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Part I: The Muse has Risen

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Born on the eve of summer's gathering to leave, my father was in the room with my mother as she pushed me into the world. The cold harsh world; you see, that night was a bitter one. My father, Bernard Hesse was a respected wizard in our little community and my mother, Valerie Stillheart was an accomplished English woman who married a bit too early for her time. I remember my mother telling me as a child, during the times where the days were golden and evenings were filled with stories, such wonderful things that I wouldn't have found out on my own.

We had lived in a humble home somewhere on the outskirts of Paris, France. Love had such an infantile meaning but that is what I felt whenever I looked outside of the single glass paned window and saw the distant lights of the city, flickering on and off like a candle that wasn't quite in focus. Whenever I had a walk through the lush forests of Oak and Willow with each parent on either side of me, I felt it just the same or even more. Those days are long quite over; yet I dwell on them, much like obesity dwells on the soul who chooses to be lazy rather than fit.

Still, I live under this cursed name, those abominable markings that show where my family traces to and to where it does not...where it shall never be. Even if I want it so dearly. Even if I call to the stars, nothing will grant my wishes.

Jenescia Valienne Hesse-Stillheart.

Cursed, I say, because that is the only reason to explain my misfortune in life and love. I sorrow for the girl who gets placed of the burden of sharing a name with me. I don't even dare using that name in public, or even in private, so I go by Jennie Stillheart, dropping my father's surname because he is an idiot who I wish I never knew.

Those times where all 3 of us were fine did not last too long. By the young age of 5, I had grown my violently wavy auburn hair, which I had acquired from my mother's side thank god, to my waist. And so did grow the arguments. I had no idea what they were about but I did know that my father would come home stumbling as my mother would try to straighten him up. She never nagged or confronted him about it, yet he became more and more aggressive toward her.

I recall one night where my father came home quite late with a soiled yellow shirt and loosened belt for wear and my mother had asked him what took so long to be back with his family. He muttered something with his hoarse French accent and pulled off his leather belt. I'll remember the piercing screams uttered out of my mother's throat from his lashings for the rest of my life. They became on a daily basis soon enough and he never cared if I was in the same room.

At that young age, it was intangible for me to understand what was happening and why it did happen. I never interfered. My mother never talked of it. I sometimes wish I did do something, anything at all. We pretended it didn't happen; even if the bruises went green and became unbearable.

I suppose the last straw, or the breaking point, would have to be the day my father left my mother for dead. And yes, he did this all in front of my face; I still do believe you can see the scars of it in my irises if you look close enough, still as red and raw as the hour it had occurred. He came home with another woman, which I now know is named Serena, while my mother was in the washing room. I remember the looks on their faces, my father's scraggly beard and sharp face devouring the lips of the blonde-headed woman. She was nothing but a whore to me and probably to him also.

He did not know my mother was in the other room washing herself as he and his mistress climbed into the nearby bed and proceeded to do things which would earn them a place in hell. I had slept in that bed once, and it makes me sick to think of that now. My mother soon heard the inescapable noises of the two loud rats mating only 20 feet and a wall away. I suppose you know what happened next. My father took his wand out, he was drunk if you had not noticed the pattern by now, and cursed her.

Cursed her to insanity.

The visceral part of me wanted to cry out and kick my own father where he had created me but the factual part of me took over. I had always been a sensible person and I suppose that was the result of me being a Ravenclaw later on. My mother writhed like a puppet with its strings tied in the wrong places and screamed as if someone had locked her in a box of needles only to shake it with her inside. I stood there, in the doorway, and watched as my father did such things, unaware of his nudity as his lover sat by the bed, with a petrified expression. How I wished I had a vase to throw at her ugly face.

But I still do blame myself for all that had happened with my mother; doing something, anything, would have been a difference. My 10 year old self at that time still did not develop maturely enough to act upon will, but freeze upon need. He and his lover knew the ministry would soon come after them so they became fugitives. My father was a potions master in our little community of wizards so he knew many things of concealment.

What happens to him now, I don't know. That night was so vivid, yet so ethereal at the same time. I do not remember much but I do know that right after he had seen me watch him kill my mother, I ran. I ran as fast as I could to the great wooden chest which held many of my mother's possessions and tried to stuff it all in my pockets or robes.

Of those things, I took a golden flute encrusted with jewels, a hand mirror which had delicate fairies and wood nymphs carved into the railing, and a ring. A ring of gold and deep jade. I still wear it on my finger today as a reminder of my sorrows and my sins. Had I the chance, I would have taken more things but he followed me, that bastard, and when I felt his presence on the hair of my neck it was too late. He struck a muggle blow at my face. Hard and cold his like his heart; I felt the back of his hand slam and shatter into my cheek. Such hands I had once felt beneath arms and thought love. Such fingers which I had played with now had rings from other women. And they were hard rings. I knew I felt blood from that impact, I knew I had heard a breaking of a bone in my face. If I was conscious, I knew I would have cried. I would have cried for my father and why he did such things.

Did he not love me? Did he not love mother?

I would rather have him love mother than he did love me because he would not have killed her and mother would have loved me at least. Thinking back on it, those were feelings of a child. Of a silly girl. Though it was the love my mother had given me all before which keeps me alive to this day.

When I woke up, I found myself in a car of leather interior and men with black robes and black top hats at the wheel. I had never been in a muggle car before then because we always just walked to places, they were all so close to home.

I did not think; I acted upon impulse. An impulse so strong I thought my heart would burst.

Fear

"HE KILLED MY MOTHER! WHERE IS HE?!"

I had blurted as I leaped from the seats. I felt such rage, such anger and angst that I did not notice the awkwardness of my cheek bones being in the wrong places. I was disfigured for a moment, but the works of magic had restored me to my beautiful self.

I thought they hadn't heard me, for I heard not but a sigh from the man in the driver's seat. The other was looking out the window.

"I suppose she's awake now. I knew we should have given her a sleeping drought before he let her in the car. Poor thing doesn't need to know such until later,"

"NO, YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND. MY MOTHER IS DEAD!" I felt like I was going to burst, the redness of my face surfaced like the determination of a herring spotting its fish.

"Your mother isn't dead, little one. Just go back to sleep and you can see her when you wake up," said the one who was once looking out the window, now at me. He was a man of old age; wrinkled and grayed with a face like a fatherly grandpa. His very face gave me much comfort and I realized the silliness of all of my yelling as my senses came back.

"…then where is she?" Such innocence I once had, but it soon stow away from me like water running from your cupped hands.

"Just go to sleep, little one. All will be fine when you do."

I felt an overwhelming feeling of drowsiness as my eyelids grew heavy with pain. I drifted off to sleep and hadn't even noticed it. He had put a sleeping spell on me; how manipulative and cunning one must be to take advantage of my young mind, of my simplicity. Had I not fallen to a dreamless nothing, I would have felt anger at him for doing such a thing without me knowing. It was evil of him and I thought of him to be the devil.I never regained my ability to trust as easily as I did since then.

I found all these things out once I woke up from my sleep.