She had never been more tired in her entire life.
As Daphne went, her eyes remained firmly on the ground. She didn't feel like looking around, she was just determined to get tonight over with. The way she cradled her stomach was for more than just holding Merula's things in place.
She'd been walking for hours. She didn't even know if she was heading in the right direction. Her orientating skills were fine, but that didn't change the fact that she was lost in a world where she didn't belong. If ill intent happened across her, she doubted she was in any state to defend herself. She couldn't apparate or call for help. She would be completely at theirs, or anybody else's, mercy. Closing her eyes, she gave a sigh and quickened her pace.
She really wished she hadn't thought of that.
As she passed under each street lamp she watched as her shadow grew and shrank with her. It was strangely hypnotic, especially as the lights enveloped her eye patch, filling one half of her vision with a bright orange glow, only to sink back into the darkness again. It helped contribute to the otherworldly daze that had since overtaken her, trudging her forward at a snail's pace, heading only where her instinct lead her. She had covered a lot of ground since she'd left the hospital, if it was any other time of year, she'd probably be seeing the sun on the horizon any moment now.
Some more time passed, she didn't know how long - wasn't paying attention - but there was still no sun. And it was getting colder. The chill had finally seeped through her layers and into her bones.
She was shivering now.
The dark of the night stopped her seeing more than a few paces ahead of her. Trudging forward, she continued heading from street lamp to street lamp, looking for any kind of point of reference. Shelter was priority now. It was cold - she didn't know how cold - but guessed way below freezing. Without magic, she wouldn't last much longer on her own out here. She had yet to come across another living being, beyond the occasional cat running into a garden or that one fox in the road she'd seen a few miles back, but no sign of any people… at this point she didn't know if she should count that as a blessing or not.
She eventually found herself in some housing suburbs. Something clicked in her head and it brought her back to her surroundings. She was along the right track, she was sure of it. More than that; shapes were beginning to look familiar to her. Zoning out was the only way she'd been able to get here in one piece, but now her eyes were peeled and darting to anything they recognised.
Steadily, she began to slow her pace.
Intentions had changed, going back to Greengrass Woodhouse was no longer the plan anymore. The mission was botched and that wasn't her fault, now her main priority was thinking of herself. Finally thinking of herself. She didn't owe anybody anything, and she'd deal with the repercussions for daring to think like that later. Right now she could go the rest of her life without seeing her father, Merula Snyde or the Carrows ever again.
She came to a stop. A faded memory was the only guidance she had, how she even made it here?
A familiar sight went a long way for the condition she was in. The house was exactly as she remembered. It was in a row of identical ones, but this one stuck out for it's unkempt garden and general run-down aesthetic.
She'd spent the long walk thinking about this decision. It was something she was certain she never she wanted to do, but her circumstances were absolute. It was this, death from the elements or incarceration. Unfortunately that didn't make it any less of a difficult decision, and there were brief moments when her anxieties were trying to make her second guess herself. But eventually she convinced herself that... whatever happened next… it would not be as bad as the alternative.
Reality was running slower now. Her limbs hurt more than before, each step making them worse. She trudged forward towards the house, wincing with every step, but determined not to let it fall away in front of her.
There was once a time where she was always happy to see this front door, and though that was a long time ago, it paled in comparison to the sheer joy and relief that she felt now. Never in a million years had she imagined herself actually being here again. She took another deep breath – as deep a breath as she could manage - and relished the feeling.
She lifted her hand, and after a few shaky misses, knocked on the door. It was late into the night... or early in the morning... but Daphne liked her chances that the homes occupants were awake. For an anxious moment, there was complete silence.
Then a thump.
Her blood ran an icy cold.
Another thump and the sound of shuffling.
She doubted herself again. Her heart sank.
The door creaked open, allowing a partially hidden face to peek through the gap. A familiar eye met Daphne's own. For a brief second, the two held one another's gaze. The eye widened.
A deep, yet feminine voice answered from within.
"Daphne?"
It was a voice that Daphne had not heard in so long. As such the circumstances made her nearly want to break off running when she heard it - it scared her, yet at the same time, and against her better judgement, she missed it and its reluctant owner.
Leaning against the door frame to support herself, she gave a weary smile.
"Hey, Mummy. Can I come in?"
A dozen shouted questions were bombarding her at once, questions that she couldn't entirely hear, if she was being honest. She had long since zoned out, knowing it was the only way to get this all over with. She surrendered any and all physical protest, completely giving into her mother's control. Her body simply floated in the direction it was lead. She was helpless to fight off whatever storm was about to hit, that much she knew.
Tonight had long since ran her dry, and she was just taking solace in the fact she was finally safe.
A feeling of relief washed over her upon entering the house. Her nose was being filled with a thousand nostalgic smells. It wasn't anything particularly nice, or of anything one certain thing, but it was the scent of home. It wreaked of safety and comfort, of Tracey, of their childhood spent playing knights and dragons in the woods around the corner from here. Memories of days long passed by washed over her and by Merlin, how she wished she could go back to them.
"What on earth happened to you!? Are you okay!? What's wrong with your eye!? Sit down, sit down!"
Her mother kept the questions coming and the fact that she wasn't getting any answers didn't seem to be phasing her. Daphne stared blankly as she was pushed down onto an old settee, which was the exact same one and in the exact same place that she remembered it being.
"Why aren't you at Hogwarts!?" was partially-shrieked at her.
She looked properly at her mother for the first time. A sudden and startled sigh escaped her lips. It was Tracey's eyes that were staring back at her, grief-stricken with fear. They brought Daphne back to the room.
With a heavy heart, and her mind racing a million miles per hour, she finally tried her best to answer.
"I've... gotten myself into some trouble, Mummy."
Her mother, Moira Davis, was younger than her father by a few years, but hadn't aged as well as he had. She had the same tubby figure and hair that curled into dreadlock-like appendages she remembered her having, albeit now with grey streaks in them.
The image of her, just like the memories, brought a pang of anxiety with them.
All the times she'd thought of coming back, it was always the unforgiving Davis stare that scared her off. Yet now she was actually here, the stare was absent, and her mother's face scrunched up in confusion, and then as realisation dawned on her, it fell flat.
"Oh, Daphne… please, not you too…"
Her tone - that tone - struck like a slap to the face.
A swelling happened inside of Daphne and their brief eye contact was broken. She had lived through shame and embarrassment before, but this had hit differently. A bombardment of emotions she couldn't recognise was descending on her all at once. Was she feeling guilty? Embarrassed of what her life had become? Frustrated over her situation? Or just ashamed her mother had seen her like this?
Her face retreated behind her hair and eye-patch, and she saw her mother's figure move away from her. Daphne didn't know what she was feeling, and didn't quite know how to process the sensations flowing through her system. All that she could recognise was she was suffering she was in.
Her mother had her back turned to her now, she knew she wasn't just admiring the scenery.
"What did he make you do?" she asked gently, but with a level of solidarity to her voice. "Are you okay? Did he make you hurt anyone?"
Daphne shook her head, fighting for her words.
"No... I'm fine, Mum."
A loud crash sounded elsewhere in the room.
"YOUR BASTARD FATHER!"
Daphne's body cleared five foot in the air.
"I knew this would happen!" she shouted. "God... how could I have been so stupid! Ackley Snyde was the worst thing that ever happened to your father! I was an idiot letting him take you! It wasn't enough he lost his brother, was it? No! Now he has to go and drag you into it!"
Heart-pounding, she kept her gaze glued firmly on the ground. She was rapidly doubting the choices that brought her here. A tear welled in her good eye, but she did nothing to wipe it away. She tried to open her mouth and retort, but her mother simply shouted louder.
"I swear I could kill that man!"
Her mother's face was hidden behind her dreads, but she sounded more fuming than Daphne had ever seen her.
Her eyes inched around the room for an escape route. She saw at that moment that it wasn't just the same sofa she was on, the entire living room looked identical to how she'd remembered it. Just as cramped, cheap and rundown as she had known it to be, even back then. It wasn't just politics that drove her mother and father apart, they also both had very different ideas of what constituted a healthy lifestyle.
And it was a life Daphne had long since left behind.
She was a fool if she thought for a second any of this would be easy. She had not quite convinced herself of that either; more she had just been avoiding thinking of the confrontation that would come it. She had so much she wanted to say - so much she knew needed to be said - but her words were failing her, as they often did in the heat of the moment. She had come with innocent intent. But now she was actually here, doing it and saying it, she suddenly missed the cold night air.
She knew that words would have to be spoken between them tonight, but was in no rush for them to actually start. She was content to sit in silence for however long she needed, waiting patiently, yet anxiously, for her mother to calm down. It was difficult enough just being in this woman's presence, she was not about to start an argument.
Her mother fell silent, her ragged breaths being the only sound in the room. They stayed like this for several minutes, both mother and daughter too emotional to say a word. Daphne had nothing to say, and the only things that came to mine wouldn't do herself justice. After a few moments, it was clear that one of them had to speak again at some point, regardless of how much they would hate it.
Her voice barely a whimper, she opened her dry lips again.
"I need to use your floo powder."
"Why?"
Her mother's reply was quick. It followed an air of accusation with it that churned Daphne's stomach.
"I need to get back to Hogwarts."
Her mother finally turned back to her, wearing a look on her that Daphne shied away from. She considered herself good at reading expressions, but even if she wasn't, the scepticism on her face was obvious.
She winced, and clenched down hard on her teeth.
"A lot of stuff has happened tonight, Mum... I can't tell it you all, but... I honestly just want to go to bed. Please."
Even from here, she could see the tears beginning to form in her mother's eyes. They weren't ordinary tears, either, not ones of sadness or hate, but of frustration. She knew them all too well.
"What's happened to you, Daphne?"
That was the question that broke her.
Something inside snapped. She had no answer to it. There was nothing to say that could justify her actions tonight. She'd broken the law and was a wanted woman, and had just about traded her soul to get away with it. At that moment all of her anxiety and restraints broke.
It took a night full of abuse and terror, but the Ice Queen finally shattered.
She hated this. She hated feeling like this. Pathetic and vulnerable, running back into mummy arms when things had gotten too difficult for her. It took a lot to push a person into actions that went so fundamentally against their nature, but yet she was there. She was a Death Eater, the lowest of the low, and wasn't even good at it. She was a coward and nothing else. She had fallen past the point of no return.
Her head felt cold. Her throat felt empty. She felt empty. Empty and cold.
She picked herself up off the sofa, sniffing hard, and slowly walked up behind her mother. Then, with only a brief pause, she tilted herself and leaned her shoulder against hers. It was the absolute bare minimum that could be considered a hug, but that's what it was. She didn't enjoy hugs - any human contact that wasn't on her own, very specific terms, in fact - but Merlin's Beard did she need one right now. Her mother froze on the spot. Daphne felt her muscles seize up at the sudden contact. Inhaling sharply, she looked down to meet their eyes. Like her voice, her eyes held a swelling of emotion, but her expression seemed bewildered, as if not quite believing what she was seeing. Daphne opened her mouth, but no sound would come out. She silently cursed her vocal cords for their betrayal. Focusing on 'doing' rather than 'saying' something, she buried her face into her mother's hair.
The tears were flowing freely now. After a moment, she spoke the words she'd long been denying herself.
"I'm not the person I want to be, Mummy. I've made a lot of mistakes and…" she choked, "... and… and I always tried to do what was right, but I'm not even sure whose side I'm on anymore. The lines have blurred and I don't know what I'm doing now. No matter what I do I keep digging myself a hole that I just can't get out of… and I don't want to do this anymore!"
A pressure on her back pulled Daphne down. She seized up. A pair of lips touched her forehead, then she felt an arm on her back as her mother wrapped around her, holding the taller girl in a cradle like she was a child.
"Oh, Daphne… sweetpea, I wanted you to be happy. That's all I ever wanted."
The dampness coming to her forehead told her that her mother was also crying.
"I let you go with your father because that's what you choose to do… I never imagined it would end up like this. I am so sorry."
Daphne released a violent cough into her mother's neck, a result of forcing her words out.
"Neither did I," she mumbled.
For this brief second, she knew she was safe. Nothing could get her while she was in her mother's arms. There was an impregnable shield around her. The Dark Lord never existed, her father was but a distant memory.
It was false hope, but she knew that.
Just like the false hope that things would get better. Like the false hope the war would sort itself out before she left school. The false hope that she'd get to remain neutral in a war that was a black and white. The false hope she could ever be with the man that she fancied. The false hope that she could ever be happy - She'd spent so long fooling herself into thinking things would improve, not seeing that she was just setting herself up for disappointment when the truth was brutally beaten into her.
There was never any hope, she was always just too much of a coward to face her reality. She'd lied to herself and everyone around her, and now she was backed into a corner with no way out.
Daphne blinked a few times, trying to dab away at the wetness forming in her eyes. Her mother held her tighter than before, almost like she was going through the same revelation she was. She made strives to collect herself before they separated properly. As she pulled herself from the hug, her mother took her hands on her own. She wiped Daphne's tears away with a gentle hand, before running that same hand through the blonde's messy hair.
Her hand cradling her face, they held each other like that for a while.
"Stay the night, sweetpea. You can have Tracey's room... we don't have to talk if you don't want... Just as long as I know you're safe."
Trying to breath through the flood of tears, Daphne shook her head.
"Thank you, but… This isn't my home anymore."
She needed an escape from her current life, that much was true. But residing herself to the toxic environment her mum bred was no more an escape than it was a condemning. As much as the heartbreaking look on her mother's face convinced her otherwise, Daphne was set in her resolve. It seemed to take her mother a second to process what she'd just said, as she'd obviously been expecting a different answer.
Then, after another moment, she slowly nodded, and began to shrink away from her. The sight of the stump woman waddling away brought more tears to Daphne's eye, which was now leaking through her eye-patch.
"I'm sorry... Mummy..." she mumbled after her.
Her mother moved like she hadn't heard her. She took a scan of the room, paced back and forth a few times before silently exiting it all together. She was looking for something, Daphne guessed, and thanked her blessings.
Alone, she brought a hand to her face, the area her mother had just touched.
It was then she noticed her hands were shaking. It was all beginning to catch up to her now, she'd reached her limit. Fatigue was setting in and her heart had been bled dry. Jitters were making their way into her system, and the shadows on the corners of her vision started to dance and scheme against her. She didn't have long left.
"Do what you have to, I know I can't stop you. But apologise to yourself, Daphne, not me.. "
Her mother was in a different room, but as she spoke, it was the clearest she had ever heard her.
"Whatever path you're on that's taken you to such a dark place in your life… just know you always have a way out... I'll always be here for you, for as little or as much as you want me. You're your own person aside from your father, and I know you're not a bad person..."
She'd heard those words a thousand times, but hearing them come from another person's mouth did more for her than she thought it would. Daphne's hand clenched into a tight fist.
"... Please realise that before you do something awful and it's too late. You're better than them."
Her mother returned and brought with her a barely-used pot of the purple fire-powder. Daphne nodded absentmindedly, her attention now on the pot before her. She took the small container in her hands and drew her eyes over to the over-sized fireplace on the wall opposite them.
Her exit was now closer than ever, yet as Daphne took a step towards it, a horrid, lurching feeling made itself known in her stomach. Her head moved on it's own, and her gaze returned back to her mother.
She looked at her - staring back was the woman that had caused her family so much pain in the past, but yet, also was her mother, the woman who undoubtedly loved her most in the world. Even when she was disgusted in what Daphne had become, she still helped her in her time of need. And in that time of need, it was her that she chose to come to. They couldn't trust each other, they were not allies in this war, but that had to mean something, didn't it?
Any chance of the four of them - Daphne, Benedict, Astoria and Moira - being a real family again, was a possibility that was long dead, undeniably. They were truly damaged, and far beyond repair. But yet, for the first time since before she could remember, Daphne wished that it didn't have to be that way.
When she spoke, her voice was barely a whisper.
"I didn't mean to cut you out of my life..."
Her mother smiled, but Daphne saw no happiness in it, "I know we argued... I know we had our differences, and me and your father even more so… but you're my daughter. You have a home with me, always."
Tonight they couldn't even begin to scratch the surface of what they'd need to do to begin to make things right, and definitely not while she was like this. Her body was shutting down. Her head had began rolling as she talked, Daphne doubted she'd even managed to keep her eyes fully open while talking this long. It hurt her to leave like this, and even more so that she couldn't explain herself, but she'd come too far to give up now.
Daphne inched slowly towards the fireplace. As she stepped inside, she offered her mother a weary smile. It was a false one, and only done to hide the true feelings inside her. Her mother knew this, and gave her a smile back of equal sadness. It was truly a grim example of mother like daughter.
"I'll write to you back more, I promise."
Her mother moved in closer. She had a different look on her face now. Daphne struggled to keep her head straight while looking at her.
"Your father is not to be trusted," she said seriously. "Do what you must, but if you feel, even for a second... that you're in danger, get yourself out. That's the only promise I want from you tonight."
Daphne bit her lip, uneasy.
There was still so much she wanted to say. Stuff that she needed to say.
"It's not that easy..."
Blackness was dotting in and out of her vision now.
Her mother shook her head, absolute.
"It's as easy as you make it, Daphne Greengrass."
