Last night seem to pass in a blur, everyone was so eager to make my acquaintance and ensure they made a good first impression, no doubt in the hopes that I would put in a good word for them to my father. I lay in my princess style bed and watch the moon and stars swirl in an intimate dance in the enchanted rooftop of the canopy. "Ahem." I hear someone clear their throat. I turn my head and see my only source of comfort here.
"Did no one tell you that you should knock when entering a ladies room?" I jokingly enquire.
"Yes, in fact I was, but there is no lady present therefore no need for me to knock." Draco retorts.
"oh ha ha." I respond dryly. I sit up and Draco approaches my bed.
"breakfast will be served soon, if you open the wardrobe you'll notice my mother has also chosen pure-blood appropriate outfits for you, chose something casual and I shall escort you down." I raise an eyebrow.
"Escort me?" I inquire. Draco nods once. "Have my legs suddenly become incapable of locating the very obvious whereabouts of the dinning hall?"
"Aria, this is you first morning here, and you are a guest at Malfoy manor-" he starts, Draco looks unsure if he should carry on talking but does so anyway. "Plus your father thinks it would be wise if you are escorted everywhere you go… for protection."
"What?!" I say a bit too loudly. "How am I meant to do anything if I'm watched like a prisoner? I thought I was a guest?" by anything I mean try to secure a means of communicating with the order to share my findings. All Draco does is shrug, I suppose he is probably just doing what he is told by his father. Instead he walks over to my wardrobe and pulls out a black form fitting dress, from my distance I can tell it is made of the highest quality of material, but that is irrelevant now, right now I want to know why I am going to be babysat. "Draco, you don't think it's unfair that I am going to be escorted everywhere?" Draco doesn't respond and instead walks towards my door where he will wait until I am ready to be taken down.
"You can ask your father when we get downstairs." He offers with his back to me as he exists my room. Oh, I will. I think to myself as I prepare to cleanse myself for the day ahead.
When I reach the dinning hall however and am sat on the right hand side to Voldemort I find that I apparently lack the courage to demand free movement within the confines of the manor. I don't touch the food and find that I do not have an appetite. "Aria, I understand you were part of Gryffindor?" Bellatrix giggles from where stands in the shadows of the room. I gulp hard and just stare at her, imagining the stuffed deer head above her falling flat on top of her.
"Yes but Aria was forced to, she put the sorting hat on and discovered she was actually meant to be a Slytherin." Draco interjects on my behalf.
"Is this true?" my 'father' asks. I simply nod, I know this where I must start transitioning into my role as the dark heir.
"Yes… father, I suspected from the beginning I was put in the wrong house." I say, my voice dwarfed in the expanse of the giant dining hall. And that isn't strictly a lie, I did find it odd that I was placed into Gryffindor however I suppose it was Dumbledore's attempt to bring me closer to Harry, an objective that would have been made much more difficult if I adorned a silver and green signina on my robes.
Voldemort ponders on what I have just said and I watch as a smile spreads across his reptilian face. "That makes me glad to hear, do not worry child, I will ensure you will be in your rightful house next year." I want to ask him more about that but I do not get the chance. "Aria, I fear all those years of being raised by your mother has changed your out look on what we think of mudbloods and muggles…" he begins. I churn what he has said and carefully think of a response.
"Mother forced us to live amongst muggles for so long, I resent her for that…" I begin, again, a small part of me was not lying. "When I joined Hogwarts I was saddened by how different my upbringing was to my peers, I am thankful I had Draco there to help fill in all the gaps."
"Come now" my 'father' chuckles. "Your mother is still your mother, we must not speak ill of the dead." I smile slightly in a respectful manner. "I am glad to hear you and Draco are so close." He also adds, I flash Draco a smile who is sitting someone across from me. "But enough small talk. I have a lot to teach you during your summer." He clicks his fingers and Snape steps fourth.
"Professor?" I say inquisitively.
"Severus will be joining us this summer to teach you proper defence."
As I sat in what was most likely a office that had been idle and unused for a long time I found myself wondering how Snape turned out the way he did, if according to Harry's moment of using legilimency how did a snivelling victim of severe bullying end up being part of this?
I felt the familiar sensation of someone trying to penetrate my mind and instantly put to work the skills professor McGonagall had taught me. "I was speaking and you were not listening, I was curious to see what so interesting inside your mind that you could not pay my word heed." Snap slowly and expressionlessly says.
"Sorry, I'm sorry professor." I spurt, the adrenalin rush of my occlumency working to evade the intrusion of someone as strong as Severus Snape.
"you father wants you to master the three unforgivable curses." Something catches in my throat and I fight the urge to cry, there was a reason why these curses were unforgivable and there was a reason I didn't want to learn these.
As I hid in the bedroom wardrobe I sat and listened as a clocked figure use the cruciatus curse on my mother, her screams still haunt my nightmares, I had no idea that when my mother shoved me in that wardrobe and ran downstairs to fight the people who had invaded our home that it would be the last I saw her face.
I noticed tears had started to stream down my face. My heart felt heavy with the feeling of loss and all I wanted was to feel my mother's warm embrace. To inhale the scent of orange blossoms that clung to her hair because of her shampoo and to hear her tell that it was all going to be okay. I was trying so hard to regain composure that I had not realised that someone else had entered the room.
When I did realise it was too late, Bellatrix had used Legiimency on me and in my state of despair I was not quick enough to counter curse it. Bellatrix peered into my soul and watched as I sat in the cupboard and whimpered whilst my mother's scream echoed throughout our once loving home. She watched as I coward in the safety of a wooden box instead of fighting for my mothers life. She saw the moment I resolutely climbed out of my cowards chamber and slowly walked over to the upstairs landing. Bellatrix saw my hesitating to go downstairs whilst my mother whimpered in pain and whilst the cloaked stranger stood over her in dominance whilst shouting for answers, answers my mother would not give. Bellatrix saw the moment Remus apparated into the house, the quick witted expelliarmus he shouted in a desperate plea to help my mother, but it was too late, as the cloaked stranger was flung backwards he casted the killing curse, intended for Remus, but he missed whilst being propelled backwards and ended up killing my mother. I fell to the ground and vomit, emptying my stomach of all its content, my mother, my poor, beautiful, dead mother. I try to crawl towards the edge of the stairs, to my mothers body, to Remus, but he's chasing out the cloaked figure, firing spells and curses. He doesn't see me, too hellbent on destroying the man that ended my mothers life, he chases him out of the house and when he returns he finds me where I stayed, sat at the top of the stairs, for if I move, then I'll have to see my mothers dead corpse, and that I couldn't do. The memory stops with Remus gathering me in an embrace and sobbing into my hair as I too choke on my own tears.
When I force Bellatrix out she looks serious for a moment, looking me in the eyes with what looked like sadness and empathy, this facial expression slowly turns into a smile and she starts cackling. I sob even harder as this women mocks me with her laughter. She doesn't say anything to me and instead skips out of the room without closing the door, her cackles were heard for a long while whilst she descended further and further away.
I look to Snape and all he does is look at me with what looks like disdain as a crying girl sits before him. He conjours a hot drink on the desk before me and a blanket wordlessly and stalks out of the room, clearly the lesson was over today.