i.
Dorcas has never been one for formalities.
It is the reason that whenever a guest arrives, Dorcas is sent to her room, where she wallows in her self pity, because she still isn't damn good enough for her mother. And everything is blue and not just because her sister had insisted on it and she is so tired of being alone and can't wait until she's eleven-
"Dorcas!" her mother calls for her yet again, and Dorcas trudges downstairs, only to be met with the sight of ugly hag Walburga, and she wrinkles her nose. Walburga Black is one of the most hideous people Dorcas has ever met, inside and outside (she doesn't judge). "Dorcas, Walburga says that maybe next time she'll bring Sirius over. How would you feel about that?" Her tone speaks of harsh consequences if Dorcas does not agree, and it is for that very reason, fire burning through her lungs and up into her throat and spewing out of her mouth that her blue eyes shoot daggers, no diamonds with the hardest edges ever to be found, towards Walburga, and it takes all of her dignity to stride out of the room.
Dorcas Meadowes does not take orders.
ii.
Hogwarts is scantily large enough to fit everyone; Hogwarts is a disgrace to wizarding institutions; Hogwarts does not teach. Her mother's words are the only thing running through her head as the raven haired girl steps through the grand doors, alone in a sea of people. Her mother still bothers her, even when she has left and is somewhere else and has a chance of finally gaining her halcyon days.
"Meadowes, Dorcas!"
Her name is called, and Dorcas does not simply walk towards the patched hat, no she struts, attempting to become the cynosure of everyone's eyes. However, life goes on for everyone but Dorcas, and she is yet another blip in the face of Hogwarts' students, and it is with a frown curved on her lips that the hat covers her eyes and her fate is sealed.
iii.
Dorcas is thirteen and she is happy.
Large, grand, houses that have the very moon rotting in their corners, and their ancient halls that creak of 'help me, fix me' are all Dorcas is used to, and this strange castle full of laughter and adventure feels like something that home is supposed to be. The tall tower, with its tall, tall spires and its soothing blue that speaks of calm and comfort is where she belongs.
It is only one day when she is sneaking to the kitchens past curfew when there is a stone out of place, and she stumbles over it with a loud thump! Arms whirl around like a windmill, and she lands flat on her stomach, wind blown out of her, knee searing, a shredded supernova. There she lies, stumbling to her hands and feet, when she hears a slight cough behind her, silent as a shout swept away by the roaring wind.
"Sorry," Dorcas apologizes as she turns to face the prefect who surely is about to give her a detention, but the prefect's emerald eyes widen as she takes in Dorcas's torn skirt (how mother would go on a rampage about this) and her bloody leg.
She asks, "Are you okay?" and all Dorcas does is give a wry smile. It's been a while since someone has asked her this question, and maybe for once, the answer is yes.
(It makes the detention that Marlene gives her worthwhile anyways.)
iv.
They say the Meadowes are cursed.
Dorcas has thought at a fair few points in her fifteen years that maybe Gracelyn had broken the curse, starting with her name that spoke of a warbling songbird, yet maybe it had just been lurking, a serpent with inky venom, for this very day, this very moment.
It was supposed to be the best day of Gracelyn Meadowes' life, the day that she shed the Meadowes name, destroyed the curse and stopped pleading to ghosts. Instead, it was the day that everything crumbled, and people were talking in a high voice and everything was frantic and sorrow dripped down her face and Dorcas couldn't run to her sister fast enough.
"Gracie, Gracie, you're okay, you're going to be okay," Is all Dorcas can say as her sister sobs into her shoulder. Gracelyn is burning and smoldering in her own ashes, and there is nothing that Dorcas can do or say to help.
v.
Dorcas doesn't regret accepting Marlene's invitation to come over. The breeze tangles her hair, and Marlene's curls bounce against her back, and Dorcas couldn't imagine a time that they didn't know each other, dating back to the scar on her knee.
"How's your summer been?" Marlene asks, even though she's obviously bursting to talk. Dorcas likes that about Marlene, how she always listens.
"It's been fine, how about yours?" Dorcas' breath hitches as they enter the cold ocean water, because it stings. But then Marlene smiles, and Dorcas forgets how freezing she is, because Marlene's grin could light up the whole damn world.
Marlene begins to go on a tangent about something or another, and Dorcas can't stop staring, and fuck it, she leans in, and smashes her lips against Marlene's. Her lips taste of popcorn and hazelnuts, and Dorcas can't help but smile as Marlene returns the kiss, because the chill of the ocean is completely gone.
vi.
St Mungo's is gloomy, and the claret strings of ornaments give only a dismal tone to the room, and all Dorcas can hear is the pounding of her heart- thud, thud, thud. It's a bitter similarity to only a year ago (or was it two?).
This time there won't be death. Never mind that her prefect's badge was practically destroyed by now, that when she got back to Hogwarts, trouble would be awaiting her. Brash actions had consequences- that Dorcas knew, she wasn't a Gryffindor for a reason. And there were few people that she would stop time for, change for, spew molten red gold through her angry, broken mountains for.
"Dorcas?" Her eyes slide up from their fixed position towards nowhere, and she swallows when she sees that it is Marlene. Marlene, whose letters she never answered. Marlene, who had been with her thick and thin until- Marlene, who Dorcas had left after their brief symphony of salt stains and fingers tangled with each other like fishnets, their orchestra of storm and lightning and rain.
"Yes?" she swallows, for the last thing that Dorcas needs right now is Marlene bloody McKinnon, not when her sister is lying in a room dying.
Marlene avoids eye contact, and her gaze lingers just left of Dorcas. "...Are you here for Gracelyn Meadowes?" Like she didn't know.
"Can you tell me how she is? Can I see her?" Dorcas ignores Marlene's expression, the soft look of pity reflected in her eyes, because it couldn't be, can't be-
"I'm so sorry."
And Dorcas' world blurs into a Mess of Colors and the Meadowes' Curse has stricken once more.
vii.
Dorcas is Head Girl, and a year ago she would have laughed.
Dorcas is all rough edges, a girl with eyes like diamonds, and a soul with an inky venom like a viper's, and a year ago she had begun to dig her grave, etching the word 'medusa' on it in big bold letters. She wonders in what state Dumbledore was in when he made the selections- he needs someone strong and bright and empathetic, not this callous girl (even if she was legally a woman, she certainly didn't feel like it) whose only strength was magic, and how could that even help if it couldn't bring back the dead?
And she races down the corridors, away from Timothy Hipworth, who decided it would have been a fine idea if the two Heads had gotten a little closer (she hoped someone wouldn't find him, he deserved having his bogeys turned into bats).
She passes Evans and Potter, some of the only decent people left in this rubbish school. And she doesn't notice that they're much too close, breath intermixing with each other's, until Dorcas glances over, and a pang of longing passes through her chest. It's been written in the stars that James Potter and Lily Evans were made for each other, that was for sure, just as clearly as the threads of constellations spelled out the cursed fate of Dorcas Meadowes.
To be alone.
viii.
There is nothing as subtle as the beauty of the world tearing itself apart in war.
Dorcas fires spell after spell after spell, and there is no force that will stop her, can stop her. Dorcas Meadowes has been severely underestimated time and time and time again, and she is not, will not be sold short again. Not until the screams of 'cheat, liar, bastard,' stop echoing around her skull, over and over again, the Meadowes curse striking once again at her mother's shock that no, her father didn't have late work hours or that his boss sprayed her pungent perfume everywhere (lo and behold, he worked for a man). What a ruin the Meadowes were! One dead, one estranged, one alone.
After all, an Auror isn't a suitable career for the Meadowes, Dorcas thinks as she fires yet another spell. She's on autopilot, and her spell careens into yet another hooded figure. The air is full with colors, red, blue, yellow, but it is only as green is added into the fray that Dorcas goes wild.
No one else will die. Not on Dorcas' watch.
ix.
Rising up the Ministry's ranks quite quickly, it comes to no one's surprise but the twenty year old when Dorcas is recruited for the Order of the Phoenix- what a rubbish name for an organization, she privately thinks. And maybe this is what she believes in all along, getting rid of Lord Voldemort, as he calls himself. Or maybe she just wants to avenge Gracelyn, who is most certainly the first death in this horrid war. Either way, revenge burns through her bloodstream like damned infernal gold, and it consumes her, and Dorcas Meadowes is nothing but a war machine.
She slashes and bites and venom lingers in her every wound, and maybe people are terrified of her. Dorcas Meadowes isn't a sorry little girl anymore, and the grave that she had dug for herself all those years ago is deepening and she's a monster. The stench of blood lingers on her clothes and she fakes a smile every time she is congratulated on her mission. Because shit, no matter how much she scrubs and scrubs the blood won't come off and the earth keeps shaking. Maybe this is her variation of the Meadowes Curse, to be estranged from everyone and anyone.
Shit.
x.
The new members of the Order are a breath of sunshine to the group, a deep contrast to Dorcas' dark raincloud. Dorcas remembers Sirius, not only from their childhood trysts, but his infamy around Hogwarts (how long ago that was). Peter is slightly familiar, and Remus, James, and Lily being clear in her mind, all having been figures of authority at the school at one point.
Maybe they were just friendly, or maybe Dorcas was tired of being alone, but somehow they melted Dorcas' ice walls barricading her titanium heart. And talking to them was like a breath of fresh air, and somehow her smile, her dimples that Marlene used to poke, came out more and more.
"Dorcas! Are you coming for dinner today?" Lily asks one day. "A whole bunch of Order members are coming." And Dorcas agrees, with a nonchalant grin, because she's been getting nicer, back to her old self. Lily's always been the type of person that Dorcas never was, never would be, because she lacked empathy, lacked a certain something that would make anyone like her.
And she goes to Lily's house and stops dead in her tracks, because Marlene is there. And Marlene glides up to her, sorrow in her face, and Dorcas flashes back to their last meeting and her heart crumples in her chest. When has Marlene ever been in the Order, anyways? Since her last mission?
"Hi, I'm Marlene," she greets, and Dorcas sees the hidden message glinting in her beautiful emerald eyes.
Dorcas gives a polite smile, and holds out her hand. "Hi, I'm Dorcas," she says, as if they had never known each other at all.
Maybe Marlene McKinnon is Dorcas' curse.
xi.
Marlene is dead.
MarleneisdeadMarleneisdeadMarleneisDEADMARLENEISDEAD.
Dorcas wishes she was dead too.
xii.
Dorcas Meadowes is a volcano, and she erupts at the most explosive of times.
Today it is when Lord Voldemort comes calling, because of course Dorcas' curse that won't leave. The Dark Lord himself drops by on her doorstep, and doesn't even bother to ring the doorbell. If Dorcas ever lives past this, she'll make sure to get a magic-proof lock.
"Hello, Voldy," Dorcas has a habit of saying exactly what could kill her.
"Miss Meadowes. It's a shame you're too imputent, you could have been a good Death Eater," is all he says- doesn't she get a villainous monologue as well?- before striking. It's a clash of colors, of personalities, and it's red against green against blue against green and why is he so insistent on killing her-
Dorcas is going to die. She's going to die but she's going to go out in a explosion, and as her first curse sails over Voldemort's head and into the cabinets, flames tear across the wood. And the world is spinning and all she can hear is bang and she thought that the blood had finally gone away, why is it still here and oh god there's so much green and Dorcas can't hear, can't see, can't think-
Death stops for nothing, not even the remnants of the sun.
a/n: some of my old writing from one or two years back :) hope you enjoyed!