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So last chapter, there were a few typos where Fred was mentioned instead of Ron. I fixed it, but just to clear up confusion, Fred shouldn't have even been mentioned in the first chapter, and if he was, it was supposed to be Ron. Thank you so much to the reviewer who pointed this out to me!
Ronald Weasley was 15 years old, and incredibly confused.
Recently, he'd been… approached, by Draco Malfoy. Malfoy and him had never gotten on well, but… what he'd said was intriguing.
"The Dark will value you" and "The Dark is where you belong, not wasting your talents as the sidekick to Harry Potter" and "They don't value you, exactly like all of your brothers. Be yourself, strike out. Join the Dark. Be different."
Now, Ron wasn't stupid. He knew that those words were being fed to Draco, either by his father or someone else on the Dark. He knew that if he left it would weaken Harry and the Light… but how could he not?
It wasn't as if he'd ever been, well, as Draco said 'different' from his brothers. He was in their shadow, and if not theirs, then Harry's. Harry, who was always braver and more important and so much more in the light than Ron. And if not Harry's shadow then Hermione, who was smarter than he could ever be.
And none of it was fair. Ron was just as deserving of respect and attention than anyone else was, but he never got it.
And so he decided it was time to change that.
The initiation was horrible.
Lord Voldemort was horrible. He invaded Ron's mind ruthlessly, hoping to see where his loyalties lay. And then, when he determined that Ron had sufficient cause to join the dark, he was finally given the Dark Mark.
That was the worse part. It had burned worse than how Ron imagined fire burned. He thought that he'd yelled, but couldn't remember hearing it over the pain. It was a permanent reminder of his choice, but he never brought himself to regret it.
Even when he told his family a few months later, he never regretted it.
The Dark revealed what Ron had done during a raid. He was there, but with a mask and robe, so no one knew who he was. The plan was for the Dark Lord to call a stop to the fighting and call Ron up, as his 'most loyal and new follower', which seemed dramatic. Ron would then take off the mask, showing himself.
His mother had cried, seeming resigned.
His father had simply seemed to crumble into himself. Ron thought he was going to cry. He didn't. Instead, he just stood there while making direct eye contact with Ron. He could see his father's eyes go dark and detached, which was easily worse than tears.
Fred and George looked angry, they charged forward at him, determined to have revenge. Voldemort had smirked, and waved his wand. He blew up the road in front of them, killing Fred on impact. Ron still didn't know if George survived. His other brothers weren't at the raid.
Ginny had screamed and tried to run forward with Fred and George, Harry held her back.
Harry had looked so shocked and horrified. Disbelief echoed in his eyes. It was only Ginny trying to run forward that had shocked him out of his daze. He'd yelled that it wasn't Ron, trying to convince himself. A few minutes after than, in the ensuing battle, Harry had sought him out, and Ron proved that he really was Ronald Weasley with only a few words, "I was the Knight", referring to the Chess Game in their first year. Harry had crumbled, just like Arthur, after that. He fell to the ground, and just stayed there. Voldemort would have killed him if not for Dumbledore apperating him out.
Hermione. Ron and her had been tentatively dating when this raid had happened. She sobbed, seemed to pull herself together and then looked beyond furious. She, like Harry, sought him out in the battle. They'd dueled. Ron was intent on proving himself to the Dark, and had shot an extremely dark curse (he'd picked it up from Bellatrix Lestrange, who was responsible for showing him the ropes) at her. From what he heard, she had been in the hospital for weeks. He was surprised she survived.
But that was it. He'd survived. And now he was in the Dark.
There was no going back, not after what happened to the twins and Hermione.
The Dark was everything he'd hoped it would be. As one of Bellatrix's only trainees, and a Weasley turned to the Dark, he was given quite a lot of attention. He rose to the Inner Circle in 6 months and any qualms he may have had were crushed.
He was truly a loyal Death Eater. He'd given up everything, the good and the bad, for his cause. Outside of the Dark, he had nothing.
Which was okay with him, because for one of the first times in his life, he was truly good at something. Dark magic seemed to come easily to him. He had trained with Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband for a few weeks before The Raid when he was revealed to the Light, and she'd taught him a lot of things.
For example, how to torture people. Included in that, were a lot of more specific things he'd learned. Like how to turn someone inside out. How to remove all their teeth in one flick of the wand and make their mouth a bloody mess and they wouldn't be able to eat very well. How to remove all their skin, slowly. And a multitude of other, helpful things.
How to create Inferi, which proved to be an exceedingly helpful skill.
How to make a person think that, as you tortured them, a loved one was the one hurting them.
How to manipulate people (well… he'd had an idea of this before she taught him, but she made it much clearer and more straight forward). This too was easy for him and he used it a lot among the stupider Death Eaters.
Yes, Ron Weasley was a very happy Death Eater.
And then, just under a year after he betrayed the Light and his friends, Harry Potter and Hermione Granger were captured. By Snatchers no less, how useless could Potter and Granger be?
That had made him very happy, because when they were caught and killed, two things would happen:
1, the Dark would stop doubting him. A lot of the other Inner Circle members were suspicious that he was helping them. He supposed that that was easier than accepting how incompetent they were.
And 2, the war would be over. He would be on the winning side, and would get to retire in a form of power under the Dark Lord and live the rest of his life. No fighting, and always on top (he was in the Inner Circle, after all). If he really wanted he could probably save the rest of his family. He wasn't sure if he would yet. They probably would help him much and would probably interfere with the Dark trusting him. They were still his family said.
All being said, Ron was quite looking forward to the death of Harry Potter and Hermione Granger. He was confident that the Dark Lord would do it, too. His master would kill Harry and life would be smooth sailing from there.
Ron smiled at the thought.
Thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed, and please review! Have a wonderful rest of your day, guys. Review!