecto replied, her eyes burning. "They would be useful spies at Hogwarts."
Triton Carrow stood and slammed his fist on the table, causing his sister to jerk in surprise. "You will not drag my girls into making the same mistakes that you made and are still making!" he shouted, for shouting was the only thing that ever seemed to stop Alecto when she was focused on getting her way. "Our family has been around for many generations. We have loved and protected the sea and it has provided wonders for us. That is why we do not live in a gauche Muggle estate like the Malfoys. We live as we always have- with the sea air and the bracing cold of the water filling our bones! Have you forgotten just what our parents sacrificed to keep us safe?!"
Alecto shrunk back and lowered her head, seemingly cowed.
"Don't take it personally, sister," Amycus said, patting her on the shoulder. "He has a point. The girls need to focus on finishing their studies. They can make a decision for themselves when they are of age, just like we did, eh?"
Hestia wanted to ask what they were talking about, but she knew better than to interject when her father's face was that particular shade of scarlet.
"In any case," Dawn said, "we're all here to celebrate the girls' birthday, so let's focus on that instead, shall we?"
Alecto shot a sullen look back at her but said nothing.
"Who wants to go for a bit of a swim, then?" Amycus said, pointing his wand at his mouth and elongating it just enough to flash a shark-toothed grin at Hestia.
Hestia grinned back and nearly jumped out of her chair in excitement. The ocean would clear her head. It always did.
"Oh no you don't," Hestia's mother chided, shoving a plate in front of her. "You have to finish your birthday breakfast first. You'll need the energy if you're going to be wading around in that icy thing you call an ocean."
She opened her mouth to protest, but her mother shot her a warning look and Hestia knew that there was no point in arguing.
Flora left the table to show Aunt Alecto her current charms experiment. Hestia attempted not to snort eggs through her nose at the faces that Uncle Amycus was making at her while simultaneously trying to steal her bacon. Her father read his copy of the Daily Prophet, which featured a poorly-edited picture of Harry Potter with a demented look on his face and the headline "Victim or Villain? Skeeter Investigates Suspicious Death of Beloved Diggory Boy!"
Hestia hadn't really interacted with the boy, who was a year younger than she was and a Gryffindor besides, but from what she'd seen the past few years, he either got himself into trouble or trouble found him. This was precisely why she'd avoided him at all costs.
"He's got a weird fixation on that boy," Uncle Amycus said, suddenly, all humour drained from his voice. He looked at the picture with poorly-disguised hatred and jabbed at it with his fork. "I say just order Snape to kill 'im, but he's got other plans. Has to do the deed himself. A prophecy said so, apparently. But what do I know? At the end of the day, all I care is that I can finally stick it to those Muggle bastards."
Hestia wanted to ask who he was, but she was fairly certain she knew exactly who. The thought of it made her sick. She was a simple girl who wanted to protect those dear to her, but other than that, she had no real loyalties towards anyone or their nefarious designs. The ocean breeze whistled through the window, and she could feel her thoughts sharpening. Mortals that dared to defy the gods never came out better for it. Like the goddess she was named for, Hestia did not wish to take a side, not if she could find another way.
"C'mon Uncle," she said, grabbing his arm, "let's see who can catch the most fish today."
"Ah?" Uncle Amycus said, turning to look at her with an excited look on his face. "Have you been practicing?"
"Indeed!" Hestia replied, brimming with pride.
She led him out the side door of the kitchen and down the steps, but she looked back before the door closed and noticed that her father was looking at them with a mixture of relief and worry on his face.
They got into the cold water and Hestia pulled out her wand, tapping it against her forehead. She didn't need to speak the words any longer- they were in her heart, and she simply willed them into being.
Instantly, she could feel her face elongating, her teeth sharpening to razor sharp points. Her uncle clapped wildly when she was finished and spun in a circle with her horrible shark head.
"A mako shark? Hestia, you truly have outdone yourself!"
Moments later, a sand tiger shark was swimming lazily next to her and flashed her a very un-sharklike grin. A fish was spotted and the hunt was on!
In the end, Hestia came up with at least three fish fewer than her uncle, but she attributed that to the partial transformation. Her uncle had obviously been doing his own practicing, as he'd only ever gone for the half-transformation in the past.
Standing in the waist-high water, Hestia canceled the spell and marveled at the blue sheen her skin had taken.
"Us Carrows were not given the conventional beauty that those Muggles covet," Uncle Amycus said, his voice bitter yet proud as he held up a hand that had gone a stony blue. "The truth is that there are only a few families that are truly pure- purely magic, my girl!"
His broad, heavily-built chest had gone blue as well, and there was something right about it that hadn't been there before.
"Our power draws on the water," he explained, "Your father won't like me telling you this, but you're old enough now. I'm sure you've noticed how your hunger for the sea grows with each passing year. When I was sixteen, it nearly drove me mad to be away from it for any length of time."
"But...but what about Flora?" Hestia whispered, hugging herself for reasons that had nothing to do with the cold. Despite their differences, they shared the same features and a fierce love for one another. They were supposed to do everything together.
"It is a gift. It only ever happens with twins," Uncle Amycus said softly, his eyes shimmering with a golden, otherworldly light, "and it only ever chooses the bigger, stronger twin. We are heirs to godhood, the children of the sea. It is where all life and magic begins."
"Then...why do you follow...him?" Hestia said, her voice tiny.
Uncle Amycus grinned, his teeth a mismatched stony gray. "He claims to be a god in the making and promises to share his bounty with those who follow him. If that is so, then he is kin, and the mortals deserve anything they get for turning their backs on us."
"But he disappeared! He left you for so long! Isn't that proof that he was lying?" Hestia frowned as the ocean's power thrummed through her body, filling her with a sense of calm.
"Be still, little nereid," Uncle Amycus said. "We are like the sea - patient and calm to those we favor, and violent to those who stand against us. The Dark Lord did not leave us. He was defeated by a prophecy, and there is no shame in that. It is prophecy that delivers all of us to our fates. Still, he returned, and even now grows stronger. He defies his fate, which means that he may yet be seen fit for godhood."
Frowning, Hestia took her uncle by the hand and slowly led him out of the water. As he sat on the rocky shore, his skin slowly regained its normal fleshy texture and colour. His eyes went from golden to their normal brownish-gray.
"Something...spoke through me," he said, finally, rubbing his forehead with one hand. "How did it not affect you as well?"
Hestia merely looked out at the setting sun as it dipped below the horizon. She held her finger out towards her uncle's skin, pulling the stray droplets from his body and gathering them into a floating orb made of water.
"I may hunger for it, but the water does not control me," she said, tossing the ball into the air and catching it with her other finger before flattening it between her hands and then showing him her perfectly dry palms. "As you said, our rituals ensure that we are named for what we are. I choose to remain, like my namesake, a neutral force who loves her family and keeps them safe."
Uncle Amycus ruffled her hair affectionately and as she turned to look at him with annoyance, she heard her sister calling her name.
Flora was running towards them waving excitedly, as Aunt Alecto followed with her arms crossed and a half smile on her face. Flora had obviously just done something incredibly impressive by her aunt's sky-high standards. Hestia glanced a final time at her uncle, who smirked and tilted his head to the side as if to dismiss her. Then, she pulled herself up and turned towards her twin. She could see her mother and father standing in the shadow of the cliffs on the worn stone stairs leading down to the beach.
Hestia gave herself a moment to take a deep, salty breath before she began to run, her heart filling with giddy abandon.
After all, she was home.