The Golden Thread

Chapter 10: Aftermath

(A/N: Sorry for my little hiatus, guys! Life caught up with me for a while, but I'll be updating more consistently from now on. Enjoy the chapter!)

Before Lucie or Abraxas could provide an answer, Grace turned and ran up the stairs to the dormitory, tears running down her cheeks. Lucie heard a sob escape her friend's throat, and something began to creep through the fog in her mind. She couldn't quite grasp it, though. All she could think of was Abraxas.

They kissed again, but something felt off about it. Lucie didn't know what it could be. All she could think about since—well, as long as she could remember—was wanting to kiss him, to be with him. There was nothing wrong about it.

"Abraxas," she said breathlessly, pulling away from him. "Should we...talk to Grace?" The notion seemed absurd. Why would they waste time talking to Grace when all they wanted was to be together.

Abraxas put his lips to her neck, and all thought flew from Lucie's mind. "Perhaps we should wait until morning," he murmured against her skin. It tickled, but Lucie loved every second of it. "She may be calmer by then."

"Perhaps," Lucie replied. "And you'd really leave her for me?"

Abraxas leaned back, smiling. "I'll break up with her the second the sun rises. I love you, Lucie. I'd do anything for you."

So as much as they wanted to continue kissing each other, Lucie and Abraxas agreed to go to bed. They had all the time in the world to be together. Abraxas would only need a few minutes in the morning to terminate his relationship with Grace.

When Lucie entered the dormitory, the curtains were pulled around Grace's bed, and all was silent. Lucie didn't think much of it. It was only natural for Grace to be upset, of course; she'd lost someone as great as Abraxas. Lucie wondered if she should have felt guilty for taking Grace's boyfriend, but shook her head. It wasn't her fault that she and Abraxas were in love.

So with thoughts of him, and the life they would lead together, Lucie drifted off to sleep.

…

When Lucie woke up, she felt as though she'd like to go right on over to the washroom and vomit. Her head was pounding, she was nauseous, and she felt an inexplicable sense of shame. Once, during Anastasia's wedding, her parents had allowed her free access to the Firewhiskey. She'd drank far more than she should have, and the hangover that had followed had made her want to die.

That's how she felt the morning after her kiss with Abraxas.

Lucie's stomach churned as she remembered the events of the previous night. She had kissed Abraxas. She had told him that she loved him. It couldn't be further from the truth. He was her friend—and worse, he was Grace's boyfriend—and she cared for him, but she most certainly wasn't in love with him.

What could have gotten into her? The symptoms—the immediate, unconditional love paired with the complete lack of regard for anyone who got hurt in the process—seemed like that of a love potion, but Lucie couldn't imagine when she would have taken one of those. Perhaps it had been slipped to her, as a joke.

With a sense of dread that she could not shake, Lucie rose and put on her casual clothes—which, in 1943, was a skirt, blouse, stockings, and a pair of glossy black shoes. It was Saturday morning, and the dormitory was already deserted. Her stomach growling, Lucie headed for the stairs, thinking that her friends would be waiting for her at breakfast.

They were not. Grace and Abraxas were in the common room, huddled together and looking highly disturbed. Lucie walked over to them, opening her mouth to ask what the bloody hell had happened the previous night.

Grace beat her to it. "How could you, Lucie?" she asked, eyes red-rimmed and blazing with fury.

Abraxas looked angry as well. "Honestly, I thought you were better than that."

Lucie furrowed her brow. "Better than what?" She shook her head. There were more important matters to discuss. "Look, Abraxas, about last night, I think someone slipped us a love potion—"

"I don't think 'someone' slipped us a love potion, Lucie," Abraxas spat. "I think you did."

Lucie's eyes widened. "Me? Why on earth would I give you a love potion?"

Abraxas put his arm around Grace, who had begun to cry again. "I don't know, Lucie. I really don't know. If you're attracted to me, I'm sorry, but I'm in love with Grace. You know that. Trying to get around it by giving me a potion...that was a really despicable thing to do."

"But I didn't!" Lucie, becoming angry, was nearly shouting. "I'm not attracted to you, Abraxas. I never have been. I swear to Merlin I didn't give you a love potion. Someone slipped it to both of us!"

"We've doubted your judgment before, Lucie," Grace cut in, "when you started talking to Edwin Bones. I guess our instincts were right."

Lucie's eyes narrowed. "Don't you bring Edwin into this. He's your friend to."

Grace drew herself up to her full height. "Any friend of yours is no friend of mine. I couldn't associate with someone who keeps such horrible company." Lucie's mouth fell open. How could Grace say such things to her? Just as Lucie was about to retort, Grace spoke again. "I bet you thought I wouldn't find out. Lucky for me, you were too loud. You woke up Lucretia and Eponine. They said they heard something in the common room, and asked me to go down and check. I never imagined what I'd find."

Lucie reached for Grace's hand, but the other girl pulled away. "Grace, I didn't give Abraxas that potion. You've got to believe me—"

"Well, I don't," said Grace, her voice colder than Lucie had ever heard it. "Don't bother talking to us any more, Lucie. This friendship is over."

Realization dawned on Lucie as she thought about what Grace had said. Desperately, she reached out again, only to have her hand slapped away. "Grace, don't you see? It was Lucretia and Eponine! They must have slipped us the potion!"

"Why on earth would they do that?" asked Abraxas. "Lucretia and Eponine's issues are with you. They have no reason to end my relationship with Grace."

Lucie bit her lip. She couldn't tell them about the conversation she'd overheard between Lucretia, Eponine, and Tom Riddle. In addition to her lingering fear of him—he'd tortured her twice, after all—they'd just decided to try and pursue a friendship. She couldn't betray his trust like that.

Grace scoffed. "What, didn't have enough time to come up with a reason? Lucretia and Eponine have never been anything but lovely to me, Lucie. Don't you dare try to blame them for what you did."

"Grace," Lucie begged, "how can you not realize that I would never do something like this to you? We're friends. I care about you, and I care about your relationship with Abraxas."

"You're wrong, Lucie," said Grace. "We're not friends anymore. Let's go Abraxas." The couple left the common room, slamming the door behind them. Lucie stood there, alone, shock settling in. She couldn't believe it. Just like that, Grace and Abraxas had completely written her off as a person. It was something she had never experienced before, and she certainly didn't like it.

One thing was for sure—she was going to kill Tom Riddle. Clearly, he was going ahead with his plan to isolate her from her friends. Lucie stormed towards the door, ready to find Riddle and give him a piece of her mind.

As she reached for the handle, though, Lucie paused. Perhaps Riddle wasn't involved. He was a good actor, but he had seemed genuine when he agreed to being her friend in the hospital wing. He may have planted the idea in Lucretia and Eponine's minds, and then abandoned the plan, but they'd continued on their own anyway. Maybe they had even come up with it on their own. A love potion didn't seem like Tom Riddle's style, after all.

Lucie had to stop, and think. It wouldn't do to go accusing Riddle of something without knowing all the facts. For one, it was dangerous—he could torture her again any time he liked—and for another, it was unladylike. She had to play it safe.

Perhaps she should observe from a distance. She could go ahead and try to be his friend, and perhaps if he came to trust her enough, she could ask him if he'd been involved in the incident. Yes, that seemed like the most reasonable course of action.

Lucie sat down heavily in an armchair, burying her face in her hands. She couldn't go to breakfast, hungry as she was. She didn't think she'd be able to even look at Grace and Abraxas for a while. She couldn't exactly stay in the common room all day, either, though. Sighing, Lucie trudged back up to the dormitory and shoved some books and parchment into her bag. It seemed as though she was going to have to hide out in the library.

Lucie sat in a secluded corner, at the same table she'd studied at just a few days after arriving in the past. Back then, she had just met Grace and Abraxas and Eileen. They were just getting to know each other. There were no complications regarding Muggle boys, pureblood-fanatic parents, or love potions. Back then, she hadn't even been afraid of Tom Riddle.

A few hours later, out of the corner of her eye, Lucie saw someone sit down across from her. She looked up from her book, but it was not Grace or Abraxas, as she had hoped, but Edwin. He gazed at her carefully, and she could tell by the look on his face that he knew what had happened.

"Hello, Lucie," he said after a while.

"You're actually speaking to me?" she snapped, rather impolitely, feeling only a tiny twinge of guilt for her tone. Edwin raised an eyebrow, but said nothing about it.

"Yes, I'm speaking to you. I don't believe what Grace and Abraxas said. I don't think you gave him that potion."

Lucie's expression softened considerably. "You—you believe me?" Edwin nodded. "Oh, Edwin, I tried to tell them that it wasn't me, but they wouldn't listen! Abraxas has it in his head that I'm attracted to him, but I'm not! No matter what I said, they had their minds made up."

Edwin reached over, taking one of her hands in his. Lucie gazed down, curious. "Lucie, they'll come around, I promise. If they're really your friends, they'll see reason eventually."

But what if I'm not here by then? Lucie thought, and for the first time she felt a sense of dread at the prospect of returning home. She didn't want to go back to the future with Grace and Abraxas still hating her. They were the best friends she'd ever had, much better than any in her own time.

The thought surprised Lucie even as it went through her mind. She'd never really thought about it, but it was true. Back home, she'd only ever associated with Scorpius, her siblings, and a few girls in her year at school. It didn't matter if they had anything in common, they were simply convenient. All their lives revolved around serving the Supreme Ruler, and all of them (Lucie included) were so concerned with being proper all the time that they really never had time to actually bond.

Grace and Abraxas, though, made her laugh. They were easy to talk to, and it was about things other than blood purity and the social hierarchy. Lucie had never realized until she came to the past how much those things bored her. Grace, Abraxas, Eileen, and Edwin were the first truly interesting people she had ever met.

And now she had lost all but one of them. Lucie looked up at Edwin, holding back tears, and was suddenly overwhelmingly grateful for his presence. She may have lost most of her friends, but as long as he was around, the past didn't seem so bleak.

…

A month later, Grace and Abraxas still hadn't spoke another word to Lucie. They avoided her at meals and in the common room, refused to look her direction during classes, and by the time Lucie went to bed at night, Grace would already have pulled the curtains around her bed.

Lucie and Edwin had begun spending all of their free time together. They sat together when the Slytherins had classes with the Hufflepuffs, they studied together in the library well into the evening, and Lucie had even begun eating at the Hufflepuff table. She got glares from some of Edwin's housemates, but mostly she was able to ignore them.

As sad as she was to not be speaking to Grace and Abraxas, Lucie rather enjoyed Edwin's company. He was a good listener, and she felt that she could trust him far more than she had ever trusted anyone. He hadn't abandoned her after the love potion fiasco, and it didn't look like he would any time soon.

Lucie's relationship with Riddle had improved substantially as well. He was pleasant during their patrols, and sometimes even studied with her and Edwin in the library. These occurrences were few and far between, but Lucie enjoyed them nonetheless.

Something was different about Riddle, though. Before, he had kept a very careful distance between the two of them. Now, he sometimes stood uncomfortably close to her, and the part of Lucie that wasn't afraid of being tortured again wanted to kiss him. She was still highly attracted to him, despite her wariness, and it was almost infuriating. Sometimes, he seemed almost like he could fancy her, and other times he was as aloof as ever. It was almost like he was playing a game with her, trying to keep her guessing so she would stay hooked. He'd give her just enough to keep her interested, but then pull back and make her try even harder.

Lucie didn't think he was doing it on purpose. Outside of that, Riddle was turning out to be a decent friend. It didn't seem likely that he would be attempting to confuse her intentionally. It was probably all in her head.

One day, Lucie and Edwin were alone in the library, deep in conversation. Their books sat on the table, open and discarded as the two friends discussed what they would be doing over the summer holidays. Lucie was letting Edwin do all the talking, praying that he wouldn't ask her any questions she couldn't answer.

"What about you?" he asked after a while. "I know it's been quite a few months since you've seen your parents. Are you going to be able to see them again?"

Lucie tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear, eyes trained carefully on the wood of the table. "Oh, I expect so. I hope so."

"You've never told me much about your parents," Edwin said. "What are they like?"

Lucie bit her lip. These were exactly the kind of queries she'd been hoping to avoid. "Well..they're great. Wonderful. They love me very much. They're...great."

Edwin leaned back in his chair. "You don't sound very convinced."

"What makes you say that?"

Edwin scoffed, and Lucie looked up at him surprised. "Lucie, you're my best friend," he said. "I can tell when you're lying."

Lucie looked back down at the table. She was his best friend? Well, she supposed it made sense. She and Edwin had no one but each other. Truth be told, she saw him as her best friend as well. Perhaps it wouldn't hurt to tell him just a little bit about her parents. She didn't need to reveal her secret, but there were some things that had been plaguing her since arriving in the past, and it would feel good to get them off her chest.

"Well," she said finally, "honestly...I do love my parents, but sometimes I don't understand their way of thinking. Ever since I was born, all I've been taught was that blood purity is the most important thing, and that I have to marry into a good family. All I'm worth is continuing our bloodline, keeping the Selwyn name from being tainted. To my parents, Muggles and Muggle-borns and Half-bloods...well, they're seen as less than human. Sometimes this all makes sense to me, because it's all I've ever known, but sometimes it just seems...cruel. I never thought like that until I came to Hogwarts, and it scares me. I don't want to let my parents down."

Edwin looked deep in thought for a moment, and Lucie was glad for the silence. She'd never said any of those things out loud—to do so would be treacherous—until then. It felt...liberating, to her great surprise. Saying them to Edwin didn't feel like a betrayal of her family, but as though she was finally being honest with herself.

"I was raised in a pureblood house, too," Edwin responded, "but I've never held blood status in particularly high esteem. Eponine didn't, either, until she befriended Lucretia. I don't know how to help you with that, Lucie. It sounds like you're coming to those answers on your own, though."

Lucie toyed with the ends of her hair. "I think I am."

"I will say this, though," said Edwin, picking up his textbook and placing it back in front of him, "perhaps you never should have been in Slytherin after all."