If the truth was told instead of a lie, then the pain would go away sooner and not hurt as much.

Oftentimes we say goodbye to the person we love without wanting to. Though that doesn't mean that we've stopped loving them or we've stopped to care. Sometimes goodbye is a painful way to say I love you.

November 24, 2017 8:14 AM

Ivory walked slowly through the dungeons, her wand held loosely in her hand. She stopped at the wood door that led to the Entrance Hall, feeling a heaviness in her chest she hadn't felt since… April 17, 2011. The day she killed Aiden Dursley. She tried to shake the thought from her head, but it just hid in the far reaches of her mind. The silence grew to be too much to bear and she slowly turned the knob on the door and pushed the door forward, eliciting a dull creak that had suddenly showed up second year. The entire first floor of the Hogwarts castle was deathly quiet, and that didn't sit well with the already panicked Ivory.

I can't prove anything, I'm probably just psyching myself out.

Ivory didn't even believe that as she looked in the Great Hall, strangely deserted after the past few weeks of constant surveillance. Chess games had been left unfinished, books open, food half eaten. There was no denying it now, something was wrong that called everyone away. But where to look? There were surprisingly few places in the castle where nearly a hundred people could gather: the common rooms, Entrance Hall, Great Hall, Room of Requirement, Quidditch Pitch and Lawn. The common rooms were impractical because of the whole password thing, and she had already checked the Entrance and Great Halls. That left the Room of Requirement, Pitch and Lawn. After a moment of indecisiveness, she decided to check outside before climbing seven floors just to check.

Ivory walked swiftly towards the main door, urging herself not to freeze when he heard voices through the thick oak doors. It was the first sound she had heard all day from another human, and unfortunately the voices were less than friendly. Ivory inhaled deeply and pushed the door open silently and took a few steps out into the pouring and studied the situation with a lump in her throat.

On her right stood her entire family, the Pack, along with the Order, people her father and Sirius had introduced to her from the ministry. They all stood without seeing her, glaring to her left, oblivious to the pouring rain. Sweeping her head to the left she saw the fear she had been trying to avoid all morning, vampire upon vampire stood smirking at the insolence of the foolish mortals that dared to oppose them. Renato and his sister, his nieces, all of the vampires from Italy. In the center, five stood about twenty feet ahead of their respective sides. Smoky was eyeing Cyrene with a fury that explained the condition of the dorm room, and Vincinte was head to head with Rebel, Kris standing in a position that implied he was acting as Rebel's second. It was the first time Ivory had ever seen the two work together.

Ivory saw a purple curse erupt from Vincinte's wand, it was a paralytic curse, and Rebel through up a shield, barely avoiding the spell. Everything in Ivory's head seemed to click into place, and slowly, Ivory began to walk down the steps that led to the castle with a look halfway between and anger and betrayal. Remembering an old habit of her youth, she allowed her face to smooth out into a calm expression. This was only made more frightening by the rain pouring down, soaking her to the bone, and how cold everyone could feel it was. Besides, she was showing an unusual amount of skin and her feet were bare as they began their slow decent onto the muddy grass.

She remained unnoticed until Angel made a high-pitched squeal, effectively gaining the attention of most of those surrounding her. Many gaped at her, whether because of the odd choice of clothes or just because she was making a grand entrance into a battle situation, she couldn't tell. The vampires soon found her, some giving Vincinte hard glares because he had told them that she would not be present today. Yet, the dualists in the middle were too preoccupied with trying to kill each other to notice her. But Ivory was not going to allow herself to be ignored.

As Vincinte and Rebel both moved to throw curses at each other, Ivory cast the strongest shield she knew of between them, which easily destroyed their curses when they hit it. This, to no one's surprise, got the boys' attention immediately. Rebel looked shaken by her appearance, as if unsure of what side she would pick. Vincinte on the other hand, faltered immediately. Ivory had been expecting that, after all, he had drugged her and done his best to ensure she didn't show up.

Vincinte took a deep breath, "Ivory, I swear, this isn't what it looks like."

Ivory kept a calm face that she could tell was unnerving them all, "And what exactly is it that I believe this looks like?"

He hadn't been expecting that, he had expected her to grow angry and yell at him, attack him even. However, she was staying perfectly calm, and making him look like a fool.

"Perhaps I thought you had invited the family over so that they can meet my family when they're all together." Ivory said, "In which case, I completely agree, this isn't what it looks like."

Vaughn was the first to relax, it was becoming obvious that Ivory wasn't about to betray her family. However, she did think that the situation was seeming frighteningly familiar. As if sensing her distress, Wolf's hand found hers and squeezed it for reassurance.

"So, how did it feel?" Ivory asked, her eyes losing the softness she had forced into them, "Killing them."

Cyrene smirked in an I-told-you-so way, but Vincinte missed it due to his surprise at the question, "I don't know what you're talking about,"

"The werewolves, how did it feel to kill all of those werewolves?" Ivory asked, "They were the ones on the light side, weren't they?"

"Ivory, I only killed because it had to be done. They were trying to take over." Vincinte insisted.

Ivory's eyes hardened, and to everyone's surprise, she laughed. She shook her head at the vampire, "No they weren't. And even if they were, I don't think I can believe you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I didn't want to believe it, I have denied for years what's been right in front of my face." Ivory said taking another step forward, "But you are one sick, evil son of a bitch."

Vaughn, for the first time since her children were born, had absolutely no urge to tell Ivory not to swear.

Ivory continued, "Thinking back, I don't know how I could've missed it. Even when I was eleven you were trying to get me into dark magic, and when that didn't work you began twisting my mind until I felt justified to use dark magic. You even made me think it was right to be just plain cruel to others. Especially Smoky," Ivory locked eyes with the black haired pyrokenetic, "You okay? Looks there was a bit of a fight last night."

Smoky was having a hard time believing she could be so calm when she had obviously figured out he had been attacked. He nodded in response and was able to mutter, "I'm fine,"

Satisfied with his response, she returned her gaze to her soon to be ex-boyfriend, "That brings us back to the whole werewolf thing, where you had me convinced that the werewolves were evil. And I believed you. I killed in that war, and after the war I overheard you talking about 'expanding your kingdom'. The vampires weren't the victims. And how can I forget my favorite birthday present that I got that summer, Cruor Devinus."

There was a simultaneous intake of breath as Ivory felt the hollow wings of her bones poke small holes through her numb back and her shirt and continue growing, followed by a sensitivity of her newly grown feathers. Unlike the last time she had transformed, Ivory welcomed her wand melting into her left arm. A small hum of magic came over her as she looked at the life expectancy of people for the first time in years. Everyone's read the same: ????

Vaughn grasped almost painfully onto her husband's hand, they were both remembering her vision over the summer.

Ivory relaxed back into her calm expression, "You also talked about a next phase that you were going to start at Hogwarts. I suppose you meant the murders. I bet Cyrene killed Hazel, it was too bloody for the prince of vampires' taste."

Cyrene growled, in the past minute or so she had lost her patience with her brother, was he going to let the little pansy he had grown soft for ruin the whole plan? No, Cyrene wouldn't allow this to happen. With her vampire speed she lunged at Ivory with an angry growl. Ivory raised her left arm and a bright green light broke from it and collided with Cyrene head on, throwing her backwards.

Renato, wearing his signature pink shirt moved forward to see what the young witch had done to his prized daughter. His worry turned quickly to panic as he looked at Ivory with a look between anger and sadness, "She's… she's dead, how did you kill her? She's a vampire, she's immortal!"

Ivory looked at him evenly with a glare that stated simply that she was not afraid of him. He backed up until he was even with the other vampires.

"I'd answer your question, but I have a few of my own that I would appreciate answered," Ivory said softly, and she was heard, even through the rain. Though the dead vampires lying in the mud was quite the distraction.

"Like what?" Vincinte said, not taking his eyes off his sister's body. If she could do that to Cyrene, was he any safer? Would she have the guts to kill him?

"Did you kill them? Between you and Cyrene, did you kill all eight of them and try to kill Smoky?" Ivory asked, finally showing a bit of her anger.

Vincinte didn't say anything for a long moment, probably still wondering if he had any control in the situation anymore. Apparently he decided answering the question was the right decision, "Yeah, Cyrene killed two, I killed two, we killed the four together, and last night, Cyrene was to kill Smoky. He got away."

"And where did I play into your little plan?" The simple question was surprisingly angry due to the venom she imposed on the last two words.

Vincinte cast his eyes down, "…you were to be my wife. There's no point in lying now, is there? I was going to take over the world, you were going to be my queen. I really do love you Ivory."

Ivory was silent as the rain poured down, her hair plastered to her head and shoulders, a few strands inevitably falling in front of her face. "I love you too."

No one dared to talk, instead they watched the teenage girl who, without them knowing, was silently crying over what she was about to do.

"That potion you tried to knock me out with," Ivory said, although no one understood what she was talking about other than Vincinte, "It's not just a sleeping potion, it's poison. You killed me. Or would have, but I can't really die. You see, I had it explained what exactly I was by a few close friends. Dead friends, but friends all the same. I'm a valkyrie."

The only sound was rain as every last person, other than a few vampires that were nearly a thousand years old from what she'd heard seemed to understand.

"Valkyries are literally the Angels of Death. In old Norse mythology they were the ones who decided who would be slain in battle, and then the legends say they carried the souls back to Odin." Ivory recited from a book she had read in her youth, her mother had gotten it almost ten years ago in order to give her something to do while she was teaching, "In truth, we just see death, and kill those deservant of death. So while I'm around, there is no immortal."

The words hit the vampires like bricks, but Vincinte had never been one to give up easy, "Come on, you wouldn't kill me, Ivory. I love you, and I know you love me too."

Ivory fought herself from faltering, the ones you love the most are usually the ones that hurt you the most. Ivory breathed deeply as she slowly brought her left hand up again until it was pointing directly at Vincinte, the vampire who had loved her despite her flaws, her anger and had been the only one to call her beautiful. She had returned the favor, and he had spoiled her. She closed her eyes, he had lied too, made her kill, nearly killed Smoky…

Ivory's eyes opened again, just in time to see the green light hit between Vincinte's eyes, filled with fear for the first time in his life. Her stomach coiled up, and she was sure she was going to puke, but a rather large distraction stopped her from reacting to Vincinte's death. Like every vampire rushing to attack her in effort to live. They didn't last long before they fell victim to the Angel of Death.

When every vampire had fallen, Ivory stayed where she was, but everyone could see she was far from the calm manipulator of the earlier discussion. She was shaking, both from the cold that she could suddenly feel and from what she had just done. Her left hand was still up, which effectively stopped everyone from moving, lest she decide to kill them. Little did they know that two figures were doing their best to get the young girl out of 'kill anything that moves' mode.

"Ivory, you did what you had to do, you don't have to be strong anymore," Remus said, putting a hand on her arm, but she couldn't feel it.

"Just don't cry, Slytherins don't cry," Tom said rolling his eyes, royally pissed off that she had chosen the light.

"Tom! She's already crying, you aren't helping," Remus yelled back at him, then turned to Ivory, "Go ahead and cry Ivory, no one should have to do what you did today. Cry it out,"

"Come on, she just owned some major vampire ass, and now she's going to cry?" Tom asked as if the notion was ridiculous.

"If you're going to act that way, just leave now," Remus growled, showing his inner wolf.

"Fine," Tom said as he faded away.

Ivory's eyes were closed as she cried in the pouring rain, and before Remus could add anymore words of comfort, her knees buckled. Her knees splashed loudly in the puddle she had forgotten she was standing in, her hands the only thing stopping her from falling face first in the mud. The ends of her hair were trailing in the mud, but that was the last thing on her mind at the moment.

Reactions had been mixed when she fell to the ground, some relaxed to see she was no longer about to kill, those who knew her better were stressed because she seemed to be crying. Ivory didn't cry, well, as a baby she had cried, though quieter than most had when they were babies. Wolf was the first to gather the courage to approach her, and did so with caution. He was pleasantly surprised when she didn't stop him from touching her, although he was only brushing her soaking wet hair from her face.

"Come on Bri, its okay, you're safe. You can lose the wings." He said quietly.

Ivory seemed to struggle to remember something for the first time in her life before whispering, "Cruor Desino."

Wolf watched with curiosity as her wand emerged from her arm (which he quickly pocketed because he didn't want his daughter to be doing magic while she was distressed) and her feathers and wing bones molt and turn to ash. Wolf watched as she had her eyes flickering from dead vampire to dead vampire, and she softly whispered, "Cyrene, Vincinte, Renato, Enrica, Alisa, Marisa, Aria, Sansone, Marco, Guido, Ercole, Carin, Ottavia, Quorra, Rosetta, Chiara, Mia, Luisa, Viviana, Dante, Ilario, Ehno, Rocco, Taddeo, Ugo, I knew them all by name… and I…"

Wolf watched her eyes fade from green to grey, she wasn't going to finish her sentence. He hesitated for less than a second before picking his fifteen year old daughter up, thankful that she was small and light, because her wet hair had to weigh at least ten pounds by itself. Without saying a word he began carrying her inside, and she made no complaint.

Sirius was one of the next to come out of the stupor Ivory had caused and began directing the group to dispose of the bodies. Smoky's pyrokenetic abilities were used to burn the bodies even in the rain. As Cyrene's body was levitated onto the flames, Smoky felt numb rather than the joy he would have felt in the same situation a month ago. Most, in light of the celebratory circumstances, were stuck in a somber mood. Ivory's little show had been startling at best.

-

You can close your eyes to what you don't want to see, but you can't close your heart to what you don't want to feel.

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(A/N: Well, I con only see one, maybe two chapters left. And trust me, I'm going to cry when posting the last chapter of this. Not only because I've been working on this story for a over a year (well, the start of Cub was March 4, 2008), but because many of the characters have aspects of myself. Ivory is the embodiment of my hate and love, hate with all your heart and love childishly. Seriously though, I want to finish this while I can (I'm on stage crew for my school play all next month) Questions, concerns, and one shot challenges can all be submitted by review.)