chapter one: the silver-green poison.
Hogwarts, 2004.
AVA PENFALLOW; GRYFFINDOR
It was five minutes until the train for Hogwarts left Platform 9 and ¾. In the centre of the bustling platform, six people stood still and tense; two students stared at their parents, one unbelieving, the other unmoving.
"What?" I said, taking a step back from my parents. "What?" My voice rose on the second word, and my father looked around nervously at the bustling students around us.
"Ava, don't -"
"Don't what? Don't freak out?" I whispered. "What should I do?" I suddenly whirled to the boy on my right, and my eyes were wild. "Did you know?"
The boy only looked back at me with an empty expression, his features tense.
"Yes," was all he gave in return. I opened my mouth to shout something, anything at him, but he closed his dull green eyes and ploughed on, an edge of resignation to his voice. "It was decided over the summer. But... don't you think this was already coming? I... I do care for you."
"Our families are already linked," my mother said quickly. "We lost so much in the war, all of us. Please let us have something." A hand reached out and clasped mine, and I looked at the owner; the boy's father looked at me, his dark green eyes echoing sorrow that his son never seemed to show.
"I miss my other two sons," he said softly. "But it's time to live now. You and Jasper have a chance that wouldn't have existed if the war had been lost; we don't mean any offence by this, but the Wizarding World needs more blood. If Jasper marries a half-blood, or a muggle-born, his children probably won't have any magical abilities, as he himself is a muggle-born. By marrying a pure-blood..."
"Me." I said robotically.
"You. By marrying a pure-blood, both our lines will continue - and we can all keep the world the better place it is. We know it's early to suggest something like this, but you and Jasper are already in a relationship... and your family more than approve. Please -"
I slipped my hand from his grip and took another step back, breath catching in my throat. The station felt so silent then; most students had taken their seats inside the carriages already, and I felt so out of place among the adults still standing on the platform.
I was not yet old enough to make this decision; not yet so unselfish as to look past my own wants and make the right choice. I wanted to date Jasper, but suddenly my future seemed set in dark green stone.
"I need to think," the words fell from my lips like something inside me pushed them out; something inside me begged me to run, but Jasper stood like an anchor beside me. I can't leave him, I realized. I can't do anything but wait for the day I say yes.
"Go." Jasper said, and I glanced at him in shock, wondering if my facial expression spoke louder than my words. "The train is about to leave. We have to board."
A mixture of relief and sadness flowed through me; he didn't know my thoughts, and the realization hurt. He looked at me as I lifted my trunk, and I stared back. Do you think I'll marry you? I wondered.
I only wished I knew the answer myself.
I walked from both sets of parents without a goodbye. My head felt tight and hot, like a helmet was slowly being tightened around my skull; my vision blurred at the edges, and when I staggered my hand flew out to steady myself on the closest thing to me – the shoulder of a girl I didn't recognize for a few moments until she steadied me, warm brown eyes looking at me with concern. Was it... Mary...?
"Get your hands off her!" a voice barked. It was apparently directed at both me and the brown-eyed girl, because she let go as abruptly as I was made of shards of glass. I blinked away the dark spots at the edges of my vision and turned to the source of the voice – ah.
This was a face I knew.
Ciel Luyten looked back at me with a cold kind of rage in her bright green eyes – so different from Jaspers, so alive and angry – and stepped between myself and the girl I now recognized to be her twin sister, Merielle Luyten. Her ice-blonde hair moved in the cold September breeze and caught on a small badge on her scarf as she moved.
"I see you've let yourself go early this year, Ava," Ciel spoke again. "Try not to come near my sister again, or your next firewhiskey will pour straight out the cut I'll leave in your throat." With that she whirled around, ignoring both her sister and myself, and boarded the train. Merielle followed, throwing an apologetic look back at me before her wavy brown hair disappeared round the corner.
I frowned at the display. Ciel's words were nothing new - I was Gryffindor and she was Slytherin... it was as simple as that. Insults were nothing compared to the all-out death threats that were exchanged almost daily between our two Houses, but Merielle was a Hufflepuff, and they didn't associate with Gryffindors either.
A mistake, I think, and follow the two twins onto the train. I look up the rows of carriages to see Jasper entering the Prefect's carriage; he's reprising last year's role. They made away with the Head Boy and Girl system two years ago; there was too much House favouritism with only one or two Houses represented. Now we only have Prefects for sixth and seventh years; two from each House for each year.
All of a sudden I halt in the centre of the hallway, staring towards the Prefect's carriage; slow realization takes a hold of me as my memory catches up with my thoughts.
Ciel standing by her sister, sneering at me... her white-blonde hair catching on the glinting emerald badge on her scarf... the badge that said Prefect.
CIEL LUYTEN; SLYTHERIN
I was self-conscious, but I refused to show it. I simply sat beside my fellow Slytherin Prefects as if I have always been there.
"I thought Orla Aymslow was last year's prefect?" A rosy-cheeked boy opposite me asked. My eyes flickered to his blue badge and back to his face; a name surfaced in my mind but before I could answer, he went on. "It's Lucio. We've only been in the same year for going on seven years now, but that's fine."
My lip curled as I listened. Slytherin and Ravenclaw are closer to each other than they are to any other House, but only to the point where there is no animosity. Actually talking to one is...
"Bagman? Lucio Bagman?" I suddenly said.
"Yeah," he answered, looking wary. I let a smile spread across my face.
"My family knew your father. Ludevin Bagman, wasn't it? Not to mention your uncle... Ludovic."
Now the carriage was completely silent. The boy's cheeks paled and he looked away, looking more distressed than angry. A Ravenclaw girl beside him touches his elbow lightly before he shifts it away.
"I haven't spoken to my father in six years," he said quietly. "And your family haven't, either."
"Oh, I don't know," I said lightly, and my smile disappeared as I looked at him intently. "One of my uncles was sent to Azkaban at the same time – I'm sure they've had a few conversations through the bars."
Lucio's jaw set, firm and tense, but he didn't reply. The Gryffindors and Hufflepuffs looked at us accusingly; yet more proof, they think, that these Houses are bad.
They're so foolish.
The greatest witches and wizards have nothing but magic in their veins. The sooner our world realizes that we are better off without anything that can corrupt those veins, the better.
I look away from Lucio Bagman to see the Gryffindor boy staring at me with undisguised fury.
"How would you feel if your sister had been killed, Ciel?"
JASPER CREEVEY; GRYFFINDOR
I took my seat just as the train started moving; a small Gryffindor moves up to let me sit beside him. On either side of each group of Prefects are small spaces; walls of air between enemies, like oxygen can defend us from one another.
I know already that the greatest pain comes from everything but being psychically hurt.
I let my eyes slide closed for a few moments and let the talking spill over me. I'm a Prefect again this year... my last at Hogwarts. It doesn't seem fair that I endure while my brothers didn't get the chance to.
Colin, Dennis... I miss you, I miss you so bad. I want you here. I want you to wave me goodbye.
I open my eyes and look out of the window - Mum and Dad are already smiling into the carriage, standing on the very edge of the platform - as I watch, a conductor waves for them to back away slightly.
They've always been like that. Overeager, jumping up like a puppy at every moment of excitement; desperate. When Colin got his letter for Hogwarts they were more excited than he was; then when Dennis got one too it was like they'd won the lottery. They threw themselves into the Wizarding World like they had been there all along; spoilt Dennis and Colin with owls and fine robes, and when they were old enough, broomsticks...
Then my brothers died in my first year.
They told me about bad wizards and witches, and how everything was alright again but my brothers weren't going to be there anymore; neither was Professor Snape, and my best friend Casper, and...
... and the list went on.
"Bagman? Lucio Bagman?" a sharp voice said, shaking me from my reverie. I raised my head and noticed Ciel Luyten – what's she doing here? she's a prefect? she wasn't here last year – smiling as the boy across from her agrees, looking guarded.
"My family knew your father. Ludevin Bagman, wasn't it? Not to mention your uncle... Ludovic."
My fists clenched automatically as I stared at Lucio. By the look on his face, that information was true. This was... Ludevin Bagman's son?
Ludo Bagman was well-known as being the Head of Magical Games for the Ministry, although he had resigned in a disgrace a few years back; half the reason being the discovery of his brother... Ludevic Bagman. I knew Lucio was related to the Bagman's, but never so directly. But it should have been obvious to me; I should have known. On top of the same sandy blonde hair and blue eyes all the men in that family own, Lucio Bagman was a Ravenclaw. Ravenclaw produces as many Dark Wizards as good ones, and they are closely linked with Slytherin: Ludo was a Ravenclaw; his brother was a Slytherin.
Ludevic Bagman was also a Death Eater captured after the war. Ludevic received a life sentence, as did all Death Eaters found.
And the son of one sat before me.
"I haven't spoken to my father in six years," he said quietly. "And your family haven't, either."
"Oh, I don't know," Ciel said, the smile slipping from her lips. "One of my uncles was sent to Azkaban at the same time – I'm sure they've had a few conversations through the bars."
I sat in shock, staring at the girl and Lucio.
Accomplices. Traitors. Murderers.
How many people did their family kill in the Battle of Hogwarts? Did they kill children, brothers, sisters, mothers, lovers?
Did they murder Colin and Dennis?
"How would you feel if your sister had been killed, Ciel?" I asked, forcing my dull green eyes to meet hers, bright with poison curling round her pupils.
MERIELLE LUYTEN; HUFFLEPUFF
They're talking about Quint Toldaren again.
"Quintin Quintin Quintin,"
"Blah blah blah love eternal blah!"
"Hot blah blah Quint blah blah?"
Okay, so that's not what they said. But it's what I heard, and I'm sick of hearing about Quintin – oh, sorry, he prefers 'Quint' apparently – Toldaren, who seems to be Hufflepuff's best chaser. I grudgingly agreed, but only because I went to every match and practice.
No, not because I'm obsessed with Quint. Because I love Quidditch.
The three Hufflepuff girls that sat on the seat across from me looked suspiciously at me and drew closer together, clearly to discuss something that was even less appropriate.
I of course, looked as uninterested as possible while straining to hear their hushed voices over the sound of the train.
"I heard he had a girlfriend over the summer, but they broke up before he came back," one girl whispered.
"No, I heard that he's still dating her but she goes to Beauxbatons, so they never see each other."
"No, I heard -"
I stopped listening and slouched in my seat, watching the landscape outside the train blur into a muddy green. Why do people have to be so obsessed with others? What's so special about Quint, or this girl he's supposedly dating? The corners of my lips turned down as I realized that I had indirectly quoted my sister; in an argument we'd shared not long before boarding the train she had said exactly the same thing.
"Ciel, where are you going?" I asked my sister as she made to board the train. "I thought we could sit together."
"What? No. We can't," Ciel said. She sounded confused though her face was set in irritation.
"Oh, right, you have to go to the Prefect's carriage."
"No," she said shortly. "I will never sit next to you, Merielle. You know that, but every opportunity you have, you test me."
"I'm not testing you. I'm just waiting."
"Waiting for what?" she snapped.
I shrugged, losing any nerve I may have had, and she didn't like it.
"Do you think I'm going to change my mind? That love and family and friendship can change everything? You're stupid, you're just so stupid! Believing people can change doesn't make them change. You have to make them change, and you have to be there when everything goes wrong! Because everything always does, Merielle, and if we pretended like the differences between us didn't matter, everyone else would make up for it. We would be ripped to shreds by everyone else. It's not just that I don't want to be your friend; it's that we can't be friends!"
"But you don't even try, Ciel!"
"Why try? Why risk it?"
"Because something different might happen."
"Oh, that's it. You think that you can change the war and make everyone forget all the people who died, and all the people who killed?" she slows down and looks at me for a second, and for the first time in years there is sadness in her eyes; not anger or maliciousness, just sadness. "How can we ever go back to the way things were, when so much bad happened? The second we stop blaming each other, we start blaming something else. The elves, the centaurs, the giants... something else will have to fight."
"Why blame anything?" I whisper.
"Because it was someone's fault! You think you're special, that all the fighting stops because you say it can?" she looks as me incredulously and steps closer, lowering her voice to a poisonous hiss.
"What's so special about you, Merielle?"
"I -"
"You're not special! That's why you're a Hufflepuff!" Ciel cries.
Then Ava Penfallow stumbled and grabbed onto me for support; as I steadied her Ciel shrieked so loudly my hands leapt away by themselves.
"Get your hands off her!"
The anger in her voice made my head hurt, made me stand mute and simple and stupid, like the Hufflepuff I was - because Ciel thought I was too dumb to understand all the fighting and hate between Houses; too dumb to understand that I cannot catch someone that falls if they are my enemy; too dumb to understand that my twin sister hates me because I don't wear silver and green.
I'm not dumb. I'm not cunning, or witty and resourceful. I'm not brave enough to stand up to Ciel, either. But... I wish I was. And the things we want to be define us more than what we are; because I can hope to one day be daring enough to tell her that she is blind; clever enough to say the words that will make her see; and determined enough to help her change.
But I will always be loyal enough to keep on loving her if I never can become these things.
That is why I'm a Hufflepuff.
JASPER CREEVEY, GRYFFINDOR
"I wouldn't," she replied simply.
I said nothing - but I sat and shook with how much I hated, and grieved.
SELKY MCFARLANE; RAVENCLAW
I sat and watched the dark lump on the seat across from me. Altair, my tabby – three months old, a replacement for the last familiar, a toad that finally... well, croaked – tried to climb off my knee to go see what the thing was, but I held him firm.
It was probably a teacher, by the size of the figure. And waking a teacher up would just be awkward. I wanted to move carriages, but this was the only one with any space left; I arrived late, as usual, and had to fight my way through the crowd of waving parents to actually get on the train. I didn't bother turning around to wave at my parents. The reason was simply that they weren't there.
That wasn't unusual either.
I guess neither was me sitting alone. But I had better things to do than talk. There were so many things to look at outside, and so many new books – second-hand, with broken spines and stained covers, but unread pages nonetheless – in my trunk, so much time to play with Altair...
I felt lonely all of a sudden.
The compartment door slid open with a rattle – faulty door, I noted, it could be fixed with reparo, unless the problem was an oil build-up in the hinges in which case scourgify would be ideal – and Zacharias Caine folded his tall body into the seat beside me.
Altair sniffed at the air, looking towards the blue-haired boy. I wondered whether he dyed it naturally, or used magic. I supposed only muggles bothered with hair dye; probably magically, then.
The door rattled back by itself – a spell to make it automatically shut? lazy – and the figure under the cloak stirred. I sensed rather than saw Zacharias stare as intently as I did at the lump; the cloak slipped down to the figure's lap, and I felt myself stiffen uncontrollably.
Professor Vance looked as if he had never been sleeping; his steel-grey eyes were already alert and coldly assessing the two students before him; with a look of distaste at me, he turned to Zacharias.
"Caine," he acknowledged. Oh, that's what everyone called him, wasn't it? He hated Zacharias. So did I, actually. "How was your summer?"
"Fine, Professor." Caine replied. "Yours?"
"More than fine," the older man paused while fixing his cloak back onto his shoulders, "But too short."
I had yet to relax. Altair rubbed his head on my hand, but my hand stayed frozen, clutching my knee.
Professor Vance terrified me.
It was ridiculous. He had never taught me; he wasn't even my Head of House, he was in charge of Slytherin; we had never even spoken.
But the look of hate on his face when he looked at me was enough.
I knew why he looked at me that way. I was muggleborn, and he was a pureblood supremacist. Nobody dies for being a mudblood these days, but it doesn't stop some people hating them regardless; sometimes the hate never goes away.
"Professor, is it true that classes are mixed for N.E.W.T.'s?" Caine asked, his brow furrowed. Even I felt a flicker of concern.
I didn't care about other Houses. It didn't matter to me who was who; but I knew that bad things happened when students were mixed together. People got loud and stupid and blamed each other for all the awful things that happened, even though it was years ago now.
Why were we still angry?
"Yes." Professor Vance looked irritated now. "And now Professor Flitwick and the Headmistress have both retired, I am forced to take on extra classes... including N.E.W.T. Charms, which I believe you take, Caine?"
I had never understood the metaphor 'my heart sank'.
If your heart really moved position, the valves attached to the organ would break off and you'd probably die almost instantaneously.
But at that moment, the ground rushed up to meet me in an explosion of fear, even though I stayed completely still; my heart hammered and I felt like I was drowning in my own blood, and the taste was rusty and unavoidable.
My heart sank through the floor of the train and back up again.
I was taking N.E.W.T. Charms.
[A/N: I hate introductions. There's too much explaining to do, and the first 1,000 words are always boring boring boring. Ava's POV is a bit crappy, but there you go. All eight of the main characters are here some way or another, bitching and angsting and other such things. I know that Caine, Quint and Lucio didn't get a turn to show their POV, but COME ON. I think this was long enough already. To aid your memory, here's a list of all the main characters;
Ava Penfallow, Gryffindor
Ciel Luyten, Slytherin
Selky McFarlane, Ravenclaw
Merielle 'Merry' Luyten, Hufflepuff
Jasper Creevey, Gryffindor
Zacharias Caine, Slytherin
Lucio Bagman, Ravenclaw
Quintin 'Quint' Toldaren, Hufflepuff
There's no order to the way I write. Things will rarely be seen from Quint's point of view, though he appears often; vice-versa, no-one really sees Selky, but her POV will be in almost every chapter... it's complicated. Probably interesting though.
Enjoy. – appleseedquest]