Chapter 8, Master
Everyone sat chatting for a few more minutes before Kereston plead exhaustion and headed up to bed. Loughness glanced longingly after her, causing Hydra to shake her head. "What will you do if she's not interested in you when you're finally old enough to act upon your feelings," she wondered.
"It's me! I am hot and amazing! Of course she'll be interested," Loughness replied incredulously. "If not, I am patient. I can wait."
"On that note, I'm going up to bed as well," Hydra said, rising from her chair with a chuckle. She hugged both Daddies goodnight and waved to her twin before heading upstairs. Walburga trailed along behind her as she frequently did. Though she couldn't tuck her grandchildren in, it never stopped her from trying. "Do you think it will work, Grandmother," Hydra asked as she changed into her nightdress.
Walburga didn't have to ask what her granddaughter was talking about. "It should. With everyone on board who is on board, it truly should unless they do something monumentally stupid or overlook something painfully obvious. It's high time things changed. We're a century or so late for a large change if we're looking back on history for a pattern." She sighed, drifting toward Hydra's window to look out into the night. "Push back the curtains for me, will you child? You're dressed now and no one can see in regardless."
"Sure," Hydra said. Though Orion and Walburga practiced daily, they found moving things rather difficult. Now, after years of practice, they could finally manage small chess pieces, though it tired them out, especially if the game was a long one.
"So many things are possible that I never thought would come to pass," Walburga continued thoughtfully as Hydra crossed the room to her and pushed back the heavy silver colored curtain from her bedroom window. "I never thought to have another chance at life. Though Regulus worries this isn't enough of a life for us, it truly is, because it's better than we would've had if we'd remained on the other side." She chuckled. "I get to see my grandchildren grow up to change the world! What more could I ask for?"
"Well, perhaps to go out and actually see the world," Hydra suggested.
"While that would be nice, I get plenty of descriptions from you and Loughness, and that will do," Walburga said. She stood at the window with her back to the room, staring out into the night as Hydra brushed her hair. "I just wish we could make it illegal to breed with Muggles," she said. "Then this revolution would be perfect, with no risk of Muggles and Mud-bloods ruining it in the future. I did suggest as much to Kereston, before you tell me that I should," she added.
"The girl thinks such a law would be too difficult to uphold and that it would breed too much resentment with us dictating what people can and cannot do to that level." Walburga huffed a sigh. "Perhaps she's right, but I still like the idea. Leave idiots to their own minds, and they ruin everything, after all, because those minds are small and stupid."
"It is a good idea," Hydra said around a yawn. "Not weakening the magical races with Muggle blood would be nice, but as you know, Kereston is likely right as well. It's why I enjoy philosophy. Two people can be equally correct on the same topic when considering different aspects of it. It's truly fascinating!" Sortia's grandparents, Mag's parents, had the biggest personal library in the wizarding world, and in it, Hydra had discovered many fascinating books on philosophy.
Walburga sniffed. "One can be more correct than the other, but I understand the girl's predicament.
"Perhaps one day such considerations can be safely implemented," Hydra said as she slipped into bed. "Once everyone sees how much better things are and how much stronger we all are with magic staying pure and all the magical pure races working together, people will understand the danger to magic itself if we thin the blood with Muggle genetics. It won't have to be made a law if it's accepted when simply spread as a good idea. Some may still breed with Muggles, but far less I should think. Loughness and I shall serve as grand examples of the fact that other races can mix successfully with wizards and witches so it's not all about inbred wizards, but one can thin the blood while still keeping it magically pure and strong. It will still give you what you want without the risk made to what we've done that Kereston fears. It's just about patience and time."
"You are a wise child, Hydra. You remind me of a more relaxed version of myself," Walburga said proudly. Drifting across the room, she bent over her granddaughter's bed, brushing ghostly lips across Hydra's forehead. "Goodnight, Baby girl."
"Night, Grandma. Love you." Hydra snuggled into her blankets with another yawn as her eyes fluttered closed. She fell asleep feeling warm inside, because compliments from Walburga Black always made her feel more special than anything else in the world. Though she fell asleep happy, the dream that claimed her mind was anything but. She found herself in a strange manor that she had never seen before. She stood in front of a cold blonde woman with a thin hard face. Her eyes were severe and angry as she looked at Hydra. "You've risen far above yourself, Hydra. Now go and clean the kitchen."
Hydra opened her mouth to ask the woman if she'd lost her mind, but something else happened, twisting her vocal cords to speak the words, "Yes Master." Master? She attempted to speak again, to scream the word no, but instead of her denial, other words came out. "Yes Mistress. Hydra meant yes Mistress!" She turned and hurried toward a kitchen, feeling each step of her feet to be unwilling. She kept trying to scream, but no words would come from her open mouth.
"Hydra! Hydra! Stop it! You're screaming." She felt hands shaking her. At last she was able to scream, and scream she did, her voice tearing out of her to echo into the darkness. Suddenly the room flooded with light. The daddies, still dressed, stood in the doorway with matching expressions of alarm on their faces. Loughness was bent over the bed shaking her wearing only his sleep shorts and a dark scowl.
"NO," Hydra screamed again. "No, No, No I won't!" Though her mind was slowly beginning to realize that she was awake at home, safe in her bed at #12 Grimmauld Place, the words had to be said. The strange manor and the cold severe woman were both gone. It had only been a nightmare. Only a nightmare," she silently told herself as she struggled to still her roiling emotions.
"It was just a bad dream, baby," Daddy Regulus soothed, his light husky voice reiterating her own thoughts. As he spoke, he and daddy Kreacher crossed the room to the bed hand in hand. Both regarded her with expressions of concern.
"It was dreadful," Hydra said, and her voice shook. As she spoke, she noticed that she was still feeling unsettled and oddly frightened.
"Tell us. It will help." The voice came from Grandma Walburga. Hydra glanced over to see her floating in the doorway with grandfather at her side. Like the daddies, the two were holding hands and looking grave. She opened her mouth to complain about the two couples weirdly mirroring one another and how it was creepy. Instead the dream began pouring out of her in all of its horrific detail. "I hated not being able to say or do what I wanted. I know I was being forced to be a slave." She shot a sudden glare at her twin who was looking sleepy and bored. "It's your fault for carrying Kereston's stupid tray like a bloody servant! Stormy and the rest get paid to do it and you don't. I didn't like it. Not on top of the conversation we were having about everyone being free and working together. It's going to be hard for the elves, you know. All of it for so many reasons." Surely they all wanted... Needed to be free, but could they handle it?
"What," Loughness blinked at her, then regarded her as if she'd quite lost her mind. "You're being ridiculous. I'm no one's servant! I didn't see any reason to make Stormy bring it in like some sort of power trip when I was coming back myself. Besides, I like doing things for Kereston," Loughness huffed.
"Like a servant," Hydra demanded peevishly.
"No, like a boy who likes her, idiot," Loughness shot back.
"Valid point," Kreacher murmured. "Kreacher very much enjoys doing things for Master Regulus for the very same reason."
"Gross, but thanks for the support," Loughness drawled, making a face.
"And do stop with the Master Regulus," Regulus grumbled.
"Why," Kreacher demanded. "Kreacher finds it sexy." Loughness groaned, then made gagging noises. If Hydra wasn't quite certain that she was awake before, she most definitely was now. This topic between the daddies was not a new one, but it was always icky to hear about nonetheless. It did serve to convince Hydra that she was awake like nothing else could, though.
"Is that what it felt like, Daddy Kreacher? Constant force while you were screaming inside," Hydra asked, a lump of horror beginning to rise into her throat as her thoughts returned to the nightmare. She knew that daddy Kreacher was treated like family always, but daddy Regulus had freed him, so he'd obviously been a slave.
"Of course not," Grandmother Walburga snapped. "We were good to Kreacher. We loved him. He was family even before he and Regulus began their disgusting... before things changed between the two of them."
"I don't think they ever changed," Orion muttered. "They were always unnaturally close, it just became... physical."
Walburga shot him a glare. "Whatever, Orion. I don't care how, but it changed. Their relationship was oddly close but strictly platonic until it wasn't."
"True," Orion nodded.
"But that isn't what I was asking about," Hydra interrupted gently. Long ago, the grandparents had explained to she and Loughness that though they did not completely approve of the relationship between the daddies, it had nothing to do with how they felt about the twins themselves. The grandparents believed daddy Kreacher still could've have had his idea of creating children that were Pure-blood squared without being physical with daddy Regulus.
A woman had carried them, after all, so no physical interaction between the two was required. Though Hydra didn't mind her parents as a couple, she did understand that it was not the way of her grandparents. In spite of this, they were generally supportive of the daddies in their way, which allowed her not to mind their vague disapproval. Clearly it did not stop them from loving the daddies, and they weren't trying to break them up or anything, so she didn't care.
"Not usually," Kreacher spoke suddenly. "Kreacher loved taking care of his family. It was only when M... When Sirius Black gave him orders that it was somewhat as Hydra describes." Hydra hated Sirius Black anew for that. She'd always hated him for how he'd treated her parents and grandparents and cousins. Even though she was born long after he'd died she hated him loyally as did Loughness, but now she hated him even more for making her daddy Kreacher feel the horrific way she'd felt in that nightmare.