Chapter Two
Her mother, Ramona, was a strange woman. Dolores always thought she was pureblood. Her magic was just so wonderful. She was so good with charms and house-hold enchantments. Her eyes were usually kind but Dolores had seen her furious before, when they were shunned away from most of the magic community because of their mud-blood family name. But Dolores knew the name was fake, and could not explain the pride and fury in her mother's eyes in any other way: there was a pureblood line in her mother's side at least. That kind of fierceness she only saw in the Selwyns' eyes before, the only purebloods she had seen up close.
When Dolores got home, it was later than she expected. Her mother would sure be worried, and she would have to explain. No, trouble, she could not wait to.
"Mother, I'm home."
She wasn't afraid of her reaction, but her heart was pounding. Deep down, she knew her mother would never be happy for her daughter's display of powers, not in that way.
"Dolores! Where have you been all day? I was worried sick!"
"I'm sorry mother, but something stunning happened today!" Her voice became high pitched when she was excited.
"What happened dear? Should I be worried?"
"No mother, be glad instead." And Dolores told her mother the whole story. She looked her in the eyes through all of it, looking for a reaction. But her mother was very good at hiding her thoughts, and she would not say anything until she was done.
Telling her about the trick played by the Selwyn children was painful, but she took her revenge when talking about the Muggle. Her voice seemed almost a canary's for the happiness that soaked through it.
Her excited grin fell off in front of the seriousness her mother displayed once the story was over.
"Dolores, why are you excited about this?"
"I am a witch! I am more than all of them! Why are you not excited about it?"
"You tortured an innocent man, who just saved your life, and you are happy about it?"
"He was a Muggle!"
"So what?"
"So what? Muggles are not worthy of being among us! Everyone knows that!" Dolores had never confronted her mother about this, but it was common sense, how could she not agree?
"It seems you let other people's beliefs influence you. I have never told you a single word about Muggles' place in this society. "
"These aren't beliefs! It is the truth!"
"Dolores, your words wound me deeply. You speak like those I ran away from." A moment of silence sneaked between the two, standing wordless in the kitchen. "It's time you knew your family's story. Sit, and listen, maybe you will see where all this hatred leads, and what it has done to the world. I want you to understand this, Dolores, you are more a part of it than you imagine."
Dolores sat on a chair, and waited, half concerned about her mother's opinion, half excited about her family's story coming. She had always hoped to hear it, but learned not to ask about it. it was one of the things that brought out her mother's fury.
"When I was your age, my last name was known in all England. All at its time Dolores, I'll tell you the last name later." She added when Dolores seemed about to interrupt to ask something. "Pure blood status was very important at the time, mostly because Muggles had been fighting a war between nations a few years back, and our world had been almost destroyed. Many of us had to nearly reveal their nature in order to survive.
"Anti-Muggles sentiments were really popular. I was young and shallow, and like all of them, I didn't care if a few Muggles died or lived, I only cared about my family and friends, and about my school crush. A guy I fancied for all my seven years at Hogwarts. He was a half-blood. His parents were both Muggle-born, and all my friends despised him., his name was Peter Umbridge I didn't know how to justify my feelings for him, so, for years, I didn't say anything. My family would never approve, and I resigned to marry whoever they wanted, I wouldn't love them anyway. If you find this unbelievable, know that my family was strict, my father first of all, and I was never even allowed out of the house if not with pureblood children.
"In my crush for him, I begun to see how stupid it was to despise someone for the family he was born in. and slowly, I even begun to consider half-bloods and Muggles alike to us. None of my friends shared my views, obviously, and I kept it for me, scared of being shunned away. It was my seventh year when he, Peter, finally understood that I wasn't like the rest of them, and it turned out he actually liked me too.
"We snuck in the north tower in an empty room for months, before my parents announced I was going to get married to a family friend. He was shocked by the news, even though we knew it was coming. We kept away for the rest of the year, and never sent a letter to each other in the summer. It seemed stupid now that there were no hopes for us.
"I didn't see him again until the day of my wedding, when he showed up right at the moment of the joining of the couple, and I burst into tears at the altar. I couldn't marry that guy. His name was Blaise Westell, pure blood, but a total idiot. I ran away with Peter holding my hand, it was a brief moment o pure joy.
"My father tried to stop us with an Incanceramus charm, but Peter engaged a duel with him to let me escape. He barely made it out of the Manor where the celebration was held. I heard on the news he was hospitalized in San Mungo, and they had to keep my father out by force or he would kill him.
"I was destroyed, socially and emotionally, so I ran in the Muggle world, and a kind stranger took me in his house and let me rest there for days. He was a Muggle, and didn't know anything about wizards and witches. I was only a young girl who needed a place to stay for him. I worked as a maid for him, and he let me live there, for a few years.
"One day Peter knocked at my door. He had been chased by my father for the past few years, and now he succeeded into tracking him down, right at the same moment when he tracked me down. I had looked for him, but mostly, I didn't want to cause any troubles for him, so I kept away, hidden. He was badly hurt, by a recent encounter with my father, in which his wand got destroyed. He got to my house by foot.
"I let him in and he spent a few days in my house. I was so happy to see him again. We spent more time together then we ever could, and for a few days, my life was paradise. We barely left the house, we just caught up on all the time we'd lost.
"My father found us, obviously, he is a clever man. He came into the house and immobilized me with a spell, and killed Peter before my eyes. I screamed my heart out, and when the kind Muggle came to look for me, my father killed him too. He then cast a spell on me, and found out I was pregnant, with you Dolores. He cast a spell on me that would only come out if I tried to get married, and would have killed you. So that you would be born as a bastard child. I had no choice. I hid and lived in the anonymous, raising you away from all that sick way of living." Ramona had tears in her eyes now, and she couldn't look at her daughter, she kept her eye downcast and relieved all that suffering in her head.
But Dolores was staring blankly at her mother's hair. It was a heart touching story alright, but nothing would have happened if she weren't foolish enough to fall in love with a mud-blood. Now that she knew her father's heritage, and was not happy about it, she only cared about her mother's last name. A feeble hope of being a respectable witch still existed.
"What was your last name mother? Well… What IS it? You and father weren't married right?" Her expression muted, from indifference to disgust. How could she even do such a thing?
Ramona looked up to her, and Dolores's face startled her. Her expression was a lot like her own mother's, the one she hated and never wanted to see again.
"Dolores… you need to not let this information influence the way you think about… anything. Just let it go, we will never speak of it again."
"I doubt it. Tell me mother." Dolores's respect for her mother was fading away since she learned who she associated with.
"Selwyn, my last name is Selwyn."