A/N: Again, written for mew's 'Pandora's Little Box' challenge. Hopefully this is okay!
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"Crucio!"
He felt sick and wanted to drop his wand almost immediately. But, he couldn't and this fact sickened him even further as screams erupted – raw and guttural – in front of him. It wasn't just the first year he was punishing, but himself too.
"Goldstein!" barked Alecto Carrow, waving a podgy finger in his direction, "Not looking so tough now are we?"
"F-Finite Incantatem" he whispered shakily, lowering his wand. He couldn't bring himself to look at the first year in front of him – still horrified with what he had done. Almost immediately after stopping the spell, he sank to the floor and, promptly and without disguising his intentions, threw up everywhere. He barely noticed Alecto and the wounded First Year leave the room but in someways, he didn't care.
His whole body felt weak, drained. He hadn't slept properly in weeks and the training done in DA meetings was taking its toll on him. Instead of being a young seventeen year old, although nowadays the bags under his eyes threw that in doubt, he felt…old. As though nothing else could compare to the utter exhaustion of closing ones eyelids every time he tried to get to sleep and the lack of appetite at meal times.
He knew that people were worried about him, but in some ways he didn't care. When you got old, as old as he felt, did you stop caring?
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