Hello my loyal fans…or not…here is another chapter from me! The Shadow Witch! I hope you enjoy it…I (and the whole of Walford Year 10) enjoyed writing it…I'm dedicating it to Walford Year 10…'cos they put up with my wild moods of running around screaming "What's the word that means…" and my very loud classical music…I'm sure it was highly educational for them…Anyway…I don't own Sirius, Remus, James, Lily or Peter…well…I own the bits of them that are my creation but apart from that…I own Amara, Orion is herself, as is Rusulka. So pull up a chair, grab a mug of Hot Chocolate, and set about reading
Chapter 6: Searching for Black
The seven young people stared sadly at her across the lake. It was cold, and snow swirled around them, but somehow she could still see them clearly. There were four boys and three girls. She glanced over them; curious as to why they had invaded her previously peaceful sleep. Then she returned and studied them carefully in turn. The first person, on the left, was a short, somewhat chubby boy who seemed like he spent half his time looking sad, like he did now, and the other half frightened out of his wits. He was wringing his hands and couldn't quite meet her eyes. The next person across, another boy, wasn't much taller, but he exuded confidence. He stood like he expected people to follow him, and in a manner which suggested that they usually did. Behind the perplexed melancholy in his blue eyes, however, was a sparkle of merriment, which seemed to fuel him through everything, and his short black hair seemed possessed of a mind of its own. The next person, a girl, was seemingly on the verge of tears. The second boy had his arm round her shoulders in a manner which was both possessive and protective. Not that she looked like she needed it. She had the same air of unquestioned authority and confidence, despite her tears. She had flaming red hair and glowing green eyes and alabaster skin. The next girl, whose hand the redhead held tightly, had a very different aura. She seemed almost submissive, but she had a core of steel and a comfortable, fuzzy feeling of someone who knows exactly what they want. But that feel, and her grey eyes were shadowed with extreme sadness. The next person, who had a hand resting protectively at the small of the second girl's back, gently stroking her lustrous black hair, seemed tired as well as sad. The just-past-full moon was reflected from the water into those tired eyes, though she had no idea as to why this seemed significant to some deeply buried part of her. He was around the same hight as the second boy, but he seemed gentler and slightly less confidant. Mixed with the confusion and sadness in his eyes was pity, and he seemed to want to comfort the other boy next to him as well, but he thought better of it. The last boy was gripping the third boy's shoulder so tightly that his knuckles were white. In his near-black eyes was a mixture of desperate hope, utter desolation and, strangely, fury. But behind that glittered a soul filled with keen intelligence, exuberance and blatant sensuality. The sensuality exuded from each pore, was highly evident in his long, glossy black hair, in the strangely androgynous curve of his lips in the gentle flow of his robes about his lithe body. She was about to drag her eyes away from him, in the interest of examining the last person, but one final look sent shocked recognition searing through her. The man in her previous dream, the man who screamed her name from the empty, clawing depths of a repulsive, hate encrusted prison, was the same as this sensual and so vitally alive boy who stood before her now. The exuberance had been beaten into submission, and his sensuality had been buried under layers of both physical and emotional filth, but there was no doubt that the starved, lonely, half-insane, desperate, tortured and empty man whose image arose in her mind was the same as, albeit a mere shadow of, this vibrant boy. Something in her soul howled a dirge for this boy, while something, hidden, locked away in the deepest recesses of her mind screamed for release. As the maelstrom of emotions picked at her, tearing at the very core of her being, she tore her eyes away from him, to stare in incredulity and a growing sense of foreboding at the girl he held so tightly and possessively against himself. A girl who had her head on his shoulder, her face masked by a mass of vivacious, russet curls. Time slowed, and the girl lifted her head, one delicately sculpted hand sweeping the hair backwards, revealing an intelligent, beautiful face. A face with large, glittering dark eyes, gently curved lips, twisted into an almost apologetic smile, despite her tears and subtly pink cheeks. A face that Amara had seen, albeit somewhat older, in the mirror every day for the past thirteen years. As Amara stared in utter shock, a voice spoke from next to her.
"Hello Amara" it was an amused voice, yet an ageless, wise one. Amara turned, glad of an excuse to tear her eyes away from the questions those young people evoked. The woman who stood next to her was tiny. Well, not unnaturally tiny, but more extremely short. She had long, black hair, plaited and wound intricately behind her head. Her eyes were a storm-tossed blue, gentle and smiling, yet hiding secrets and knowledge too vast to be anything but terrible. Her skin was a translucent white, and her floating blue dress added to her ethereal quality. The only thing about her that seemed entirely real was her mouth, which had a humorous curve to it, which was just too earthy to be anything but real. Her smile grew broader, and she continued
"I can't stay long, and of course, any message or help I give you has to be cryptic, but I hope this" she gesticulated to indicate the young people of the other side of the lake "is of some help in finding out who you were, who you are and who you can be." She faded slightly, and the snow swirled faster, "I can't stay much longer, but we Blacks will help in any way we can. My brother can help you more than I can; he was with you for much longer. Amara, you have to…" The snow swirled up and around, and the small woman disappeared. Amara sent one more, half-hoping, half-fearing look across the lake and saw the young people standing there for a moment longer before a fell wind swept across the scene, whipping the snow into a frenzied dance of fury, longing and desolation and veiled them from sight. As the snow swirled around her and the world twisted, dragging her back up into consciousness, she heard a cry, ripped from a young throat, and a matching cry from his older self echoing, swirling, dancing in her mind as the snow danced around her body. The wind howled, adding it's cries to the two men, and she was flung upwards and back into…
her bed where she sat, gasping with the sudden return to the land of the living. She got out of bed slowly, and got dressed, willing her suddenly reluctant body to go through the mundane, necessary motions of a normal morning. In a daze, she left the house, and began the route of her normal morning run. She had reached the first corner, when the full realisation of her dream? Vision? Hit her. Those people were from her past; from a past she couldn't remember. And what had the small, ethereal woman said? "My brother can help you more than I can" her brother…Black…it was all part of a complex puzzle she was missing the pieces, and the picture, for. But there was one thing she did know. And that was where she could get answers. She had to go looking for them. She had to go Searching for Black…