Disclaimers: I do not own Harry Potter nor do I own the beautiful song, "Broken Like an Angel" by Dollybraid.
By Callisto Callispi
Riddle: Dropped by the moon, no sooner picked up by the sun.
The black shore glittered with shards of pearls and a few tears. Jewels of stars glistened with mad energy, twinkling, shining, almost moving. His inspiration was the evening star. His sorrow was the iridescent moon. His fear was the rope of pearls wrapped around his fingers.
Wind caressed his cheek with each step he took. The thick grass and thicker sand moaned beneath his feet, relinquishing their salty aroma of the ocean. And he remebered even here the scent of magnolias. He smelled magnolias everywhere, just as he smelled it on the curls threaded from new gold, on the skin carved from porcelain. It was nights like these . . . the nights where poetry sweetened his breath.
The poetry came and went like the breeze of summer -- all at once refreshing then nothing but the sweltering heat of frustration. The frustration of the blank parchment. The frustration of all of that white.
But then he would run his quill over the paper, forming a gently curving line. The almond-shaped eyes would emerge next, life breathed into her features with ink. From nothing would everything emerge. The slender nose, the luscious lips, the curling hair, the rope of pearls . . .
A frightening thing happened then. The curtains lashed out almost as if in pain, the hurricane shot in through his chambers, madly whirrling up all of his loose documents to the ceiling. But he kept his portrait of her between his fingers as he slammed the window shut. His heart stopped, however, with one glance at the portrait. Rain spotted the drawing, staining the ivory parchment with that dirty, dirty water, and that drop of rain spilled down from her thick lashes and marked a heavy path down her cheek. She, the portrait, wept.
The night was for lunatics. This night was for him.
Did she know love's true potential? He grimaced. Not with him. She wanted to find love again. And he was just satisfied to own her. But . . . maybe, he did not just crave satisfaction. Maybe he craved the warmth. Of course, the moon was for lunatics.
Lucius paused for a minute, waiting for some sign, some poetic justice. The surf crested and dissolved rhythmatically. Like a song. The ocean reminded him, whispered memories and coaxed them into the unwelcoming light of acknowledgment.
Did he remember her as she was? Now, as he stood with his back against the shore, he realized that memories were what remained with him of her. She was but a shadow now. Oh, to just be lost in her embrace. God, how he just longed for one more night of love. Lucius climbed to the top of the jetty.
x
x
She comes to me during the night, clad in only the thinnest of silk. And at once, magnolias engulf my senses. The sweet aroma that I take in with each breath leadens my mind, rids of all rational thought that does not include her.
The moments threaten to pass in a haze of fog. But I contain each one, memorizing the very texture of her skin to the pink of her lips. She came to me in the chilly moonlight, lost within a dream.
With each kiss that I place on her jawbone, with each caress of her soft breasts, she submits herself to me. The moan that began to rumble deep within her bosom rises to her throat. She pleads that she wants to fall in love again.
But let me reveal my secret: I want to fall in love too.
The silk tumbles from her shoulders. Silver curls loosen from the pearly barrette. And with animalistic hunger, I lunge, trapping her trembling body beneath mine and ravishing her lips with my own.
My hands are the shackles that bind her to the bed. Her fingernails dig into the skin of her palms as I refuse to observe the rules of love-making. And spreading her legs quickly apart, I take her like a madman, losing myself in my own black fog of bliss. She is lost in the open wind of my impatience.
It never occurs to me that the tears she released were that of pain. It never occurs to me that I've never held her to my heart. It occurs to me that my wife . . . never loved me.
Otherwise, she would have never left me with those ropes of pearls bound so tightly around her neck.
x
x
"What did you want, Narcissa?" Lucius demanded, as he stood defiantly on top of the jetty.
The rain began again. The moon hid her lazy face behind the blanket of clouds.
"What did you want from me? Answer me!"
The wind howled like a wolf. The pearls dug deeply into the skin of his palms. He closed his eyes, those awful nightmares seeping in through his brain and poisoning his very thoughts. Only they weren't nightmares. They were real. The gagging was real, the cough was real, the spray of blood was real.
And the words, those god-awful words, were all real.
"Let me fly."
She's been holding on for an angel to come along. No reply from the sky, but she just keeps looking up . . . she just keeps looking up . . .
Fate conjured up a tempest for Lucius that night. And as the silver strands of his hair thrashed about his face, as rain battered his skin, as thunder shook the very foundation of his being, Lucius wept.
The tears he never knew, the wounds that never healed . . .
Lucius turned his head up to the sky and wept. The rope of pearls slipped from his hands, and Lucius's eyes widened in horror. Narcissa's necklace!
Falling, falling . . .
And then did the hurricane wind sway the pearls against the unyielding jetty wall. And just before the pearls shattered, Lucius dove headfirst off the jetty to retrieve them.
"Let me fly."
The glittering pieces (stars) fell into the ocean. The black shore glittered with shards of pearls and a few tears.
Solution: Dew.