Disclaimer: I'm J.K. Rowling. I'm j/k.
Parvati Patil sighed. She hated having divorced parents. It wasn't something she thought about often, because the very thought brought surges of anger into her heart and streams of tears to her eyes, but it was true. Every year she went to Hogwarts. Then she could be with her friends without her father's constant badmouthing of her mother. It would be a lot easier to deal with if she wasn't the idealistic, sweet Gryffindor that she was, but she couldn't help that. Her father raised her, and that was how anyone raised by a man like her father would turn out: sweet and idealistic.
At Hogwarts she could forget it all. Just go to Lavender and do her nails and look at boys. But she couldn't just stay there forever, much as she might wish, much as she might want. She had to go home to her father and hear about how awful her mother was. She momentarily wondered who this Mother was, but pushed the thought back. It was a fruitless effort, she knew. Mother was a topic you couldn't speak about at her house.
Now she had to leave Hogwarts and go back to that awful house in Surrey where her father lived. Dang it. It wasn't that her father was a bad man in himself, or that the house was particularly ugly in itself. It was just that she hated his constant complaining about her mother, and the way that everything was strewn topsy-turvsy around the house. She wasn't a freak about having everything clean, but she did like to be able to see at least a few patches of floor now and then. She sighed as she boarded the train quietly and sat in her own compartment.
Padma Patil sat in the last compartment that wasn't full. She generally preferred to sit alone, but this compartment was better than the rest; the only one here was her sister, Parvati.
The two didn't really know each other. Their parents had divorced when they were young, before they were one. They'd never been able to get a straight answer out of either as to why except for "opposing each other" and "different positions on issues." At least that was what Parvati thought.
But Parvati was wrong.
Because Padma had gotten a straight answer out of her mother. She'd known this "straight answer" since she could remember. No exaggeration. It was her first memory.
Mommy comes over to my bed. "Padma?" she says quietly. "Padma?"
"What, Mommy?" I ask, voice still young and almost innocent.
"Do you know why I left Daddy?" Mommy says. "Do you want to?"
All I say is, "What's a Daddy?" A few seconds later I realize that I'm not supposed to ask questions I'm not given permission to ask but it's too late.
But luckily Mommy doesn't mind this; all that happens is that a small laugh escapes Mommy's lips. "To have a baby, a child like you, there has to be a man. Daddy is what the man is called."
"Oh," I say, lips pursed, looking into the air, absorbing this piece of information like any other. "So I have a daddy too? Then where is he?"
Mommy looks glad I asked. I wonder why but I don't ask because you don't ask Mommy unbidden questions. She can get mad if you do that. Very mad. Mommy doesn't like to hear unsolicited questions from me. I don't know why but I can't ask that question either, so I just wait for the answer to the question I am allowed to ask: where is Daddy?
"Daddy lives in a different country, not in France, but in England, " Mommy begins. "England is where I lived at first. That's why we still speak English here, even though everyone speaks French. Daddy and I used to think we loved each other. But then he found out about my Lord, and he didn't love me any more, and he was very, very mean to me."
"Really mean?" I ask. I know about her Lord. He tells her what to do and he is the most important. I don't really know what he does but I don't care very much because what Mommy says goes. Mommy recently told me that he is gone but he's going to come back and then times will be good again.
"Yes, really mean," Mommy repeats. "He tried to get me to leave my Lord every way he could. But I didn't, because the Lord is more important than marriage."
"So you left him and came here?"
"Mmmhmm," Mommy says. "I came to France because it's his conquered country. He didn't get England yet but he had France so I came here. But Daddy stayed in England because he put his false sense of the Lord being bad over my wisdom. But I'm a lot wiser than him, because I chose my Lord, right honey?"
"Right," was my automatic response. "Right, Mommy."
Padma smiled slightly. Her mother had repeated the message, in different terms, many times. Padma believed it. Of course, she couldn't show it at Hogwarts -- Mother didn't have enough connections yet for her to act like Draco or all the Slytherins.
And then there was the mere fact that she WASN'T a Slytherin. Slytherins somehow almost had a license to act the way they did, show off that they were with the Dark Lord. I mean, sure, they couldn't go around flaunting the fact that their parents had worked for the Dark Lord, but they could do pretty much everything else.
But Padma wasn't in Slytherin; she was, to the slight dismay of her mother, in Ravenclaw. Mother wished she was in Slytherin; in fact, the first few months of Padma's first year had been made miserable by her mother practically torturing her over the fact that she wasn't. But, part by her mother's concession and part by the way Padma could manipulate an argument, Padma had convinced her mother that it was okay that she was in Ravenclaw -- maybe she could use this alleged wisdom to the advantage of the Lord and of the Dark Side.
Nobody knew about that except for Mother and a few others. Not even Parvati. Not that this was too surprising -- Padma and Parvati were not like sisters but rather mere classmates. The connection of Padma to Parvati was the same and Padma to Susan Bones, and vice versa -- they were total strangers. They hadn't lived together, seen each other until they came to Hogwarts (well, except for the few months before their parents had divorced), hadn't spoken together much, and in general shared only the same parents, last name, and genes.
Padma generally kept to herself. It was safer that way, she knew. Less chance that she might let slip a little family...secret....and ruin it all. And then there would be more to pay than she wanted to think about.
Nobody asked why she was so quiet, so withdrawn, so solitary. For all they knew, she was just a quiet little smart girl with nothing really in her life that would make her worry or care. Sure, her shy attitude was a bit excessive, and of course most girls weren't that shy, but when they looked at her, all they did was shrug and say, "I guess that's just how she is." And it made Padma glad. That made her job of pretending a lot easier.
Padma snapped out of her thoughts and looked over at her sister. She could see that Parvati, too, was deep in thought. Momentarily she wondered what she was thinking. Surely sweet, innocent, Gryffindor thoughts. She detested those idealistic things. It was stupid, innocence, because it was guaranteed to be stolen. So were ideals. She was glad that she'd never had either: no innocence and no ideals. Her mother had made her quite sure that she was all the better off without them.
Parvati, evidently, didn't share Padma's sentiment. "If only I could just make this work out...I bet Mother isn't so bad as I think...I wish life would just work out." She didn't realize that she was speaking her mind -- quite literally -- in front of Padma, but Padma realized it.
And Padma sneered as she thought, "I wouldn't be so sure. I wouldn't."
Then the train pulled into the station and the two girls got out, not exchanging even a word.
Parvati briefly peered around the station, wondering where her father was. She could usually recognize him -- he looked like he hadn't looked in a mirror when he got up that morning. Hair disheveled, robes wrinkled and worn with age, and socks and shoes usually not matching, he was a mere phantom of the house he lived in.
Yet she didn't see a sign of such a man, and when she finally found her father, she had to prevent herself from gasping. He actually looked like he had discovered the art of using a comb, choosing decent robes, and playing the game where you answer the question, "Do these socks/shoes match?" He actually looked...half way normal!
Parvati ran up to her father and gave him a little kiss on the cheek. "Hi Daddy," she said to him. "You're looking good today."
As the two climbed into the car (which, Parvati noticed with even more marvel, looked as though it had finally seen a car wash), her father said, "Well, in light of recent events --"
Parvati said, "You mean You-Know-Who's return?"
"Voldemort, Parvati, Voldemort," her father chastised her. "Don't be afraid of the name. Anyway, I decided I better become more...aware and better organized so I could fight him...and his loyal followers like your mother."
Parvati looked shocked -- and it was no wonder. You don't find out that your mother who you haven't seen since you were less than one year old is a loyal follower of Voldemort just every day. "My MOTHER what?????" she asked.
He sighed. "Yes, she is. That's why she left me. I couldn't let her follow the man, so she fled to France, Voldemort's territory, and left me. She took Padma with her. All she did beforehand was filed a legal divorce."
"Wait...France was Voldemort's territory?" Parvati said, confused, dismayed, and beginning to lose her ideals about her mother being "not so bad."
"Is, Parvati," her father corrected, "It is, but save that whole thing for another day. I need a promise."
Parvati's throat tightened. Her father rarely asked for promises, but when he did, they were major. And sometimes, Parvati thought, not quite a good thing to promise. But she had a weakness, even in spite -- or perhaps because -- of the bravery that had gotten her into Gryffindor, and that was that she couldn't say no to her father. "What is it, Daddy?"
"I want you to promise me to always be loyal to your country and your cause -- to be loyal to your country even if -- nay, when -- it fights France."
Too easy. Parvati knew it wasn't the whole promise, but she said, "I promise, Daddy," nonetheless.
"I want you to promise that if you must, you will fight for England."
That was more like one of her father's promises. Idealistic and brave, but not quite so together in the head. But she still said, "I promise." She couldn't resist her father's request.
"Finally Parvati," and Parvati's heart sunk as she saw the man's serious expression, "Finally, I want you to promise that, if you must, you will die for your country."
Parvati's good sense, her common sense, told her to say no. Why should she, a young girl, have to promise to die for her country if she had to. But she had that need to please her father, and her ingrained -- if foolish -- bravery, and so she whispered, "I promise."
Padma immediately recognized her mother. One might think that, being the only Death Eater who was a woman, she would be tough, rough, and a general tomboy. Well, maybe tough and rough, but by no means a tomboy. On the contrary, she always wore the latest designer robes of Paris and looked beautiful. Parvati could almost see the men's heads turning as she passed them by.
Padma greeted her mother with a false smile. "Hello, mother." She wasn't really terribly glad to see her -- evil people aren't generally glad to see their evil overlords or, in Padma's case, evil mothers. It wasn't that she disliked the evil part -- she herself was evil, or so she liked to believe in self flattery -- it was just that evil people weren't that much fun to live with.
But no time to think about that now. Right now the only thought on her mind as she looked at her mother and recalled her mother's Death Eater status was regarding the fact that the Dark Lord had risen again. Her mother hadn't been at the uprising -- something she had expressed her regret over. However, she had an important meeting with the modeling agency, and though she would love to cancel it to see the Dark Lord rise again, she'd canceled these sorts of meetings quite often for other such things, and the agency was growing suspicious. And the number one rule to being evil was don't let people get suspicious.
She began to whisper into her mother's ear, "Mother, what is happening now that --" but her mother cut her off.
"Not now, Padma," her mother whispered urgently. "Not now! People will wonder! We'll talk later, once we've apparated home."
"Speaking of which," Padma said, abruptly changing the subject, "why don't we apparate home? I'll hold your hand while you apparate so that we'll go together and I won't splinch or something."
"Okay, Padma," her mother said, "we'll do that." She feigned perfect, sweet love for her daughter. It was a disguise she had perfected long ago so that people wouldn't wonder.
And they apparated home.
Once home, Padma said, a bit impatiently, "So what's happening now that the Dark Lord has risen? Is France again ours?"
Padma's mother smiled as she heard the word "ours." She had done a good job brainwashing the girl, and she was proud of it too. The girl was totally on the Dark Side. Good.
"Yes, Padma, it is," she said. "We have France again. Our main enemy is England. We'll get the other countries, probably, but England is our main enemy. Speaking of which, I contacted our liege Lord."
"Did you, Mother?" Padma said. "And what did he say?" Always show reverence to Mother, and only ask questions that were rhetorical, that Mother was about to answer anyway, or that Mother gave permission for. It worked.
"He told me that, as a supporter of him and France, you had to say a promise. I'll give it to you -- the Dark Lord is far too busy to come and administer it himself, and why should he take precious time out of his day for you?" her mother asked.
"I am ready, Mother," Padma said.
"Good," her mother scowled. "I want you to promise to remain always loyal, to be a ready warrior, and to, if you must, die for the cause and die for your country. Do you promise these things, under the penalty of Cruciatus if you don't or if you disobey?"
Something inside Padma told her that perhaps she shouldn't, and something bigger told her that she really didn't want to have to die for anything, even something as worthy as cause and country, but the brainwashing and her evil nature got the better of her, as always. "I promise, Mother. Under penalty of the Cruciatus."
And her mother smiled a cruel, cold smile and said, "Good. You may need to."
A.N.2.: So what'd you think? Was it awful? Was it great? Was it so-so? I'm dying to hear, so review!!!!! Reviews encourage me to continue! If you review, then I'll read any Non-R Non-NC17 Harry Potter fic or Original fic that you wrote (if you're an author, of course). So please review and remember...All's Well that Ends Well! (Don't ask. It's my authors name so I felt like saying it...)