Lyselilla

by lynara-valessie

A girl gets reborn into Naruto's warring states era, dies, then is reincarnated once more—this time, in the Harry Potter world. Only, it's a crossover, and she doesn't know what to do. Honestly, though? She's there just for the ride, family of killers and all. It's rather…familiar. [SI-OC as Lord Voldemort's daughter; cross-posted on AO3]

3. Born of the Serpents — III

LYSELILLA

Born of the Serpents — III

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

[November - December 1981]

---

"Miss Martell—please, you must understand that this was for your own good—"

"Yes, Headmaster. I understand plenty."

What an image we might have made, the man swallowed thickly; an old, tired, bright blue—against a juvenile, hateful crimson. The ghost of Tom Marvolo Riddle haunted him even now. More than the mirrored appearance, he is there in his daughter's countenance—though, the girl is apathetic to an even greater degree.

He does not know what he would have done if she shared her mother and grandmother's face, two others he failed—or even worse, Gellert's face, another phantom that keeps him up at night; but he had assumed his regrets died with them.

And yet, there is this. Just as he fears, Voldemort is still very much alive to taunt him now, by presence and by memory; never giving him the chance to rest—never allowing him the comfort of redeemed shame: just as Albus himself had done, once upon a time, to a boy whom he bracketed within his own bias.

There is this.

(Gellert is sprawled on a blanket of pastel green gingham, berry gaze blank as his lips twist in scrutiny of the clouds. He reaches out to nudge a stray lock of his lover's hair, caught by his brow.

"The sky is violet." Came the accented musing. "Magical tragedy. Wonderful chaos."

Albus does not ask what it means. A part of him already possesses an idea that the answer will be worse than he assumes it to be, regardless of how casual the other young man phrases his statement to seem. So, he only hums, content to lie beneath the spread of the cold weather.)

There is this.

Violet all over again—red and blue, anger and sadness.

•⸻•

•⸻•

Voldemort and Valaena, Clara and Catelyn.

(Frankenstein and his monster, Humbert and his nymphet; Shelley and her competition, Nabokov and his butterflies.)

A parent to his babe, and a doll to her dreamer; creator and creation. It is a perfect alliteration, it is a beautiful set of partnerships; a sublime duality of what essentially belongs to a lone stream of material being. Provocative, rebellious, coy, fatalist, grandiose. There are so many adjectives that she could use to describe her situation as the last vestiges of time flutter by.

(Horror in life, horror in death; suffering from the get-go, suffering 'til the last tick. What a perfect, allusional dance. Gorgeous and grotesque: from the yearning of childhood, to the discovery of an infatuation, to what might just become another lesson in catastrophes.)

Valaena can never guess on the history between her parents. Madness meets its match—oh, Mother, meander on—and she would most often tend to her muses with a masterful misgiving, every time she minded the message the pair's mix managed. What frightened the boy named Tom Riddle into a relationship such as this? There are several things she can pull up: perhaps politics, perhaps companionship, perhaps sentiment. None of them are dense enough of a reason to be so committed, though. They could have stopped at having a daughter, one babe. But he schemed on, laboriously plastering himself within Martell the Second's social penury and making another on the way.

Oh, you really are like me, you are, she sighs as the woman dries her off after a bath, gods, you're so stuck. I wonder what you did to lure your husband in…if you ever did at all.

"Mama, I want Clara." The babe wriggles as her towel is taken off from her body. She is dressed in a loose amber tunic, paired with matching booties in light gold trims; but her content quiet falls into an irritated groaning when she has to wear a bonnet with the outfit. Her hands rip the cotton cap off, and she throws it away with a squawk. "No! Bad Mama! I don't want! Clara, Clara! Cla-ri-ta! I want Clara!"

"Ashling, we're going out today. No playing for now." Her mother summons the fallen item with a wave, gravity defied as it went flying back into those nimble fingers. "We're visiting your Grandfather Abraxas, my love. He wants to meet you."

"Play!"

"No, love." A startled yelp escapes her when her daughter causes several vases in the room to shatter. Crack-crack-crack and crick-crick-crick they go, before Tinsel and another elf—named Bin-Bon—pop in with frenzied and fishlike hops to clean the ceramic chaos, before much else happens. "Valaena!"

"Stay! Sun-spee-yah! No go!" She curses her own lips, she chokes on her own lisp. "Cla-ree-tah, Cla-ra!"

Catelyn clicked her tongue in mild annoyance. She was testy today. Valaena, despite what guilt she possesses at being so difficult, is nevertheless amused. Her mother had been fast asleep in her chambers, earlier, exhausted from another night of pure lovemaking. Thomas was rather rough the previous day, plagued by his own misgivings with the followers he commanded. She had, once more, lounged in her mind's eye as the two ambled about in romantic blare. Her father…had been nice enough so as not to harm his pregnant wife—making sure she was comfortable above all else as he pressed her into the mattress.

Valaena realises that a large part of Catelyn is still afraid of her husband, of the apathetic man he could and would be, despite him never quite showing that to either members in his family. Tom, Thomas, Voldemort; no matter the names he branded himself with, he is cruel to most—but he was kind to them. But even still, even despite his declarations of troth, the lady's own frights and envies hold her back.

The only reason why the babe does not wish to leave the castle is because…well. She is hesitant to let go of this haven. What if something happened, then, while they were out? She would rather content herself with her own toys—and that trapped doll would know best what it had been like to live with Catelyn, in all her years of girlhood. The girl wants to stay here, so she could better understand the dynamic of her family, and to learn her own place within that; and how much more they would progress, from hereon.

She makes another gesture of tantrum, and her mother is at her wit's end.

"Gods' sake, love—"

"Let me," her father laughs from somewhere behind her, "I'll set her to it."

All at once, Valaena is calmed into submission. She pouts and glares at the man when he turns her around to face him, expression set into a grumpy refusal—but he only reprimands her for her actions, not too harsh, though not too lenient either. Catelyn appears so taken aback at how easy it is for her husband to make their daughter listen to him. He only has to say something once or twice, and she is obedient! Or, at least, that was what the babe said to herself—snidely, pettily. What was so wrong with being spoiled?

"We're going to have you meet your cousin Draco as well, Valaena. You'll have a playmate, while your sibling is still inside your mother's stomach. Don't you want that? Don't you want to have fun?" He says, patient. "The two of you can play at Malfoy Manor. I've heard that he likes dragons too, isn't that wonderful?"

Oh, Jesus, she deadpans, are you serious?

"Nuh-uh," she shook her head, "I wanna stay!"

Perhaps she was being too headstrong about it. She sees and hears everything, and it was a problem; she does not like the thought of even sharing her parents with anyone else save for her godfather(s)—and she knew, should they go out today, the pair's attention would be spared elsewhere and another trouble might just come to them.

It's so childish.

You won't deny me this, she stomps on the floor in infantile dander, even willing a stream of tears to trail down her lashes to her cheeks, don't you dare deny me this.

A resolute frown meets the man's patient gaze, and the tension in the room hovers between her youthful determination and the gentle coaxing of her parents. He speaks of her cousin again—of the prospect of playing with him, and perhaps making a friend in the boy. The resistance kept on growing inside her. There was something about the unknown that troubled her, in this regard—while she would normally be open to exploring vastnesses unreachable to her, this is one thing that she refused to compromise on. Her family's safety and happiness.

She clings to the familiarity of home, where her place in it is secure. Entertained as she might be with Jane and Abraxas' history together, along with the idle musing of the man's brood, she did not possess the need to involve herself with the extended blood. Lucius, Draco, and Narcissa are not a part of her little circle. It is only ever Thomas, Catelyn, Barty, and Regulus.

(Hikaku, Madara, Izuna. That is how it goes.

Hika and Hime, Elder Brother and Little Sister, Bastard and Runt.)

"I wanna stay! Don't wanna leave." Valaena insists, her voice small yet firm, her crimson eyes locking onto her father's. Her hiccups turn into sobs. In her mind, the illusion of comfort lies within these walls, and the prospect of exploring the world outside feels daunting. Thomas and Catelyn exchange a glance, some unsaid worry passing between them. It is a moment of silent acknowledgment that their daughter's resistance is more than a mere child's whim. At least, that was how it appeared to her. They can sense her unease, even if they cannot fully comprehend its source. "Out—bad, bad, bad!"

Please, let's just stay. Papa did it once before. He never left for Potter, did he? We can do it again. None of us have to meet with the Malfoys.

Her mother sighs again, then carefully crouches down to the girl's eye level. "Darling, we want you to have fun, to explore and learn about the world. Your cousin Draco is a sweet boy, and you'll enjoy his company. It's important for you to make friends and share your happiness."

No. I don't need to ruin my own reprieve.

The child remains stubborn, her grip on the idea of being here resolute. "Don't wanna share. O-ther peo-ple, bad."

Ever perceptive, the husband kneels down beside his wife and daughter. His red eyes meet hers, and he speaks in a tone that conveys sympathy. "I know this may be frightening, my love. But being alone isn't good for you. You've been in here with no one but us and the elves. We need to get you used to other places, too. You're a strong girl, Valaena, and we're here with you every step of the way. We promise you—nothing'll happen if we meet with your mother's family."

I don't believe you, she wants to screech.

What comes out of her mouth is, "…fine, Papa."

Absolutely the opposite of what she tried to convey. Valaena gazes at her father, a silent and unseen horror coursing through each nerve. Her conflict tears at her: that desire to stay in the light of the Old Palace, and the inclination that tugs at her like a persistent breeze.

(The world has never been kind, not even to its first children.)

After a bit of further contemplation, her expression softens. Her shoulders relax, and she leans in to hug her sire, burying her face against the neck of his robes. The gesture is begrudging, and all sorts of petty. Her tiny fingers clench into the fabric. She can feel him huff a snort, and her mother a sigh. But it was up in the air: that unspoken agreement to trust in their judgement. In this, she decides to take that step into her own true unknown—to meet with people beyond the castle walls.

And all things considered—

Everything is fine.

It goes well.

Splendid.

"Why, now—aren't you a beauty?" Her grandfather groans somewhat as he lowers himself before her, in a show of what she assumed was rare humility, taking a knee and placing a thin finger beneath her chin. His thumb strokes her cheek, the digit soft and careful, with a certain fear trembling it ever so slightly. The lord smiles. Gentle, genial. "I've no doubts you'd drive us all into the Seven Hells with that little frown of yours."

Abraxas Malfoy is a sweet man.

That much is clear.

(Not kind, no. Sweet, saccharine—smart, selfish; the style of cynicism sworn in secrets and shushed sins. The fondness is there, the same sort she sees in her uncle when he rocks his son. But it is circumspect, suspicious. Like he is only waiting for another hale to bear; as if he expected her to follow her mother's footsteps, the way the woman went after hers. She wonders how long his perceived amiability will last.)

(Silver, black, green. Snake, snake, snake.)

Malfoy Manor is vastly different compared to the Old Palace of Sunspear.

As her family arrived, they were greeted by an elf at the fireplace—a poor little thing bent over in age, dressed in a thin slip of a grey shift with dull gold daisies dotting its garment. Catelyn had whispered something to the female creature earlier, while Thomas nodded at her and strode further into the foyer. The colours are the first thing Valaena notices. They are cooler, harsher. Green, blue, silver, black, white; with an occasional violet here and there. Her eyes trailed over each detail—from the glossy Tuscan columns ever so erect, to the carpeted marble flooring fully furnished, to the eccentric collectibles set up on side-tables, to the ornate chandelier hanging so high above them.

It felt grand on a more modernised scale, akin to those wide art galleries she once liked to visit; a history of recent eras presented in one, time clumped into a packed space. Compared to Sunspear, this place is…bleak. As overcast as the sea she often gazed out to, as if it was the clouds given form.

Valaena barely kept herself from vomiting.

(The magic, it is vile.)

(Rigid, unfeeling, harsh, grating. Her skin prickles at the changes in scenery, a fever of shallow proportions overtaking her from the inside.)

She conceded to being brought along only on the condition that her mother's old doll be strung too, for the ride. That is the only reason she still maintained her composure, pulling herself up to be as polite as she could despite all her impulses otherwise. Jane complained about it, when Clara was removed from the glass cabinet and tucked into her new owner's arms. Thomas provided the poppet with only one rule: that she not let herself slip, concerned with the possibility that she might say something wrong to the other family as they convened. It pleased the babe that she could have another companion with her in the damned situation, one who was intelligent enough to pace herself—too bored at the thought of spending the day with her cousin alone.

And so, there is this.

(Voldemort and Valaena, Clara and Catelyn: a visionary cancer, a vulgar caress. Frankenstein and his creature, Humbert and his villain.)

"Oh—hello to you too, Clara." Abraxas adds, once he sees the bisque thing in his grandchild's arms. He peers at it with a curious eye, continuing to feel Valaena's skin. His tone is wry. "It's been a very long time since I've last seen you."

"Merry met, Lover-boy Number Two." The lovely toy greets, as quick and uncaring as ever. Bitter, spiteful; forced to interact with those she might just push down a flight of stairs. There is no one in her inauthentic life that she would rather be with than Catelyn herself, but the said lady was ignoring her. "You've gotten old."

"And you've stayed young. Such is the way for pretty little dolls, no?"

"Such is the way for a pretty boy, too, if you'd just gotten your life together." A sneering scrutiny distorts its features, roving up and down the man's form, filled with mild disdain; eerie in an uncanny manner, like a shot of horror in a late modern film. Valaena lets it talk for her, though, disinterested in the conversation at play. "I bet even Gellert would've aged better than you did."

"I'm sure he has." The lord nods indulgently, disregarding the thinly-veiled insult on his appearance; still halfway-crouched before the pair. "Alas, I don't possess Greater Court blood."

"A damn shame, no?" Clara scoffs. "A real damn shame."

"Clara!" Thomas warns, horrified. Catelyn is turned away with a grimace. "You little—"

"No, no—it's alright." Abraxas cuts his friend off with a wave, laughing as he holds the puppet's comments in stride. He shakes his head, unminding, too amused to even bother being offended. "She's not wrong, Tom."

"Oh, yes—I bet you would know about it as well, wouldn't you?" Clara seethes against the Dark Lord. She goads the man, smug and daring. "You're only half-snake, just as Jane's silver love is only a quarter pure. She said it to me herself. And—oho? I can see your wand, you miserable twat. Hit me with a spell, I dare you. I'm not a Dellie Darling for no reason. You just got lucky, last time."

"Clara, that's enough. Please, what would Valaena think of this?" Catelyn steps in; levelling herself with her father, her daughter, and her previous plaything. The woman scoops the pair into her arms, then helps her own sire stand as they compose themselves. Ever the mediator, ever the weakling in conflict. Valaena wished she could vocalise more about all this—too damn entertained in the while to care about meeting the rest of the family, if even just the reunion between these few is as scathing and double-edged as this.

("You little instigator." Hikaku snickers, watching the chaos she let unfold as Kagami ran after his uncle; Izuna screeching in indignity as the hellion went after him for some prank she herself had set upon the man. "You just love your drama, don't you?"

"What's life worth, if it doesn't kick you between the legs?" She smirks, eyeing her clansmen speed around like fretting chickens. "You can't deny that Izuna had it coming, the fucking bastard.")

"You never change, do you?" The doll mutters under a non-existent breath, but concedes.

"Come, then. I'll take you to meet Draco—he's with Dobby, that noisy thing. Lucius and Narcissa are out—on orders, as you already know. They might not return until tomorrow or the next night, and they send their apologies at missing the chance to meet your child. Crouch is with them too, I bet?" Abraxas nods at Thomas, then sets a hand upon the small of his daughter's back as he leads them out of the lobby. His childhood companion hums some reply or the other. The five of them stroll through several hallways and staircases, then; and Valaena glimpses more and more differences between her own place of residence versus this one.

The portraits here are livelier, animated compared to the rather subdued nostalgia of the ones back in the castle. They wave and nod as they pass by, recognising the current lord's brood in their group; and a few others murmur their respects for the war leader in the midst. Snake motifs line themselves between each crook and crevice, just as they do back at Sunspear—but they relate to the sea, rather than to the sands; denoting the feeling of forests, rather than deserts. It is uncomfortable, that. Despite long being used to the idle guarding of those from the past, it is still an annoyance to her.

With them, Valaena can sense a very minute change in the air—in what she assumed were the wards, the ambience: shifting, questioning, tightening.

Everything around their party circles in on them, just as alert as a den of serpents: all eyes boring through their figures as the predators waited, watched, and wondered.

The humming in her ears is also a foreign voice, slimier than the giggly tittering she was familiar with. On edge, at complete beck and call; much akin to felines ready to pounce.

What are you? Why are you here? What do you want from us?

They arrive at a parlour. A soft breeze flows in from the open windows, ruffling the heavy grey-white curtains hanging from the bars. The babe looks for exits in the room, just in case she needs it later. Clara squirms in her grasp, and peers down at the others they have approached. There, in the middle of the furnishings, was an eager boy Valaena's age, laughing and loitering upon a hovering broomstick. How precious. He had yet to notice them, though the young elf with him squeaked at attention and bowed deeply to his master.

"Lord Malfoy! Lord and Lady Gaunt!" Dobby said, managing to sound both afraid and delighted. He blinks at Valaena. "And…Little Misses Dellie Darling and Lady Martell?"

"Good to know that we haven't gone so much out of fashion that even this wretched rat can recognise my kind," Clara drawls, "how cute."

"Dobby! No! Fly more! Wanna fly!" Draco shouts in complaint. He sticks his tongue out to the visitors, to his aunt's joy. Her mother greets the elf with a gracious coo, before lowering herself to her relative and letting her daughter and doll step off. They do so, then regard the boy with narrowed eyes, faces scrunched up in mutual misery. He stops when he zooms past the lady, then lets out a cry of elation. "Oh, oh! Aun-tie E-llie!"

"Hello, little dove." Catelyn smiles as her nephew then gasps, and falls off the device. He squeals, running up to her, sock-covered feet pitter-pattering on the carpet as he tackles her in a childish hug. She returns his sloppy kisses, stroking his head and cupping his cheek. "I brought you a playmate! Remember what I told you about your cousin? This is Valaena. And, oh, this is Clara. They're both friends, just as you and Dobby spend your time with one another."

"Liar—I only got out today." Clara scoffed. "And don't lump me in with the elf."

And Valaena is prickled.

"Get away! Get off! She's mine!" The babe shrieks, pushing her cousin's weaker form off her mother's frame. His arse tumbles onto the floor, and he grunts, gaze wide as he stares up at her. To most, it was a simple and innocent gesture of familial love. Oh, oh, oh—if only. It is irrational, she would admit: to be so personal, so prurient, and so possessive over her parents. On any other occasion, or had she been another person, she might have sneered at herself. Nevertheless, it is an intrusion on the sacredness of the body that only she and her father were allowed to share. She frowned and squirmed in her mother's arms, tiny brows furrowing as she raged like some bull in a ring.

"Mine, not yours. Not yours. Always mine." Valaena repeated, to the apprehension of the men in the space.

You're a spiteful sprite, aren't you?

(Voldemort and Valaena, Clara and Catelyn. That is how it goes. Draco and Dobby are another unit entirely.)

(Creator and creation, doll and dreamer. What makes it work is the pattern of their existence: harmony just by terms alone. The words lordling and servant are disoriented, out of rhyme—and that, she would say, degrades the two in terms of her own subjective needs.)

"Mine, mine, mine." She murmured—a single set of letters that only her father (and perhaps, his silver-haired romantic rival as well) could understand as she whined. The devotion is exclusive.

(Monster and nymphet: abuser and seductress. Eldritch and muse: destroyers of the heart and mind.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(It was more than just the colour of their eyes that she shared with her mother, this much her sire had told her. They were the eyes of someone who had seen and experienced things that most people could never even imagine, the sort of pair impossible not to feel a sense of warmth for when one gazed deep into them. Less wisdom because of the years, and more acceptance that went beyond them—a weight that only those who have faced the world and laughed can carry. It was remarkable, really, that she could possess both at the same time; as though the destiny for great things—the separation from her peers—was a comedy in itself: never to be realised by anyone else but her.

Seika, they said, was hopeful as she waited to see what the parasite in her womb would grow up to be, excited for the incredible feats that it would accomplish with the famed blazing red eyes of her husband's clan. They told her that it would be a privilege to birth and be able to witness a beast's journey; to be a part of its life, to see it rise and thrive.

Well, they were not wrong.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"There's no love for people like you, here."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

His eyes unnerve her, she thinks, the same way her own used to unsettle Regulus and still continues to irk Barty.

Eyes shaped just like her mother's, eyes a shade of light grey close to his daughter's lavender.

Eyes as cowardly as his firstborn's, eyes as curious as his grandson's.

Eyes that have traded boyish ambitions with Thomas, eyes that have captivated Jane's heart.

Eyes that peer into Valaena's with nothing short of…mild disdain.

Abraxas Malfoy hates her, she is almost sure. Under the warm stone ledges where she often sat, at post-morning and afternoon past, she would see sand and pebbles stumbling down into the ancient water ahead—and she would throw more of it with them, fists up and about in euphoric colours she liked to reap; but beneath the light of a colder country's countryside court, she is forced into a lilting lack of spiritedness. All of a sudden, she must behave.

She was told that she would be staying at Malfoy Manor for a week to familiarise herself with her extended family, before her official presentation at the annual Yuletide gala to be held there. Finally, the chilliest season has arrived; she must comply with the demands of those around her, as is intended of anyone in good standing to do. The girl had clawed for the chance at freedom—begging once more. But this time, she was silent, too prideful to admit her own unhealthy attachment to her parents and to Sunspear itself.

You'll never make it in the real world, like this.

(Oh, but she cannot escape prison with just a thought.)

Her grandsire had to pry her away with a faux mournful sigh, at that. It is then a repeat of what went on when Thomas and Catelyn left her, almost an entire year ago, and left her to frolic with Barty and Regulus in the comfort of that summer-themed castle. Only this time, it is a jagged manor; only this time, it is a new environment; only this time, she is out of her element. She does not know any of the dynamics that might come to play, here.

Oh, she supposes that this place would be…welcoming enough.

Tolerating, even.

But she will never belong.

(Killer, liar, whore.)

Aberration.

(She is the shadow in the mirror, one face of someone she once knew; with eyes crying echoes of the past, and tears lined in dreams were never built to last. It is a blank expression, it is a blank dominance, it is a blank suppression. The things that have scratched their way down her tongue have made it bleed with longing, spitting out no true depths, even despite the glimpse into the sadness of her very own nature.)

("Why'd you leave? You were doing well enough on your own." She asks her elder cousin, exactly seven years after he had already retired from service. "Everyone thinks they're chaining me to you, like this."

"I was tired, Hime. I still am, to be honest. I've never really wanted it." Hikaku kisses the back of her head as he helps her in brushing her hair. He inhales her scent—some faint lavender that she lathered onto it—and hugs her from behind. "Nor do I want it for you…and the elders are, well, right, in a sense. I do think I'd rather have you alive and with me, than crumpled on the field, far from where I could still reprimand you for getting hurt in the first place."

She snorts. "You overestimate my value, Hika."

"Do I?" His embrace tightens. "You underestimate yourself.")

Valaena has to deal with stupid little aperitivos over the course of those days. Her transitions are not only climatic, but also cultural. Then, her playtime hours—which was whenever she demanded it, pretty much—were cut down and replaced with mini-lessons between her and her grandfather, with her cousin to accompany her as they progressed. Alphabets and abaci, picture books and beguiling politics, songs and socialisations; and whatnot. It is boring. She does not hide her intellect, too vain to dumb herself down for her fellow babe.

Draco struggles to keep up with her, that much was to be expected. She can speak in full sentences, now, while he still chirps in clipped clauses; she can express each and every rational thought if she so wished it, while he still did not have the propre vocabulary to even say what he wanted; she strode where he toddled, she twirled where he stumbled, she graced where he floundered, she free-fell where he galumphed. Was it mean of her to set such a standard? Maybe. Did she care? Not really. Is that even worse? Yes—yes, it honestly is. And what does that say about her? Valaena does not bother to know.

Monster, the magic tells her, how dare you harm one of our own.

That new buzzing in her ears is of a different voice. This time, while it is just as mocking as the one she feels in Sunspear, is more aggressive in its statements. It does not put on any airs of pretence, going straight for the verbal jugular whenever she bothered to respond to it. Whatever thoughts or emotions it harbours towards her—or what counted as that—were openly hostile, less derisive but more loathing in its entirety.

She supposes that it is that, which sets Abraxas Malfoy off, whenever they interact. He is still the lord of the manor, after all—and for him, the wards shift to warn him of foreign presences or dangers. His granddaughter is one such thing. What a sad fact, that. Not that she particularly paid much attention to it, too caught up in her sulking and seething to even notice his observations. But she is peripherally aware of his examinations, subtle as he thought he was when he monitored his grandchildren's shenanigans.

"You have your father's eyes, but your mother's gaze." He murmurs, on the third night that she spends with him. The man says it with a minute flinch, as if the statement was something he did not even want to admit; like he could not stand it, nor bear even the thought. "Catelyn was the sweetest little babe. I wonder if you've taken your traits from Tom or Jane, then. You're a very jealous girl, aren't you?"

A bitter, dreading sigh. "Rhaenar won't be happy about your existence."

I am his sister's child, she wants to reply, as she stared up at him, he might hate me, but he won't deny me.

("You belong to the of the sea as much as you are a child of the sun," states one of her Kaguya cousins, "you tangle with living corpses as much as you bathe in your blue fire.")

(Wild war children, madness twice over.)

"Your parents have been spoiling you far too much." He frowns. "You need to learn how to control yourself."

("You've been given too many leeways, niece. You might be my brother's child, my own flesh and blood—but even I won't hesitate to send you to a worse punishment, should this brazen behaviour continue." Tajima grits out. He taps his calligraphy brush onto the rim of the inkwell, cleaning the fine hairs off of any excess liquid before he lifts it onto a parchment. The man glances up at her.

"I know you can do better than this, Kyō.")

She catches a glimpse of someone committed to nothing but lying to himself, in search for some sort of minute comfort; and as her courage turns into uncertainty, a familiar childhood dream presents itself to her: of authentic companions, of shared reveries and miseries, of a wish on a star in a blue sky, of a longing for freedom in a world filled with nothing but routine. It is but a wisp of a forgotten memory, a margin of fact; her own lost ambitions from the past. There is this, yes—a new life, a new family, a new home. Still, she supposed that she misses that part of herself; the kinder, wistful side.

The man before her reminds her of it. Her younger self, the one from the first life. Young, stupid, idealistic; as eager as a summer rain trampling down on a parade, with no wisdom to call her own, save for the hopeful heartfulness that only someone so damn optimistic can show. Her grandfather wants to learn how to love her, she thinks, a very stark contrast to how Thomas said that his friend would receive her. He is guarded and reserved, despite his seeming ease and indulgence.

Valaena knows that it is due to his own experiences with Jane and Catelyn.

(His eyes unnerve her, but only because he and her both are unfamiliar with one another; cloud-grey and unreadable. Eyes that look upon her with something close to care but not quite so, eyes afraid of her potential for ruin, eyes that hold a screen to ugly secrets, eyes that do not want to want her.)

"He's right, I think. Rhae'll smother you in your crib before you could even utter a word to him. Best you stay with the Malfoys, even though I don't like it." Clara mutters to the babe, sometime in the middle of the night, when she could not sleep in refusal to dream. She snuggles up against her doll in her assigned crib, in the nursery where her cousin, too, rested. The two females are whispering to one another in silly titters, like they were old ladies trading gossip over the most inane of matters.

"Abraxas' boy—Lucy—he'd take you in, if your elder prat of an uncle won't. If only to spite him. Then again, it's still a risk. Rhae's practically magical royalty, for all that the Targaryens have gone, in name. I remember him raving about Lynnie's marriage to Tommy. That was, what? Seven years ago. Oh, dear, he was apoplectic. Nearly swept through the entire Twenty-Eight, just for the insult."

"Un-cle Rhae-Rhae, bad?" Valaena tilts her head at her toy. "Why? He likes Mama. So, I like him!"

"You're bloody strange, you know that? You'd suffocate your cousin with a pillow just because he touched Catelyn, but hold some kind of curiosity and affection towards your more murderous uncle? Even I wouldn't dare, Little 'Laena." The poppet does not bother to mince her words, already aware of her sharpness. It pats her cheek, shaking her head in a rather dramatic display of bemoaning, the sound of her green eyes rolling within her fragile face akin to a coin in a machine.

"The madness runs deep, even if he and his sister could control it. Your grandmother's been a right bitch to both her children."

"Gran-na Jenny, bitch?"

"Shut up!" It hissed, horrified. "Don't say that!"

"Bitch?"

"Valaena!"

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(Tobirama gently lays her down into the furs, holding her chin up and looking into her eyes. They are half-lidded and heavy, brimming with lust. His voice is uncharacteristically afraid.

"Would you have me?" He whispers.

"Yes," she breathed, "take me."

The Senju looks like a man in complete and absolute bliss, as if even he did not predict how sweet her reply would be.

He leans down, tilting her head back, and kisses her deeply. The contact of their mouths is nothing short of hypnotic, like a precursor to some magical incantation that only serves to drive her higher and higher.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

Even if she does see and hear everything, there is still much that is being kept away from her. She could realise that, at least. On the fourth night after she arrives, Abraxas takes her to meet Lucius, who is also decidedly neutral about her presence in his home.

Naturally, Clara speaks for her again.

"My, my, my, now you've grown into quite a fine young man." It cackles, hopping away from Valaena and twirling around the said person. "If only your stepbrother had the good sense to keep himself as sane and sophisticated as you are."

"I feel as if I'm missing something here." Lucius loftily smiles down at them, taking his niece and her doll into his arms. She stares at him with that wide, wild gaze; drinking in every detail that made him so uncannily similar to his half-sister. The man stroked her hair, whispering a greeting as he regarded her. Draco whined from behind them, squirming in Narcissa's arms—the lady herself ever a graceful sight, though quieter and less spirited than Catelyn. Like a poor copy of her birth-giver, or perhaps not even half of what she is.

She and her husband both are bleaker versions of the two silver-haired siblings from the Greater Court. Lucius is gaunter, duller, and simpler than Rhaenar; like jade against emerald, or greening water against unclouded pools. He does not have that same intensity, nor even a fraction of the latter's energy. In a near train of fact; Narcissa is colder, placider, and flintier than Catelyn; with none of the easy joys that the babe associates with their relative youth. What a stressful idea, that. As early as now, she can surmise that it would take a rather heavy amount of effort to get them to even so much as like her, at least, where it counted.

Valaena wonders if either of them would hate her, too.

(Even she could notice that Lucius is subdued, and Narcissa is bitter. Mm. This is about that boy with the silver-grey eyes, is it not? She grits her teeth, pretending to be smart but not wise—just about enough to live past their postulations, but not too much to be noted as suspicious.)

How cruel.

I wonder how Bellatrix is, in person. As a living, breathing being, and not as the phantom in my dreams.

Oh, but imagine if she and Catelyn got along. They'd tear your father apart.

"Sharp thing, aren't you? Merry met, Valaena. I'm your Uncle Lucius." He plants a small kiss upon her brow. She returns the gesture, patting his chin, to his own curiosity. It is nothing at all like Thomas' affection; too little, too different, too forced. Crimson dawns give rise to monochrome clouds, and the illusion is destroyed. This is a dimension of space that she gazes at with disgust; in a repressed recoil and a subdued shiver.

"Hello, Un-cle Lu-Lu," she intoned, "me-rry met."

The young man laughs in surprise, before shaking his head in fondness. "Gods, you look and sound so much like Catelyn did as a child."

"She takes more after her father," Abraxas argued, raising an eyebrow, "though I'll admit she resembles your sister by only the slightest bit."

"A bit more silver than gold, I'd say." His son agreed. "Lynnie's the only red we've had in the family."

"Perhaps it's a good thing, then. We've had enough lions for a century, I think." The old man sighed, clicking his tongue. He nods at Narcissa, who gives him a grimace when her child would not seem to calm. The boy kept on wriggling in her grasp, wanting to be put down to play; and his mother purses her lips, before letting him, the other babe making to grasp at his cousin as the family watches them. "What a rambunctious pair."

"Were you and Lady Jane ever like them?" Narcissa asks her father-in-law, when her husband places their niece beside their son. Clara joins them, making faces at the boy. It is a weird sight on a toy. Valaena observes the two just as the adults peer at their queer group, content to be kept out of their stupidity. "I can't even begin to imagine it."

"Valaena would be more like me, I'd say. Draco, like Jane." Abraxas snorts. "And Clara would be Tom himself."

"Tom." Lucius mutters, with a very slight trace of disbelief colouring the way he pronounces the name. His sire rolls his eyes at his reaction, but does not elaborate.

"Tom, Tommy, Thomas," Clara herself laughs, squishing Draco's cheeks between her bisque palms, "is he visiting tonight? I'd've assumed that he and Lynnie would be the ones having 'Laena, not you. Honestly, I'd take Barty to do her prepping. Is this even wise? I don't think your lot's even going to be happy to hear about another Martell heiress."

"No, they won't. Orion had just sent word of his retraction. The Black family has withdrawn itself from the fray. The two are supposed to be meeting with him at the moment." The lord takes a knee once more, just as he had a few days ago. Valaena toddles over to him with a grumpy grunt, settling herself into his hold as her agemate does as his childish instincts demand. Her grandfather notes this interaction with scrutiny. "Not that it's going to stop Thomas from his goals. I don't think he and Catelyn need any more support or encouragement, on our end. Again, as we've witnessed…the trial was enough."

Your father has corrupted our young.

This is hardly any of my concern, she is deadpan as Draco and Clara put out an attempt at a waltz, to the adults' mild hilarity, both whining and whooshing past like dumb chickens gone aflight, Catelyn is not yours.

Oh, aberration, she was—she had always been, even before that repulsive creature that you call a parent came into her sights. And now, with you in it, you've destroyed everything. The little flower was meant for something greater than life itself—and you reduced her into nothing but a husk of what she could've been. You should not be here. You should have never grown inside her womb.

("You should have never lived to begin with," Junichiro levels a brutal hand to her cheek when she backtalks, once, as she expresses her frustrations and disappointments with him, "you do not get to complain. This is the privilege that you have earned for yourself.")

Abraxas, Catelyn, and Lucius. No doubt, he'd snatch the young dragon as well, when he comes of age, the new voice hisses and sneers, and she could almost picture it taking her by the throat, its claws pushing her head underwater, you are a ruin and you are ruin, and your existence is unwarranted as much as it is unwanted.

This is not the scheme that she knows, nor needs, nor longs for. This is not her father, this is not her mother, this is neither of her uncles. She loved the beach, she loved that islet they resided within: the salt, the sands, the sun; the crashing waves and how they lapped against her skin, the idea of leaving her troubles in the ocean, the vastness of it all, and the way it was so much larger than she is. In a sense, she is more connected with the sea than the land. Every time she had been allowed to walk the shore, she was alive, alive, alive: her entire soul illuminated—one with the waters, one with the heat, one with the summer.

Gods forbid that she woke up from that idyllic period.

The world has broken her, time and time again.

It cannot do so, now—she would not let it.

(So, she will break it, if, once more, it even so much as tried.)

That is the little girl that she once was, that is the little girl that she never got to be, and that is the little girl that she is now being.

("Hime," he whispers it, afraid, "please."

"Little Sister," murmurs another, "don't do it."

"Brat," the man scoffs, "you are no child of mine.")

("Kyō," the first half of her grins savagely, "the world doesn't owe you anything."

"We can leave, y'know?" the other one smirks, "damn the responsibility.")

("Time to fall," she swallows, closing her eyes, "the end might just come, after all.")

Valaena closes her eyes and tries not to cry. She wills the image of the stars in her castle behind the dark. There, they were worlds far away, but they had been nostalgic flitters of light that she could grasp. Here, they are solid: dreams etched onto tapestries, with names assigned to each blinking body; mortalised and demeaned. She hates this place, she hates these people. The babe senses another mental breakdown, imminent as it goes with her infantile state, the dreaded aftermath raw.

She does her best to not let each cold voice's heartless words affect her. But they persist, regardless. And yet, she would not regret anything of what she has rewritten in this version of the story—and she would pen a million more futures, she would delude herself with even worse fantasies, if it meant that she could remain by her mother and father.

Is she a monster for it?

(Do monsters get the honour of love?)

It is not a foreign amusement if she decides that she does not want to be. Once, she attempted to fix a system that was already broken the moment it was made. But did she succeed? No. If anything, she even contributed to its propagation. Uchiha Kyō was simply another statistic, great as she grew herself to be. That had not been something she possessed control over. Her trauma was never hers either, it was her father's—and each other pain that came after, they were the faults of others.

(Of men she idolised, of men she thinks she loved.)

Abraxas is not an evil man, not by any stretch of the word, even if he did have a morally ambiguous caricature of a character. When Lucius and Narcissa take their turns in tutoring (read: babysitting; even if none of them would ever admit to doing that) Draco and Valaena, he is there to support them, content to let his brood's blood flourish as much as it could in these times. Whatever she fails to gleam, then, is in no responsibility of her own. She never bothered to look past the general idea of the war whenever she dreamt.

If she comes across a lord or the other scheming, if she passes by another family weeping in anger and anguish, if she finds ugly and uglier truths coming to light and context; then she does nothing. Because their comfort is the song of their security—damn the rest of the world.

("Shoganai, shoganai, shoganai," she hums to herself, "the way things have been, the way they are now, the way they'll always be.")

("The big fish eat the little fish, and I keep on paddling." She recalls that quote, she lives that philosophy. Her nails, sharpened and manicured, go tap-tap-tapping on the lacquered wood of her low table. "What more is there to life, if not for the lovely conveniences built for a piece of a peace of mind? This is it, this is authentic living.")

What she did was her own choice.

"I don't like it." She tells her grandfather, straight from the get-go, all pretences of innocence shot to dust when she could not bear the inanity anymore. It is the afternoon after she ascertains her standing in this family. Naptime for the babies, although she remained awake. Her expression is unemotional. "I want Mama and Papa. Don't wanna be here."

"Don't like what? Being at Malfoy Manor?" He condescends, though there is a hint of wariness in his tone. The man replies in kind, as if he knew that she knew what he was saying, that she understood; that, even despite his obvious inner turmoil, he is the one sacrificing something to indulge her.

"Your parents are active in the war effort. Neither one could attend to you now, even if they wanted to. Thomas is with the Minister, and Catelyn is with the Queen. One of your godfathers is dead, and the other is on the brink of collapsing. Crouch, that neurotic boy, would sooner implode than know how to properly raise a child. And even if you were left to the care of elves in Sunspear, they alone wouldn't be able to raise you in good sense. Who else would you even turn to, hm?"

Rhaenar!

"You will stay here, and you will learn your lessons. Clara's with you. She'll keep you at it. You'll be presented to the courts this Saturday. Draco needs his playmate, Lucius needs his validation, Narcissa needs her cousin back, and I need my damn sanity intact." Her grandsire frowns, pinching the bridge of his nose. His nostrils flared ever so slightly as he sighed in frustration. "Gods, you're too smart for your own good."

"Let go. Don't wanna be here. You too." She pouts, tugging on the lapels of his robe to emphasise her point. Her face twists into an attempted sneer, to which he huffs a chuckle at. "I want Un-cle Rhae-Rhae."

Abraxas clicks his tongue in reprimand, tapping her tiny wrists. "Quit that. We do not squall or demand. What on earth has Catelyn allowed you to get away with?"

She does not tell him.

(She does not think that he will even listen.)

He says nothing more to her, after that.

(Ahd her, she has nothing else to say.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(It was her choice to kill people. Ultimately, that is what it was, is it not? And if she had been that killer, that liar, that whore that people expected and demanded her to be; then that was what she is. Their little self-fulfilling prophecy comes alive. That was all there is to it.

Even many whiles later, when after her father dies and she lies in a separate bed, she reminisces about the progress of her second life; a side of the coin she picked for herself. The girl stares at the ceiling, eyes wide open despite the lack of light.

The world is almost asleep. Just barely.

Most would feel safe.

She does not, she is not. Her mind is racing all over the place. When she turns over, her eyes settle on the faint dots of snowfall outside her window. The sky is more peaceful than ever, grey-blue in the late winter, a kinder season that she kissed when she was half-awake and delirious. There is a half-smile on her lips, face bright from sleep, almost like the child that she is not.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"You're already better than they ever were. And yet—somehow, in some way, you've ended up worse than they did."

"That's the thing about this damn family, isn't it? It's just a never-ending cycle of mistakes."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

What she observes of Abraxas and Catelyn is strange. Dysfunctional at best, if anything. But there is a clear bond between them, one that Valaena cannot quite decipher—so different as it is to the relationship that she shares with her own sire. Her mother has never really imposed any stances upon her, regarding her family, isolated as they had been in the first year of her life alive in this world. What the child remembers of it is only a lovely haze, scarred by separate events; and so, it does not occur to her what goes on outside of that fragile space she called hers.

It goes like this.

"He's a cruel, cruel man," the lord murmurs, almost like a warning, but also as a note of acceptance, "you know how it goes."

"He's a cruel, cruel man," the princess repeats, in both sad joy and joyful sadness, "this is the way it must go."

There is something funny, freakish, and feverish about listening to the two speak of Thomas. This is not quite the derision-slash-admiration that Barty and Regulus have expressed in the past. Similar to it, yes, but not the same. Where the two boys were content to regard the man in begrudged respect, the father-daughter pair that the babe has taken to stalking view the Dark Lord in a deeper monstrosity; in affectionate hate—incredibly, beautifully exhausted with loving, though never done in doing so.

They love him because they know him, in full: one, as a childhood friend—the other, as her husband. Though Valaena held no suppositions against the notion that Tom Riddle kept most things to himself as a youth, she could tell that, at the very least, Abraxas Malfoy possessed a perspective on the boy he was like no other does. All that he had been, her grandfather was there to watch it all evolve. His daughter is a complicated factor. Oh, there is even less question on Catelyn having some sort of all-knowingness—mortal as it is, tilted and flawed as it has become. In point of fact, her dragon dreams—or whatever equivalent she has—allowed her a deep dive into her spouse's heart, body, and mind.

Malfoy and Martell are hopeless.

"The only reason you are here—the only reason that he keeps you around—is because he needs someone to fill the empty spot that your mother has left in him," Abraxas speaks bluntly, to Valaena's shock, "he keeps you only as a consolation piece. You know this, Catelyn."

"Regardless," Catelyn swallows, blinking her tears away, "I have his babe. Another on the way."

"He wants them because they are him."

"It's more than enough," is the denial, "it has to be."

"I swore a vow to keep you from falling into the same madness that Jane was cursed with—"

"The curse of what, exactly? My very existence is a cosmic joke. There is no curse. There is only me." The girl laughs. She does not attempt to layer anything above the acidic reply. Her mother relays another series of sorrows.

"In many ways, I envy Valaena. Valaena! My own child! My baby, my only one—and she carries his love as if it were nothing, as if it were as freely given as breathing." Catelyn breaks. "Whereas I have to be vigilant, I have to be aware of the situations I find myself in—and all just to keep his attentions and affections!"

Valaena knows that no amount of deep, dreamless sleep would ever erase it, that trauma, irrespective of the concept that the lady suffered only in slumber. Sometimes, even she wished she could bash her head against the walls, just to get rid of the sensory overload and forget all that she is made to realise. So, then, this revelation before her is a slap to the face.

"I would lock myself in and look after her for a whole day—for months, for a year—on my own, in my chambers—if it meant that he kept returning to us. No more of that Black wench, or that silver whore." The woman gasps, clutching at her chest as she refrained from throwing a square crystal candle holder from a table—and only just.

"Don't speak of your mother that way," Abraxas snapped, but softened when his daughter's eyes shone with hysteria, "Catelyn. My sweet girl."

"You can't simply dismiss all I've done and had." Catelyn implored, her voice a measured mix of defiance and desperation. "It's enough. It has to be, it has to be—it has to be! I…I might not hold his—his love. Or…or whatever counts for it."

Her voice wavers.

"But he's devoted to our family."

The older man's gaze bore into his daughter's. "Devotion, my child, is not merely a commitment borne out of duty. We can both see how shallow he is when it comes to you—I know it best, girl, I've known him since he was a boy, swooning all the chits like some muggle frontman! He stays because you bore him heirs, not out of a genuine connection—you've admitted this. You can leave! You're of Greater Court blood—you have all the rights to abandon him! All's the rage about you being 'influenced' by the Dark Lord—but it's becoming too much, Catelyn!"

She slams her palms onto his desk in a mixture of hurt and frustration. "You don't understand—we both have our burdens, duties to fulfil—"

Valaena's mother is cut off with a sigh from her father—a heavy exhale that carries the weight of years of wisdom. "I understand more than you think. You're…you're exactly as I've been, when your own mother sprung from her insanity. Do—do you remember that? Nineteen-sixty-eight. Just before the execution."

That shuts her up.

What is it about, Valaena muses to herself.

"I had to draw the line. For the sake of many—and especially for you and your brothers—I had to draw a line." He carefully approaches his daughter, taking her into a firm embrace and stroking her hair. The girl flinches, but she does not refuse him this show of his care. "He does the same to you—can't you see it? I can see the compromises he forces upon you, the sacrifices you make for the sake of this family. But is it truly love if it comes at the cost of your happiness?"

The room fell into a strained silence, the air thick with unspoken truths. Catelyn purses her lips and looks down. She is caught between a supposed yearning for her husband, and the routine of expectation. She pauses for a moment, as if collecting her thoughts. Her expression does not change at all, even as she answers in subdued snide.

"I…I'm not sure. Truthfully, I can't even tell anymore. I used to hope that it never came to it. But it's easy to feel powerful over someone else when all you can see is the back of their head, as they walk in front of you. That…that's how it is, Father. When I dream. That's how it is." The young woman cries into his chest. "I keep seeing all these things—stuck, wondering if any of them will happen, that'll make me turn around and see it all as it is. Because then, well…everything would fall into place."

She stares at him, as if waiting for a response, before following up on her own words anyway.

"Can't you see? It's inevitable. All I've been as a person—right from the very start, even before I was born—it's…it's all scripted, and I'm here to see that role to its conclusion. I was afraid to see the ending. Mother was right all along. The story isn't even tragic, anymore—it's well and truly just a waste of life. But I can't stop. Because if I stop now, then I'll have to keep staring at someone's head for ever and ever—and I'll never live for myself. This is all I can take."

She exhaled. "This is all I can take."

The lines on the old man's face relaxed. "Catelyn…you deserve so much better. More than this sham of a marriage, more than this bloody chase, more than this housewife role he reduces you to. You've been destined for so many great things. Tom, Thomas—whatever he says his name is—for all his merits, cannot offer you any of it."

Another tear slid down her cheek as she choked back her pain. "…I love him. I love him, I love him, I love him. I can't leave."

"He's a cruel man." Abraxas argues again, although this time, his assertion is weak. "He's a cruel man."

"No more than life itself has already been." Catelyn buries her face into his neck, weeping. "This is the only kindness I could have."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(The world is laughable. This is what holds constant of her life, no matter where she took herself; whether in depressed mania or apathetic dissociation. Er, lives—plural. That has never really changed, irrespective of the form she inhabited, or the faces she seared into memory. From hypocritical to delusional, from shudders of pleasure to sobs of shame, from her pseudo-messianic tendencies to an accountability for her actions; she giggles along with the chatter, with the void, if only to distract her from her own loneliness.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"Where are we going?"

"Where do you want to go?"

"Is there even anywhere for us to go to?"

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

Time is slow as the last three days before her presentation passes. On the night before she is to be prepped, she lies restless in her assigned crib. Clara fussed over Draco earlier—the boy taking the doll from her in the initiative to gain a playmate he desired; and so, Valaena is left to twist and turn alone in her cot. When the moon rises, and with it, the stars glimmer; she steps into her dreamland once more, antsy when she visits her parents in her immaterial form. The two would not return until the next day, swamped as they were with the war efforts—and morning was already a set of hours too late for her impatience to follow, so, she beat them herself and went ado about it.

Catelyn sits on a chaise, staring out of a large window that overlooks the sea. It is the same room wherein Valaena had spent her first weeks in, the very chambers that she had destroyed as her godfathers met her. Her mother's gaze is sad. She keeps silent, only ever staring out at the blue expanse of the Atlantic Ocean, with seemingly little left to her energy as she thought and idled. The child goes over to her, padding with a pout, missing her warmth. Seven days. She needed to spend another entire week away from her parents, just as she had a year ago. Oh, but it is vexing, and until tomorrow, she has to content herself in grumbled resignation to wait.

("One more day, just a few moments longer." She pleads to the man beside her, pulling him back down with a rough grip before he could leave. He grunts at the unforeseen display of strength. Her claws dig into the firm skin of his forearm, like jagged stone piercing through an animal pelt, forcing him to still before she decided to manipulate the bones in her fingers and drag them along one of his veins.

"You can't keep doing this." The albino sighed, slumping against her smaller form. With a shift of his hips, he rolls them both over; her frame atop his, head nuzzled into his neck. "You and I had an agreement."

"Bold of you to hold me to my word," she laughs, taunting him, "considering you'd raged at me for being a liar when you discovered who I was.")

"I think I'm wrong—I think I've been a fool again. Or, rather—I've always been, and this is the only time that I'm truly telling it to myself." Catelyn talks to nothing and no one. It sends a chill down Valaena's spine, causing her to freeze, heart pounding within her ears in fear of the idea that her mother could somehow sense her there. But the lady stares ever on, giving no indication of such a thing; and so, her child touches her hand with a ghostly graze, searching to provide a consolation that barely even comes. Her lilac eyes sparkled with unshed tears, though she appeared radiant in the pale moonglow—like a dream goddess that a sailor may catch in a bottle.

A true beauty, through and through; in love, in lust, in anger, in melancholy, in joy, in pain. She could almost forget everything else.

"You love them both because they are your children. But you want me only as a wife. You liked me enough as my father's daughter, you liked me enough as my mother's legacy, you liked me enough as my brothers' tool." The woman leans back, the muscles in her neck contracting in a soft reflex. She runs a hand over the bump on her stomach, a barrier of red flesh and pink silk keeping her apart from the life within. Her words cause the girl to pause. "My entire being is for you, spirit and mind—and yet, you're only ever mine in body."

There is a shadow of a man behind her.

Valaena's breath hitches.

"I'm tired of dreaming, my Lord."

Catelyn still believes that her husband holds no affection for her.

Not truly.

And—

But—

Well.

(She had long denied it, she has always kept it out of her immediate regard. But there it is, and it is there: that doubt, that longing, that angst.)

(Oh, her father might be far more human than she expected. Tender and thankful, caring and considerate. A dream man, a perfect family member. Not at all like the bastard that she learned to label a sire in her past; only ever destructive towards others when he was off and about, seeking glory being the Dark Lord. But she knows, deep inside, that he yearns for something else. Power above all else, maybe? Perhaps he wants his little babe close, in his own right. Their daughter is a result of his seed, after all. But he likely does not have that same regard for his partner, no.)

"I'm so tired. I'm so tired. When does it end?" Catelyn repeats, laughing with a shaking curl to her lips. "I can't sleep, because I worry about you and our child. I can't sleep, because I fear the presence of another woman's devotion. I can't sleep, because I fear my brother's growing insanity. I can't sleep, because I keep seeing my mother's face in my dreams. I can't sleep, because I've seen what becomes of us, and our future."

It is a statement of fact. "When does it end? Oh, much too soon."

She tilts her head back. "I can't bear it."

In that moment, Valaena views it all in a plain picture: before her is a young woman, still barely one, really, who wants nothing more than to fade into the sea, to disappear forever.

And she…can empathise.

(The haze returns. Its airiness, its easy wind, its passing satiation; she floats in the sea, she hovers in this tenseness. The water flows her along, carrying her to the gods-know-where—leaving her to wonder what would become of everything, once this ends. Grey, white, blue. Clouds in the sky. The sun and the salt sting her vision. No more reds and blacks, no more rage and hate. Only existence, and the question of why.)

Catelyn casts an uncertain grin in the direction of the fireplace where her daughter used to play. The said girl stumbles over, upon noticing Thomas within the space. It is a cold winter night. In his clutch is a fleece blanket, which he drapes over his wife's shoulders. She exhales, unable to meet his silence. The husband sits beside her, never once responding to her accusations and her heartache. What is he thinking? Valaena phases between their legs; a sound of sorrow escaping her throat—much akin to a beast in a rut, an instinctual thing scrabbling for satisfaction.

They are beautiful, like that. She wishes she could truly be in their grasp, then; because, if for nothing else, her being there might count for the formality of their union. The wife leans into his side, swallowing thickly. By instinct or by habit, Thomas returns Catelyn's embrace. He buries his face into her hair, inhaling her scent; and Valaena jumps up, the urge for inclusion overtaking her. She passes through their bodies, along with the chaise. With a snarl of irritation, she tried again, and griped when she could only pretend that she felt their forms.

"…you're crying." He murmurs. His partner trembles, face turned away, unwilling to be seen.

"…I'm sorry." She controls her breathing. "I'm so sorry."

The man hesitates, then kisses her brow. "…me too."

They fall into an uneasy quiet once more.

Then, "You say it to her all the time. I don't think you even notice. Or, even if you do, you could accept it. I've done everything to be by your side. I left my brother, I've forgone my ambitions, I razed through half the courts for you. You placate me with inane platitudes, you distract me with pretty words. But you've been ignoring my question this entire time. When is it enough, Thomas? What does it take for you to say those words to me? What would it take for you to so even just so much as utter them?"

(What a pathetic reason to live. And yet, she understands.

The killer scoffs, the liar smirks, and the whore looks on in pity.)

It is a rendition of what happened in a chapter past: that very same query, in orbit of a depressed desperation; but where the husband once asked his partner out of annoyed care, the wife whispers in an exhausted sob.

"You know I can't tell you that. Don't ask it of me." Thomas hesitates. "I—"

"Then I need your touch." Catelyn cuts him off, gripping the fleece blanket to keep it from slipping. "I need you to hold me. Just hold me. Please."

And he does.

She glances around the room, but no one else seems to be watching. Valaena yearns to capture her mother within her own embrace; as a young woman of the past, in connected rue, to mimic—because she knows what she is feeling, and she understands the pain. The woman does a bold thing; she returns her husband's seize, burying her face into his neck. It is a small, feral gesture, born from the inexplicable need for validation and belonging. It is not that she has never been this forward with him before, even when their daughter was present, but the action is indiscrete—a full show of the odd chance at emotional honesty.

There is nothing carnal or vulgar about this. She had learned to associate the pair's relationship to be something so scandalous: her own sick entertainment, for want of what already came to pass. But it does not work that way, does it? Kyō and Izuna are figures long dead. To her, at least. Perhaps he still exists within that alternate world—but she is gone to him, and for all that she thinks of conquering this new magic, she is not delusional enough to ignore the fact that it is more vast than she could assume. There is no sure method of returning. She should move on.

"Will you ever feel the same way?" Catelyn asks. "Will I ever hear it from you? Past the children I bear, would you ever have me, for me?"

"You're here, now. Is that not enough?" Thomas replies. "We're here. That's what matters."

"I want to die." She finally weeps. Her tears streak down, silver shines beneath silver light—and she cries into her hand, shaking her head. "I don't know what else to do, anymore."

The words hit Valaena like a dagger to the gut. She wants to die. Catelyn wants to die. Her dear, sweet mother—beautiful, beautiful, beautiful; darling and damned. Oh, but no. She could not let her go—she cannot, she will not. Much is already at stake, as it is, with their idyll at threat.

"We'll fix this." Thomas promises, seemingly on the same train of thought as his daughter. The girl panders over to him, setting her head on his lap. She sighs. She would do anything—anything at all—to help make both of her parents happy; to make amends for whatever horrors both had gone through. Everything, but to let either leave this world.

The man cups his wife's face in his hands.

"I've made many mistakes," he says, "terrible, inexcusable ones. But you've given me the most precious gifts. I will take care of you now; I will give you a life as happy and wonderful as you deserve. Just…give me the chance."

He kisses her gently, and wipes away her tears with his thumbs.

"…I love you."

And at that, Catelyn cries and cries and cries.

"I love you too," she hiccupped, furiously rubbing at her eyes—though the tears did not stop, "I love you so much that I hate you."

Her words visibly sting him, almost as much as watching her in distress. Their child hums in wonder. Does her mother truly feel that way? Can she even forgive him? She knew that neither of them deserve to be put in this position—but with the way things are going, Thomas may as well have killed Catelyn. Her mind races to find a way to fix this, but there is no solution. Valaena cannot fix this—this is not her battle to face. This is not for her to resolve, nor conclude.

And so, she is quiet, as her father can only hold her mother close, and comfort her.

"Then I'll hold you close until you can stop hating me." Tom whispers, and kisses her brow.

And that is that.

(He reminds her of Tajima, too, in some regard. Always skirting around an issue if it meant being vulnerable. Unfamiliar on how to connect with others who are not a part of his circle; tip-tap-tip-toeing like the skilled manipulator he was, silver-tongued snake that he had been. Awkward at best, unbalanced at most. Setting his sights on power, on legacy, on family. But where her uncle made the effort to bond with his wife, her father has no clue on where to even begin. Thomas and Catelyn are too far apart in age and priority to form that sort of…multifaceted trust.

Lovers for the sake of being lovers, in romantic politicking: one careening towards his thirst for a glorious future—the dynamic skewed as a result; the other grabbing onto what she can of the present—trying to keep him grounded, in heartbreak, to a part of herself.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(She just stares down at the floor, her face blank—not because she is numb nor dumb, but because she has learned to be utterly silent. The only thing that comes out of her mouth is fear.

"Look at me."

She blinks the tears from her eyes, but they refuse to disappear. The girl could not will the sight of her own battered body away from her mind. Her skin was too fair, and even her bruises showed like marks painted on porcelain.

"Look at me, you miserable little thing. Look at how weak you are. You couldn't even do something as simple as die properly."

The man snorts, pointing to the red lines on her neck. It was not even his fault, at this point; her lack of bravery is so blatant, that she was practically screaming for someone to bully her. She says nothing as he grabs her chin, and pulls it upwards. There is nothing to speak of: in this, he will always be much, much, much stronger than she will ever be.

"Look at me. Look. At. Me. You are a disappointment. Even a dog can starve itself better. You're a freak. It's a wonder how you came from your mother—gods give her peace. I couldn't bear to even want to witness you. You are not a child—you're not even human. You're an insult to one."

She hears it plainly: aberration.

"I should've smothered you at birth."

And then, the tears would not stop falling.

It is one thing to be told to be weak.

It is another thing to feel weak—and know that she cannot do anything about it.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"…I'm really just talking to myself, aren't I?"

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

Her mother collects her in the morning, to the surprise of all. Narcissa stands with her…sister-by-law? Or whatever they were, together. The two women stand before their respective children's cribs. The latter is unmoved, stark in her grey-silver-green, ever so keen; but the former is simply wearied, near listless, as if she is uncertain as to where she placed within all this, anymore. Valaena squeaks in that cute manner all babes do, overjoyed to have the lady in pink there.

She wriggles free from Clara's pawing palms. The doll huffs, but lets her be. It turns back to her cousin, who babbles out something unintelligible to both the toy and his own birth-giver. The older woman glances at her peer, sighing.

"Will you be safe?" Narcissa's tone is disinterested at worst, but Valaena can sense a layer of…sympathy—pity would be more apt—beneath. Malfoy née Black lets a soft hand caress the other's shoulder, as if offering a semblance of comfort for her; that, despite their frigidity and their lack of interaction between one another, there is still that companionship that lingers. "Reggie mentioned something about a blue fire, once."

"A violet haze in the clouds," Catelyn chuckled with a bite of her lip, "don't worry. The stars are safe. They'll never fall. Not now, at least. Just stay within the cover of the night—and perhaps everything will be fine."

She looks down at Draco, then Valaena, and then Clara.

There is an unspoken reality threatening to fall from her tongue, though she does not voice it. The babe wonders what it is that her mother dreams of, when she gazes upon them. Upon anything, really. Catelyn does not share much with her, save for the occasional mutter to herself when she did not realise that her child is listening. On a few better days, the girl herself follows the lady's lead in her sleeping adventures, though even those do not reveal much about what goes on in that pretty silver-crowned head of hers.

Oftentimes, she sees the woman dallying with other children. Er, well, teenagers; those just a bit younger than her. Catelyn dances around them all, honeyed words slipping free from that rosebud mouth of hers, pulling them in through the guise of a kind propaganda. She puts up pledges of a safer world—though she never quite erases a hint of guilt in her tone when she talks to them. They question her on all sorts of goings-on with the Dark Lord: how he is as a husband, what he liked to do in his spare time, why she joined him, where the future was headed, and so on and so forth. It is intriguing to find her in that state; just as maternal, like the friend that looked after everyone else when they could not even watch over her.

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry." The adolescent begs for forgiveness again. For what, Valaena does not care much to discover. Over and over and over again, her mother says it—that apology for something that has yet to come to pass, for something that she is not even sure will come to be. For days, weeks, and months; she listened to each whisper in the dark, to every broken warble that slipped out the girl-woman's throat. Eventually, it became redundant on her end. She cannot find enough context clues to piece together what she is sorry for.

But Catelyn repeats it, all the time, like it would absolve her of the imaginary sin that she built for herself.

(She finds it irritating, as well as arrogant, whenever someone decides to question her about her perversions. On wine, on smoke, on fire, on sex, on violence; on whatever in the hells caught her fleeting fancy. Not all of them were aware of the sheer helplessness of it all: addiction, and the way it eats her whole—tearing, tearing, and tearing until nothing of her was left behind.

So, when Madara grills her on her vice consumptions, she merely rolled her eyes at him.

"Look at you! You're halfway dead as it is!" Her elder cousin reprimands, his eyes lingering just a bit too long on her face.

"As gorgeous as ever." She snarks back. One would be forgiven for mistaking the look in her eyes for sarcasm, maybe even contempt. "Look at me—I'll probably break quite a few hearts as it is. Imagine it! Perhaps I'll even be offered a hand or two."

She offers him no consolations.

Addicts are never kind to themselves.

So, why should she get the right to ease his worry?)

Catelyn looks down, trying her best to keep herself from breaking down. But even without looking directly at the woman, she can still see the powerlessness in those twin lilac mirrors; pained, pressing, passing. Narcissa noticed this, too. Whatever comments about it are never uttered, though, and they are all left to let the unsaid words hang in the air.

(All Junichiro witnesses is weakness—and all she sees is pleasure; she thinks he likes it: to have her on her knees, as pretty as her mother had once been for him. She whimpers. The tears on her cheeks dry into a salty paste as she grits her teeth, as she tries to force her mind blank. No thoughts, no feelings—nothing but this. Her sire just smiles, ruffling her hair. Searing pain claws at her scalp.

She had done this before—a hundred times in temper, a hundred more in morosity, a hundred further in fury and futility: playing the role of his good girl, who does what she is told and keeps her mouth shut. The man is drunk on booze and control.

"Be quiet, Seika." He slurs, taking a whiff of that subtle lavender she puts on whenever she stays at home. "Let me have you."

And…oh.

Even though she hates him for taking away so many things from her—that simple, approving, inebriated grin brings both a flutter and a churn to her stomach; and it almost makes everything feel slightly alright.

Almost.

"As you wish, my Lord." She responds. "As you always do.")

(As it always is.)

"May I ask you something?" Narcissa said.

"Mm?"

"Why do you do it? All this. The…courts, the policies, the lord himself. Why deal with it? You could've refused it and lived a peaceful life with your brother." The Malfoy held her stare for a good few minutes, letting the Martell tremble in place, before finally speaking. There is a note of hushed gentleness, then—quiet but caring, not quite loving but just about there. At the very least, a shallow concern. A shared folly in womanhood, and the experience of being a woman that they both bemoan.

"What gives you the courage to live on?"

"Valaena." Catelyn retorts, sharp and quick, never missing a beat. "It's all always been for my child."

"That much, I could understand. A mother's love knows no bounds. There's nothing I'd stop at for my son." An indulgent sigh. "But…before you had her, did you ever live for anything else?"

"What else is there to live for? Everything I am—it comes down to her. I was already a mother, even when I'd been a maiden. In every day, and all the days that come in between—I hold her in my arms in each dream, and I've found that I'd rather be nowhere else but in the castle, holding her at my breast. I glimpsed her in every future I knew as a child, you know?"

Her mother bends over to take her from the crib. Clara demands to be taken as well, to Draco's consternation. The two squabble like incessant animals in the cot.

"More than…more than what he gives me…I…I suppose—no, I know that above all—my daughter is whom I live for. I saw that girl in my dreams…and I wanted to care for her—the way my own mother did to me, the way she never had the chance to, in the end."

"Stop that, you little prick," the doll blew a raspberry at the boy when he pulled at her pigtails, "I'll bite your face off. Try me."

"Clara, bad," Valaena giggled, peering at them, "don't bite. Don't be rude."

"But is it all set in stone?" Narcissa continued, observing their interaction. Her son cackled, bouncing around on his pillows. The material strained beneath his weight, and the object beside him playfully smacked him with a part of his blanket. "Why won't you fight it?"

"Some things can't be fought." A sorry smile. "Despite much of what I see changing in some capacity. I've learned how to take it all as it is. I've done what I can. That's what matters in the end, doesn't it? That I make do of what's given to me."

"But you could've been so much more."

"There's no point in dwelling on what-if's and whatnot's. This is it—this is what I have for myself. It has to count for something, no matter how little of a difference it presents."

The younger woman takes her, along with her doll, and they fire off back to Sunspear. It is done in a rush, to her own confusion. The bisque thing with her expresses a similar sentiment as they arrived, complaining about being stuck in the middle of a boring sea once more.

Valaena is not tucked in that night. Instead, the dark burns with a sort of desperate passion, including a mother doing what she can to prepare for an inevitability and a daughter who does not clue onto what will come to pass; two souls in the shadows, yet to be lost, yet to part—yet to come through the arch of the issue. It is a calm before a storm, if nothing else. Thomas arrives home for a brief reunion, splattered in all the violence of his Dark Lord persona; but even still, both females cannot help themselves in their approach.

To his wife, his touch is intoxicating, as though she is being drugged with his scent. She wants nothing more than to please him, even if it is only for that space of reprieve. To his child, he is comfort come alive, like a reminder of a horror that should never happen with him around. She is cradled in his arms, snug like a baby bird in its nest.

And another moment, and one more, and a last.

The temporal measures trickle. Seconds, minutes, hours. Midnight nears. By the first strike at sixty past twelve, when the moonlight is at its thinnest in days beyond waning crescent, her father leaves once more. He is off to a raid, onto a race, battling and grinning as he creates a crimson raze. His antagonism strikes again. In the familiar net of their home, Catelyn continues her trend: she shoves her heartbrokenness deep down, and accepts reality. Something is close, Valaena could tell. Her dread spoils the mood, truly.

Her mother dresses her in a wool singlet—thick enough to be warm, loose at the right extent for her to be able to breathe. She watches, curious and alarmed, as the lady leaves several enchanted thingamabobs in crannies and crevices that did not make sense. Notes slipped in between the castle stone, jewellery scattered about on unassuming spots on carpets, flowers and stationery thrown into random surfaces to cause a mess. Both babe and doll regard this with bewilderment.

All this is done in haste, like she is running away from something.

And perhaps she is—or, rather, they are.

The woman summons a leather satchel, rummaging through it as she goes; pulling in more materials inside in search of things to last them a journey. A small jar of nuts, a tied-up list of papers, more infant clothing, packs of dried fruits and other containers filled with white-coloured consumables. What…on earth? Seika is, obviously, preparing for a trip. A last-minute one, given her panic and her erratic behaviour. But what for? And, most importantly, why was she doing this only now?

"Where in the Seven bloody Hells are we going? What are you doing?" Clara asks. "You're going to make the house-elves turn grey with all this fussing. And they're already hairless, mind you."

"Not now, 'Lara." Catelyn says absentmindedly. The nickname made the former pause; the lids of her eyes sliding up in a manner of shock, uncannily akin to a human in the same state. "Get Valaena in the blanket."

"What?" Both others chorus, still immobile, as the adolescent shuffles from to and fro.

"Catelyn, for the love of the gods, at least say where we're headed." Clara gripes, but moves to follow what was told of her. She helps Valaena get wrapped in a cashmere blanket. The girl herself does not protest, knowing that whatever was happening was urgent; that, if she were to make a fuss now, things would only get worse. "You can't just pack up and pretend all's fine!"

"It's not, Clara! Everything is coming to utter shit and I'm at my bloody wits' end!" Her mother hisses, clawing at her hair. She waves that ash-coloured wand and creates an even bigger chaos within the confines of the chambers, setting up quick traps to slow people down.

(They are familiar. Similar to the ones she used to put into place, as she snuck around within nobles' chambers. A few poison-coated needles here, some oil on a surface there; illusion-coated mirrors, brainwashed servants; certain flowers in vases and pots strategically adjusted to come into physical contact; perfumes and jewellery, divans and mattresses, cigars and pipes; everything mundane that she could eye and touch, she turned into a weapon, ready to go off at a moment's notice.)

(Fast and easy, clean and efficient. A perfect assassination: kept within a simple view, but simplistic all the same.)

It makes the babe's blood run cold.

"Mama," she warbled, carefully stilling her motions, "bad peo-ple?"

Time's come, ashling.

Valaena cannot breathe.

(A birthday dinner, a sunset on the beach. Two young men laughing and trading barbs with their friend, murmuring in awe as wind swirls around them. Being held, being born, being dead, being alive. She is a child once more—although not quite, and never really. Her entire form shakes as the panic seeps in.)

You were warned.

"Shh, it's alright, my love." The witch finishes up putting whatever in wherever.

Damn this child's body!

"I won't let anyone hurt you…never again." Catelyn breathes as she puts on the leather satchel onto a shoulder. Then, she picks up her child and the doll; and with a practised swiftness, she secures them both in what she recognised was a Khanga wrap, both girl and thing squished in strange comfort together on the woman's back. She wriggles a bit. The lady's eyes are alight with a protective flame, darting around the room as she gathered a few more essential items, which were then hastily tucked into the bag.

And she runs.

It is silent at first.

Almost unnaturally so.

Too much, to the point of hurting her ears.

But then—

And then—

Then—

The waves of the blue infinity are the last thing she hears, her last reminder of the night, before all hell descends.

(And heaven is destroyed.)

Valaena does not think much in the minutes that follow. Catelyn is prepared to flee, before a sudden noise outside the door sends ripples of anxiety throughout the room. The babe, ever attuned with the castle's magic, stiffens when the danger arrives. Her heartbeat pounds in sync with the hue and cry, small hands clutching onto the fabric of the wrap as if it were the last tether to safety. Tranquillity is broken once the halls echo with the unsettling sounds of intrusion—the enemy itself, no doubt, relentless in pursuit, breaching the sanctuary of Sunspear.

She tamps down her cries, even when the chaos roars in her senses. One breath, and a second, then a third; she repeats it, in a near-musical pattern, as she presses her face against the crook of Clara's cold neck. The doll wraps its arms around her. Incoherence sours her perception as, finally, the shouts and the yells of those on the other side increase in volume. Catelyn speeds down the twists in her home, much more agile than she ever slated her being. The small things grunt in the motion, wobbling within the layer.

None of them dare make any other noise. Her mother casts other unnoticeable enchantments on every item that they pass by. Tapestries, chandeliers, still paintings, statues, curtains, rugs, side-tables, lanterns, chairs; she does it all in succession, never lingering for more than three seconds each time she pauses. Then, she would resume flitting down the passage. Tap-tap-tap. A swivel, a swish. Rushed rue. Whoever was in the castle kept advancing, figures from the shadows here to haunt.

(What a rush. She grits her teeth as she leaps from boulder to boulder, nostrils flaring as she barely keeps herself from panting. The drop from the mountainside is steep, and the pit that those behind her will throw her in is deeper.)

"I've no doubts that it's the Order," Clara breaks her from her stupor with a small voice, "Rhae's been complaining about them, last I heard."

"Bad peo-ple." Valaena answers, resolute. "Bad, bad, bad."

(It does not matter that, by all rights, her family is the one responsible for the ongoing conflict.)

(This is the story of Esther Valaena Martell, not Harry James Potter.)

Their heads snap up when a loud bang resonates in the hollow. The walls vibrate, and with them, some dust falls from the ceiling.

"You damned traitor!" Jane's shrill shriek flows through the air. "You dare enter my home? After all you've done?"

The response is drowned out by a series of spellfire. Footsteps near. Valaena chokes on a gasp. Catelyn, a phoenix in her own right, immediately unleashes streaks of red-silver-blue that crackled and flashed. With a grace born of desperation, each flick of her wrist becomes a killing blow, and a newer overwhelm plays in.

Never had this castle witnessed blood since the end of the era of ice and fire, the humming in her mind murmurs, it's rather disheartening.

Shut up, shut up, shut up, she wants to wail.

Shock overrides her system.

"Surrender peacefully," a thick voice bellows, somewhere from the right, "Lady Martell, lay down your wand. There is no need for more violence."

"Violence is the only way to make you people listen," Catelyn snarls back, waving the ashen stick in rehearsed curves, "and I will not be the one to suffer it."

("You still hold the love of many, despite what you've done.")

Valaena cannot make anything out through her tears. Thomas had gone out previously—hosting meetings with his Death Eaters. She does not know where he is, at the moment, nor does she have an idea on how to get to him. All she could do, really, is to hope and hide behind her mother's back as she ran. The figures in the shadows have yet to notice her. They come in droves: one turns into three, then into seven, and thirteen—until more and more surround them. These people—pests, her mind supplies—scutter around the protections within the palace, tripping over unseen inconveniences before blasting through entire sections of the chambers entirely.

The column Catelyn stood beneath—her right side aimed towards their attackers in honed evasion—narrows in on them. Her vision blurs, and it is as if the very stone is dragging inwards, creating the perfect hollow for them all to die and rot within. Presently, their pursuers hasten their actions—and more shots are fired. Clara pulls Valaena's head down just as a wild gust of wind pierces through the passageway. It stings her eyes. The cold nips at her skin; with the open windows, the air outside blends along with it, and that coastal winter chill bites at exposed flesh.

("No others will take kindly to me—you know this. But there are countless who would forgive you, should you claim you acted within or underneath my influence.")

Suddenly, Catelyn's anger flared at the attention now put upon her child. Her strides slowed, and instead, she released a wave of magic—enough to make them tumble back and cower. They fell, and tried, in futility, to arise—before their efforts against the witch resulted in dozens of violet-black spikes erupting from every surface that surrounded them. Valaena chokes at the display of power. This is a side that she has never seen before of the woman: in true mad fashion, lost to her own erratic swarm.

("A pretty face to distract them from the ugly reality of it all. Is that what I am to you, now?")

It is so beautiful that she is afraid.

(The killer laughs, and laughs, and laughs, and laughs.)

(The killer has met its counterpart, and it meanders on in relieved rosiness.)

(The child quivers, and the killer celebrates.)

And soon—

Soon—

"Please, my dear, do not repeat your mother's mistakes."

"I'm not. This is where it ends. Step aside, and perhaps I'll let your men live."

There is no doubt, no issue at all, for her to come to terms on who those words might have been from. By the honorific itself—my dear, my dear, my dear—Valaena can get a feel of just who it is that parallels her mother right now: that aged wizard, nuanced and misunderstood, set to oppose what her father symbolised. Both youths are imperceptibly ready for an unavoidable truth: the unstoppable force and the immovable object, both who have witnessed too much in their lifetimes, clashing in an uneven playground for soldiers.

Now that's a face that hasn't visited this island in nearly over a century.

What?

"Gellert's man," Clara whispers harshly, "that wretched codger."

"DON'T TOUCH MY PORTRAIT!" Jane wails from where she stationed herself. Catelyn jolts at her mother's indignity, reverberating all around the arches, fury clear to all. "YOU DARE ENTER MY HOME AND DEFILE IT?"

"Surrender peacefully, and no more blood is to be shed." Albus fucking Dumbledore states plainly; surrounded by friends, aurors, and officials alike. Valaena has passed by some of those faces in her dreams. Worn, torn, weary, teary; wilful and tired; hanging onto the chance that, perhaps, there might be a draw to this war. They form a bastardised circle around the trio.

This is an image that she will never forget: a unity born from affray, a companionship of collaterals and catastrophes.

"If I surrender now, then it's my blood on the bowl," Catelyn chuckles bitterly, "mine and my children's. The only freedom you could've ever granted me, Headmaster, has long gone."

Valaena hears a shuffling on the other side.

Then, silence.

And then—

Then—

"Protego diabolica."

Blue, blue, blue.

Then, black.

("Wonderful, isn't it? We've got the names to match." She chirps to Tobirama, at some point; giddy and girlish, flitting and fluttering in her high like a fool. He stayed on a stone surface, stern. "The Blue Demon, and his Witch of the Blue Fires."

"That's not quite the compliment you think it is," he drawled, peering back down at his scrolls as she twirled and tittered by the riverbank, "stop that.")

(She had always envied Izuna's crown of silk. That flowing, night-tinted hue of a curtain on his head; the kind that most women strived so hard for to achieve. He flaunts it, as is his due. It matches nearly all of the steels and fabrics he owned: his kimonos and his hakamas, his grips and his bands, his sandals and his binders. Once, just a week before he first makes his advancements on her, he 'gifts' her a ribboned lock of his hair.

It is his version of a courting present, she knew.

"Better than those stringy braids you have," he used to sneer, when they were younger, "another mark of your tainted blood.")

Valaena could not quite narrate it, what she saw then. It might have been her horror, it might have been her protector, it might have been her jurors. If someone were to ask her, years later, what it is that imprints itself into her memory, she would answer them this: that the world bled, incomprehensibly.

It begins with diamonds, as bright as the summer sky; blinking from a navy beam. Suddenly, a celestial haul is before her—stars again, as they were so long ago. Separate planets in a sea-like sight, all dead to their own developments. Ebon and grime, ink and jet, onyx and pitch, slate and soot; it is much akin to a fantasy of the very earth turning in on itself. Starting from the base, in the middle, as she fell: inertia at command, with a scream in her throat. Inexplicable ersatz, in imitation of erfahrung.

There are gabbles and rabbles, and there is a lurch, and then there is the hurt. Another bang, another boom. Pressing forward, she swallows the nausea away and holds on tighter onto her small companion. It returns her hug with just as much fervour. Soon, Catelyn is tumbling within the open area of the island—sandals thumping against the tiles and the wood of the mezzanine. A distant tang of smoke enters her nose. Valaena grimaces, only then coming to terms with the fact that her mother had blown off a section of the castle.

"The wards are down," the woman rasps, taking care as she adjusted the wrap, "we—gods, I'll have to apparate. No, wait—I have a portkey."

"In your state?" her doll replied in peturbation, watching with hesitation as it and the other little one are shifted onto her hip, "Lynnie."

"The lord will know—he's likely on his way back. The castle's magic would've alerted him, no doubt. But we need to go." Catelyn pants, padding down the stairs of the raised platform. When she edges that curve in the sand where the water meets her feet, she gives her girlhood home one last look of sadness.

"They'll take it, won't they?" Clara whispered.

"Rhaenar'll set them to it," is the response, though even it seemed unsure, "one day. He'll get his chance to get it back."

With a hurried swipe of her hand into the leather satchel, her mother pulls out a string of pearl beads.

And they are off.

Now it ends.

No, ashling—now, it begins.

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(It is startlingly easy to remain as she is, even as she has already been hollowed out; that, even with all that she felt inside taken away from her, her functions remain the same. There is only ever the path to nowhere. So, she keeps going. She kept walking down every mile, she kept stepping out of her front door, and she kept flashing from mission to mission in a static course. The world is dull, like this. And yet…she could still hear her father's words in her head—ringing incessantly, like a fly set to annoy her.

Aberration, aberration, aberration. Killer, liar, whore.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"Love, look at me. Look at me, please."

"…it's my fault."

"No. No—I should've known. I should have known."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

The portkey travel is not so disorienting in a claustrophobic sense, as much as it is tight, like an ill-fitting garment that dug into her skin upon wear.

"Where've we gone to?" Clara asks, once they land. Valaena looks around. The first thing that she notices is the heat. Immediately, she wriggled in the wrap, a sudden humidity causing her discomfort. The sun beat down relentlessly, and even the protective layers of the wrap could not shield her entirely from the blasted temperature. It is not that the weather is sweltering, no. But the shift in atmosphere—from a winter wind to a summerlike sear—is enough to have her agitated.

"Hot," she complained, itching in the wool and cashmere, "Mama, it's hot."

"I know, shh, here." Catelyn cooed, fixing the cloth to allow for better ventilation. She shifted the layers of fabric, creating small pockets of air that offered some breathing space. Her daughter shook her head, pointing to her own clothes. The woman paused, muttering a reprimand to herself as she remembered how thickly she dressed her child up previously. "Right—my apologies, love."

She casts a cooling charm, to the girl's relief. Then, the babe scrutinises their surroundings again. They are in a muggle settlement, Valaena could tell. Already, the air she breathed is thicker—more polluted—with the distinct odour of gasoline and cigarettes lingering between each puff she took. Her vision roves over little buildings: some car company, a trading shop, a grocery store or two, and a few other businesses in town. It is bustling with ordinary life. The babe swallows, already overcome by distaste.

I've been isolated for far too long, huh? I can barely breathe amidst all these people.

It is bizarre to be here. A lifetime had gone by ever since she last visited a place like this—purely mundane, with no special magic in effect.

I've been isolated for far too long, huh? I can barely breathe amidst all these people.

(There is a rush of air that enters her lungs: a memory, pushing and pestering in persistence. Long walks through cities, the smell of perfume and nicotine in her hair; rainy sunsets, getting lost across borders, freedom in a cage. Rose-tinted absurdities, idealising the horrors that she has learned to ignore and tamp down. Dysfunctional families, double-faced friends, disparate firtlings; dumb fantasies, desperate forlonging. Ruined mascara on her cheeks, countless catastrophes as her mind works on overdrive, a snarling sob at the edge of her tongue as she tries to make sense of a life unlived.)

(Existence, as it is, as human as it got; with no recreations of the 'Great': the mereness of being in a world of other creatures. Muggles are—to her—now things of fascination, after having spent years in the extraordinary, with the elements at her beck and call.)

"Los Angeles," Catelyn answers her puppet's previous inquiry, "Calexico. I've only realised that Mother dropped him off here—I've been looking for him for so long."

"Who?"

"Someone I fear wouldn't be agreeable to hosting us within his home, but would have no other choice except to do so."

Again, who?

"This isn't wise, Lynnie, if it is who I think it is."

"You've never really done much thinking in that empty porcelain head of yours, though, did you?"

"You brat! You've gotten snarkier ever since you left. I missed this. You should've taken me with you." Clara cackled, pointing a finger at her. "Anywho—if it's poor old Whitecuffs, I'll throw a fit."

"…"

The sound of her mother's quiet is enough to bring the doll to heel.

"You can't be serious." Offence. "Catelyn! He'd sooner press a damned rifle to your head!"

"Better me than my child," Catelyn puffed her cheeks out, seemingly reprimanded, "he won't harm Valaena."

"I'll kill him!"

"No, you won't."

"Couldn't you have found anyone else to leave us with?"

"No."

"The Malfoys!"

"Lu-Lu's going to rave about being imperiurised once this is over. I'm not putting Valaena in the line of fire."

"The Blacks?"

"Withdrawn—you know this. Walburga was ready to snap my neck during the funeral."

"I meant Bellatrix, you twit."

"No."

"Why not? Surely, the girl would care for 'Laena out of respect for your husband. She wouldn't dare harm her—especially not after what you've done at the Sept of Baelor, given everything I've heard was true." Clara made a point of squishing Valaena's cheeks together, then tilting her head back at Catelyn. "Your babe's going to look like Tommy as she grows. Perhaps Bella-Belle would see her lordy love in the girl and—oh, wait, no, perish the thought. That is disgusting."

The woman's magic crackled slightly. "I'm not leaving my daughter with that wench!"

"Fine. What about the other Greater houses?"

"Rhaenar'll snatch her right up. Claim she's his right as regent, or so and so. As if Valaena is his toy, and not a child."

"Is there truly no one else?" The poppet bemoaned. "You can't really be considering leaving us with a mudblood, of all things."

"He's the only one left of the family—er, whatever of the family was there to begin with," Catelyn sighed, "and a neutral party to boot. He'd want nothing to do with the magical world. That's a good thing, isn't it? He'll keep Valaena away. No one'll know where she is, nor who she's with. Besides—"

"Besides," Clara mocked, "you'll just leave your doll and your daughter to a witch-hating man. He'd sooner throw us both into the streets. You know what he's done to his own son. What makes you think he'll spare his grandchild—who he knows nothing about, mind you—any leniencies?"

"What am I supposed to do, 'Lara?" Valaena's mother slumped, defeated.

The woman moves to the side of a street, slinking into a dingy alleyway and taking a stand behind a few dumpsters. They all grimaced at the smell. Funny, the child snorted; briefly amused at the thought of the doll having any sorts of physical senses to be able to detect such a thing as this. Her mother waves her hand and creates a thin bubble to shield them from view—a transparent layer that acts as a normal spherical cavity, only keeping them out of sight or hearing from anyone passing by.

Catelyn gives her daughter a weak grin as she suspends her in the air, to the babe's delight. She and her toy float for a few moments as the lady fixes herself up; charming that iconic soft pink gown to change into something else: a knee-length sundress, a light blue, with a sweetheart neckline and a layer of fine English tulle. She groans in mild pain as she puts her hands on her hips, taking a second to catch her breath and gaze at her swollen stomach.

"I'm fat with my husband's child, carrying the other, with an extra bit of luggage on my shoulder. I look like some strange, homeless whore." She sighs, adjusting the satchel on the said joint. Her hands reach out to redo the wrap on her body. She removes the cashmere blanket, then slips the two back within the cloth fabric. "I've nowhere else to go. The other estates have been locked down since Mother made her last public appearance, remember?"

"Ah, right." Clara hummed, then made sure to keep herself unseen as her previous owner pops the bubble and steps out, walking down the street. "And what about your boys? Surely Regulus would've had access to some safehouse or the other. Gods know grumpy old Crouch would've just given his son another lot for a damn vineyard."

"They're technically 'Mius' now." Catelyn muttered, braving the late afternoon bustle. "He…he's not doing anything to the extent that 'Eulus did, before he…before he went into the cave."

So you did know about Regulus, Valaena thinks darkly to herself, bored as she gazed at the scenes in the background, I still don't know how to feel about that, honestly.

"He's not going to heal just yet. I love my child, 'Lara, but I can respect him for this." The witch swallowed. "I'm not going to scratch at an open wound."

"Whatever that means, considering you never really tell anyone about your dreams anymore. You'd put Dumbledore to shame."

By the manner in which she glided through the area, Valaena would assume that her mother was already familiar with the muggle world. They receive a few stares: a young woman possessing strange hair and eyes, heavily pregnant, with an albino infant and a creepy antique doll on her back. What a view they might have made; exotic, and perhaps just as off-centre as she now found others to be. To her hilarity, she observes Catelyn making subtle waves with her wand as they went.

They come to a bus stop. The woman casts wordless confounding charms to avail them a ride to Anaheim. She takes advantage of one of the conductors, giggling like a flirt, before boarding the vehicle and making to go straight to the back. Another woman—an old lady in a brown corduroy, sitting beside her husband—huffs and pulls at her hand, clucking in concern.

"Move, Albert," she swatted her partner's knee, to the man's snort, "have some manners."

"Here, kid," the gentleman—Albert—offered, scooting so that the adolescent sat right behind the bus driver, "don't stress yourself out too much. Christ's sake, there's another kid and a doll with you.'

"Oh, thank you." Said Catelyn, comfortable as she manœuvres her daughter and her doll. Clara is very still, having shifted into a state of inactivity due to the surrounding people. Valaena emits a noise of contentment, closing her eyes as she leans by her mother's collarbone. The witch smiled gently as she pressed a kiss on her brow; tired from running, tired from dreaming, tired from living.

But they go on.

(As they always do, as it always is.)

(Yesterday, they were both things of the enemy's hate. Today, they are only happy children.)

The ride lasts for hours. Valaena dozes through most of it in a haze, getting the first real rest that she has had since being reborn into this world. This is her first peace, with no worry for her family nor for the future; a nap upon a parent's breast for the want to lay her head down. For a while, she is half-awake and half-aware; although this time, there are no dreams to be a bother. It is nice, she thinks: unconsciousness in its rawest form.

Catelyn chats with her seatmates along the way. The couple beside her express their buzzes and their hushes for the young lady beside them, nosy and yet well-intentioned, keeping the woman entertained despite the ordeal she faced not even a full day ago. A bit past halfway through the transportation, the driver parks at a bus stop to let the passengers relieve themselves. Her mother does not budge, and they stay there, in the front corner, where the adolescent gazes out the window with a half-lidded uncertainty.

"We'll be seeing your other grandfather soon enough," she whispers to Valaena, stroking her hair, "I pray that he does not refuse me. Not after what Mother had done for him."

The pair returns and resumes their chatter. The three of them discuss their plans for the rest of the week—Albert and his wife, Eliza, were visiting family within California as well. Catelyn smiles and mentions that she is in a similar position, hoping to see her father-by-law.

"Is your husband American?" Eliza asked.

"No, no—he and his father are both English. My husband—Tom—and I are on vacation, as you know. He's a professor at a college in London, see, and we thought to reach his family for the hols." Her mother lied through her teeth. Valaena would give her credit, where credit is due: her composure does not even so much as falter, despite the major bombshells that she is dropping onto her. The babe listens to every word with rapt attention, honing in on the finer details that diverged from the narratives she was once familiar with.

Riddle Senior is alive? Well…then again, she said something about Jane earlier.

"I haven't seen his father since I was a girl," she laughed, "my mother introduced us."

("I suppose my early life consisted of constant disappointments, with my parents being who they were…")

"Oh—arranged, then?"

("All I've been as a person—right from the very start, even before I was born—it's…it's all scripted, and I'm here to see that role to its conclusion.")

"You could say that. Though, I love my Tom with all I am. We're good, I'd say. He's treated me like nothing less than an actual princess."

("Haven't I given so much to you, Catelyn? What becomes enough to satiate your wants? And when does it happen?")

"That's good," Albert commented, nodding in approval, "you better set him straight if he lays a hand on you. You seem like you've got a fine head on your shoulders, Caitlin."

("The madness runs deep, even if he and his sister could control it.")

"Yes, but the girl is a queen," Eliza countered, to her spouse's fond sigh, "oh, child, I pray to God that you and your Tom live a long life. Me and Albert made it with seven kids—imagine that! You're a very sweet girl—you deserve all that your man gives you. And your little Veronica, too, and your Victor—the darlings! With a face and a mind like yours, I'm sure you two could make it work."

"Yes, yes—duly noted," Catelyn smiles, though there is a gleam of sadness in those lilac eyes, "I'll take that to heart."

Another fifty minutes tick by before they finish with the journey. When they arrive at the next stop, it is eight in the evening; the rush hour is stark and heavy, with tourists and locals alike mingling and driving in the roads.

"You be careful, alright kid?" Albert fished for a leather wallet from his back pocket and sifted through his bills, before slipping two grand within the young woman's hands. "Take it—'Liza and I've got too much time on our hands these days. You reminded me of my girl, but she doesn't see us much anymore. Thank you for keeping two old people company."

"I-I couldn't possibly," Catelyn gasped, but reluctantly accepted the money, "I…"

"Keep it, honey. Maybe treat your little Veronica to Disneyland, while you're at it." Eliza winked, cooing and waving her fingers at a now-awake Valaena. "Bye-bye, sweet girl. Be careful, okay? Don't give your Momma a hard time."

"Bye-bye, Al-by, 'Li-za," the babe flashed them a gummy grin, "bye-bye! Have fun! Bye-bye!"

The old couple leaves, happy and content. Catelyn stares after them as they board a cab, now off to wherever it was in the state that their family resided in. Her mother's grip on her tightened in the slightest as she watched the car speed away. There she stood, still amidst a crowd, with a babe and a doll in her arms: a strange vision once more, like a scene in a movie where a protagonist has their moment of existential yearning. They stay like that for a minute before the woman breaks herself out of her stupor.

"Off to the Hills we go," her mother muttered, now striding towards another ride, "off to your grandfather."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(Tears sting the corners of her eyes, but she remains still, unmoving. She stares blankly at the man who returns her lust, who strides forward to catch her and taste the salt with his own lips. She cannot remember a time when she had not been on display like a freak for all to see. She could no longer even remember her real name, her true self—and she is someone else entirely…or perhaps no one at all.

She is not happy. Not yet. She needs more. She needs more to feel happy. That ecstacy, that moment, that feeling that makes everything else disappear.

Her hands reach out to him, looking for something—anything—that might give her the relief that she craved. She finds it in his nimble fingers and in his waiting mouth, she finds it in his sly tongue and his rough hands, she finds it in the way he cages her and kills her; like she is a toy, his, to be an amusement that kept him company. She finds it by reaching down—the way she has learned—and letting his hips meet hers.

She looks up at a face that was once so nice to her, and now comes to her much like a demon. He deserves that title.

But she does not care; she got her pleasure.

This is love.

It has to be, no? Not for anything else.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"I was the first one here, and I'd like to be the first to leave."

"You don't want to see the conclusion?"

"Is there even one at all?"

"Well, there's only one way to find out, isn't there?"

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

Sometimes, the best thing she did—or perhaps the only thing that she could do—was to stay quiet. In light of a situation that demanded her wrath or her indignity, whether it is created to demand a reaction out of her; her best bet relied on a stoicism born from muted regard. Oh, her chest could hurt as she seethed, and her thoughts could run at several miles per minute. But in point of fact: non-reaction was just as violent as it was silent, and it would always be as dangerous as the viciousest madman.

It is not quite apathy, no.

Rather, anticipation.

Tom Riddle Senior, Valaena thinks, embodies it well.

"Red eyes." The handsome old man cursed under his breath, but it was calm and…nearly entertained. "I'd've thought I'd already seen the last of your kind."

"…please…please hear me out." Catelyn begged, looking up at the muggle with a tremble in her voice. "There's nowhere else for us to go."

He sneered. "Whatever happened to that wretched boy you call my son?"

Her mother looked at him, breathing soft but uneven, and replied in a weak tone.

"Our…our home is not safe. Not at the moment."

Catelyn seemed more afraid of him than she did his child.

(And at that…she wonders.

Why, why, why.)

"I don't wish to bring the war to your doorstep. I-I know I'm asking for much. I know the history—and I know your hate. I know that you do not want us here." The young woman cleared her throat, then wet her lips. "But—please—by…by whatever grace you have—please—take my child. If only for now, if only so I can find a better place for us. I can't protect her."

Her words break.

And there it is, and it is there: a mother in need.

A simple fact.

(A tragedy.)

("Make them strong," Seika sobbed, "my children.")

"Please, I—" Catelyn cut herself off, then fell to her knees before him.

"She's all I have left."

A chuckle slipped past the man's lips. Valaena held her breath as she kept her eyes trained on his figure. He regarded them—looking and acting so much like her own father that it hurt. But then he kneels, lowering himself to the other's level, and gazes at them in a compassionate tenderness—

—filled with—

—with—

Pity.

Pity, and—

—and—

Understanding.

"Don't beg." Tom Riddle Senior swallows thickly, reaching out to caress his daughter-in-law's face. He cradles her, and the motion is practised—like it is something that they have done before. His arms wrap around her, and her child, and her doll; and they lie there, on a cold step: a girl and a father, weeping together. "Don't beg, Catelyn…I just needed to be sure of something."

He kisses her brow. "My home is open to…to you."

Oh, but what did she expect to find?

Valaena is silent as all this goes on. The part of her that exists as Uchiha Kyō is confused, shrieking in panic as this figure before her accepts them and welcomes their group into his abode. It is horrified by this stranger with her father's face; backing away into a corner like a wounded mutt in fear. Her fingers grasp at him—wishing to feel what it was that differentiated him from Thomas Marvolo Gaunt, from Tom Marvolo Riddle. But it is all there: no magic, no youth, no cruelty. There is only exhaustion on the lines of his eyes, there is only hurt on his lips.

(What a foreign thing.)

"Come inside," her paternal grandfather whispers, "come and rest."

"I can't," the woman responds, shaking her head, "I must return to him."

"I am not allowing a pregnant woman to get into harm's way—"

"I'm not disabled!"

"Regardless," Old Tom hisses, refusing to let go of his newfound family, "at least have some respite before you come back to that bastard."

Catelyn shook with a mix of gratitude and anguish as she relinquished Valaena into the arms of her grandfather. The old man, though reserved in demeanour, held the infant with surprising gentleness. Senior gazes at Seika with an intensity that bordered on paternal—parental—concern. His eyes flickered between the babe in his arms and the determined woman standing before him; considering. The bond of blood, the familial ties that bound them, resonated in that charged moment.

Valaena herself is in awe of how quick the two were able to arrive to terms. She knows the original story: of his younger years, of being an arrogant little twit with his future laid out for him, of a family high and mighty in its little county, of the man-to-be drugged with a heart poison, of a grandmother desperate for any appearance of affection; of his rape, of his return, of his recovery, of his rush away; of the boy who grew to look like him, of the boy who dreamt of him, of the boy who sought him out, of the boy who had him at the end of his wand.

Perhaps he sees himself in Catelyn, in some sense.

"Come inside," he urged again, standing with them and ushering them in, "get a few hours in. The trip was long, I'm sure."

"I'll be fine," the girl grumbled, "there's nothing else for me to be."

The real Tom Riddle is sombre as he replies, as if realising the foreboding behind that statement. "As we always need to be, don't we?"

("As it's always been.")

( "…as it always does.")

(As they always do, as it always is.)

He is tender, careful, and hesitant; as if one wrong move would topple them over, like a dandelion bent in the winds, or a daisy about to wilt. Valaena repeats her lack of energy: content to eye, assessing his worth. His likeness to her own sire be damned, that did not mean that they would equate to a similar level of care. Catelyn falls into a deep, peaceful slumber as her daughter snuggles beside her. Clara herself has been idle still, unsure of how a 'filthy muggle' would take to a horror tale come alive acting up within his home (per its own words). Though, despite it all, the babe knows that they are safe for now, together.

("How long are we keeping this up?" Tobirama asks her directly, finally, after nearly nine months of them sneaking off together. She props her legs up on the wall of the room, spreading her arms out in boredom and thinking of nothing as she laid on the bed. "I refuse to be caught with you."

"Of course you do," she muttered, fiddling with the ends of her braids, "damned if you're not."

"How long, Kyō?"

"As long as it takes me to forget my guilt over what happened," she snarks, "I'm not a fucking prophet, Tobirama."

Oh?

What a dumb declaration.

Of course she is.

That is why, another two years later, she hits his blow with a strike of her own: straight through her chest cavity, smiling in shamefaced apology as she bends over, coughing out blood.)

They lounge within a guest room, hastily prepared. The three lie on a queen-sized mattress. The space itself is bare of much décor, with only the essential furniture littered within: a faint orange bed with an ottoman, a Victorian vanity, a conch couch, and a nifty nightstand. Everything would be called frivolous by some, though it is much simpler than what she is used to. Sunspear spoiled her, eh? She blinks up at the vintage chandelier in the room, sighing.

Her grandfather serves them a late dinner soon after. He frets over Catelyn, in a mode so akin to a frantic bird that it is ridiculous to watch. Then again…the circumstances were far from ordinary. The man regards his younger companions with a weary resolve, already like a parent with too much to do on their hands. He is stern but soft, in the manner many old men would not admit but still display. As her mother feeds her some roasted turkey, the babe warbles out a few silly things, testing how her grandsire might take to a magical child in his care.

If he would be able to fully comprehend the gravity of this situation.

(Something she cannot quite identify, but seems as if it is just beginning to build, rages within her like a thunder before a storm. An offence, an indignity, an unwillingness. She receives the news of her punishment with a stone-cold expression, never betraying her unease or her irritation. Tajima glares at her and his younger brother, quite obviously on the verge of a migraine.

"One week's worth of grunt work around the compound for you," he says to his sibling, "you won't be allowed any time to monitor her progress. What were you thinking, Brother? Making a damn little girl crossdress—"

"I did what I had to do," Junichiro hisses, rolling his eyes, "I'm finding worth where it still exists between her legs.")

"I want Papa back," Valaena swats away her mother's hand when she tries to bring the spoon closer to her mouth, "it's hot. I want Papa."

"Ashling, please, not now." Catelyn briefly closed her eyes, looking up at the ceiling as if in prayer. "You'll see your father soon enough. But for the love of the gods, please just eat."

Her grandfather offers to do it, instead. He sits in the chair beside her and takes Valaena away from her birth-giver, coaxing her with—admittedly—great ease to get her to swallow the food. "Come on, sweet girl."

Sweet girl, sweet girl, sweet girl. Good gods, he even sounds like Thomas.

It drives her insane, to hear her sire's voice from another's throat. It is not that the father and son were so closely resemblant of one another that she cannot discern where one man ends and the other begins. No; Tom Riddle Senior—whatever the bloody hell his full name is—possesses nothing of the grandiosity that his child does; too little, too plain, too human. A vision in honey and russet, in comparison to her usual jet and cochineal. This man is gentler, suspended in his own disbelief, caught within a web of wonder.

She discovers that same anticipation again, by the edge of his smile; waiting and wanting for a connection to his flesh and blood.

Wrong as the image is, it does not take much for her to succumb to his…

His—

This—

Love.

(Purity at its finest.)

(Oh.)

He does not show it for the reason of madness or misery—he does so because it is an act born out of the desire to be a better person. Whatever the fool he had been in his past, this man before her is changed. He lets out a quiet sigh, glancing away momentarily before turning back to coo at her in a whiney voice.

"Here comes the train," he engages in baby talk, "you can't miss it!"

Catelyn sputters at the sight, laughing to herself in rare ease as she beheld the scene.

"Oh, my gods—she'll hate you for that," her mother said in between giggles, "she's aware enough to do so."

"Is she, now?" Tom's lips twitch. "I've embarrassed myself, I fear."

"Fu-nny man," Valaena cackles, but takes his offered spoon, "fu-nny Papa!"

"You must promise me that you won't leave your child. You must take care of her. If you leave her with me, I will take care of her in your place. Do you understand? I'm willing to keep her safe until this war is over. But I will not tolerate her abandonment." Tom says, after a while. He keeps bringing the utensil to Valaena's mouth, who is content to let him handle her, but balances their meal with the heavy talk.

"You're in no condition to return to this bloody conflict, girl," he declared firmly, "and you're carrying another child. I cannot—will not—in good conscience, allow you to endanger yourself and the infant."

Valaena shares the sentiment. The poor thing is pregnant, listless, and distraught. She has carried the burden of their situation for so long. In a moment of weakness, the babe is overcome with a sudden urge to just…comfort her: to hold this young woman in her arms, the way she used to whenever she had a lover close. If anything, she is even glad that her grandfather is going this far to support them both, even despite the suddenness of their context.

"I think you're trying too hard. To be someone everyone else wants you to be—a wife, a friend, a mother. You're too good, in a sense. But there's no stopping you, is there?" Tom is downcast, though accepting her words. "Jane said it to me, once. Just so I truly mark it in my head."

He chuckled bitterly. "You are the kindest child I have ever known."

"This isn't only for anyone else, it's also for me." Catelyn takes a sip of her water. "It's…it's also for my own peace of mind."

"And in the process, you destroy yourself."

"Don't we all do it?" She asks. "It's the way things are."

("Shoganai, shoganai, shoganai…the way things have been, the way they are now, the way they'll always be.")

And so, there they go: the two in-laws make an arrangement for the new year. Catelyn swears, to the best of her abilities, that she would come to him once more by the end of the first week of January. Valaena longed to remind her that she should not worry about this—about all that she had been through, and is currently facing. She made it; she found her place in the world: with her man, with her babe. Nothing could take that away from her—nothing should have taken it all away from them.

But here they were. Tom takes the leather satchel that she brought over, then casts a curious scrutiny over the doll that came with them. He is not as startled as the babe expected him to be when Clara reanimates herself, nor is he as grated when it spews slurs and curses at him. The man handles instruction after instruction with poise.

They work with what they have from there, unaware of what the world was going to be like going forward.

Perhaps she would come to blame herself or her mother for what comes after. Perhaps she would even hate her, to a degree, for what goes on in the future that is to be.

Or perhaps she would not even blame her at all—

—because in all sense, in the end—

Valaena understood.

"Someday, this nightmare will go away…until then, I am by your side. I will always be by your side, even if I cannot truly be there for you." Catelyn leaned up and stroked her cheek. "You are my world. I will always adore you, for all of eternity. No matter who you've been, who you are now, or who you'll be. You are my daughter, Valaena—never forget that."

(Yesterday, she was a killer. Today, she is a child once more.)

"Don't leave," Valaena sobbed, on the last day of the year, "please, please, please."

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry." Her mother embraces her tightly, kissing her brow. The words are murmured, as if to not let the other two present overhear. "I'm sorry, Kyō."

She freezes.

"There is so much more I wish to give you—but this is what I can do. Thank you for making my life better. Thank you for existing." Catelyn continues.

And Valaena chokes.

(Mother, Mother, Mother—)

Tom takes this as the initiative to collect his grandchild from his daughter-in-law's arms. Clara is subdued by the man's feet, the one hand gripping onto the fabric of his pants wrinkling it in obvious—but repressed—distress.

"Thank you. Thank you all for making my life worth it."

And in a flutter of colours—

She's gone.

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(There is no past, and there is no future—nothing that can be remembered, nothing that can be imagined; not for her, not for a little mistake in the system. She sits up in her bed. There is something different to her, now: she is no longer afraid nor ashamed. The warm, happy flutter in her stomach is a cause for excitement. It would be apter to accept this new life; to let this strange emotion—sangfroid, and too much of it. It is not something that she has ever quite experienced before. What would be so wrong with that?

She glances over at her window and wonders if the world will still be there tomorrow morning.

She decides not to think about it anymore.

There is only the present, and in that present, there is no one more perfect, no one more beautiful than a wishful girl stuck in between lives.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"Today, I learned that there exists things that are worth more than power, more than fear, more than glory."

"Oh?"

"Today, I learned that I was loved. And so, I can love."

"…oh."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

Valaena sees and hears everything, and she thinks this is the problem—

—but what she forgets is that she has no control over what the world decides will happen.

There she is, a spectator again.

Once more, she thought that she envied the dead. The true dead—vacant and insensate; thrown aside as empty husks worn by post-mortem abandon. They did not require effort, in every aspect of their ceased existence. Her grandfather tucks her into his bed, right beside him, when the new year begins. He does not go out, he does not join his neighbours in their festivities. This man, another phantom that was meant to be long gone, spends the cold holidays with her, nestled within the lonely reclusion of his house. She is restless for days on end.

We should both be dead. What gives us both the right to live long enough, past our dues?

Valaena glared at the ground as she stumbled around to follow her grandsire. He likes to indulge her and include her in his activities—much, much, much more often than Thomas or Abraxas; suckier to her whims.

Today, on the sixth morning of the first month, he lit candles on three stone graves in the pretty garden behind the manor where he resided. It is nothing too grand—it is a small affair, with only the three of them and an ageing cocker spaniel to accompany their group. She and Clara stay by his legs, then cling to his arms as he crouches with a grunt. The dog—Leigh, a sweet tan thing with a short cut—sits and nuzzles against them as they observe the little rite.

"These two are for your great-grandparents, Mary and Thomas." Tom whispers, holding them close. Leigh whines at his soft tone. Then, he leans over to drip the wax of the first candle to create a stand for the next one, and creates a row of the white sticks for whoever's bones were placed beneath them. "And this…"

He strokes his grandchild's hair. "This is for your grandmother, Jane."

"So this is where she's been," Clara muttered, in stupefaction herself, "we all thought Rhaenar preserved her remains in a glass case in the crypts of Dragonstone."

"Her husband, that Abraxas boy," the man clarified, "he came to visit me thrice over the years. Once, to accompany Jane. They'd saved me that day. Two teenagers barely on the cusp of adolescence. I didn't believe them at first—thought two crumbs went ahead and decided to have a fit with my parents and I. It took me an entire month before I realised just how severe the situation was."

He sighed. "And after that one month, I fled the Isles."

"Because of the murders, I presume? I'd seen Lynnie crying over it, a week after she met your son."

"Dreams of the future, could you believe it?" A bitter laugh. His embrace is firm around his granddaughter. "I'd been destined to die…if not for your grandmother, I…"

Valaena blinks her tears away.

"I am forever grateful to God—or whoever might be listening—that I lived to meet you, both of you. That I haven't gone to waste. That my life still makes sense." Tom picks her and the puppet up, and they are followed by the mutt as he comes in through the back porch of his house. Once inside, he sets her on the kitchen counter, now shuffling to and fro to prep their noontime nosh.

(Dreams of the future, dreams of the dead, dreams of the lives she could have lived in moments past. The stars are a witness to this. They float in fixed orbit, each one a far-flung fancy, fleering and floundering and fantasising as the rest of the cosmos bump and shake with them. In this tiny planet, the humans squabble, admiring each dead world in the sky like it is a god given form in the way only a mortal can grasp. Perhaps it is, or perhaps not. It hardly matters. What follows is the stammering dread of fathoming that none of these cocked-up jewels would ever care: that, once more, their delights are all folly in flight; but the fools flutter on, because they need to feel a purpose.)

This is what becomes of their family.

Thomas, she had seen, took the news of the attack with unfiltered furore. Her father points his wand at a messenger—a familiar face, a haunting gaze—and casts a stream of red light so powerful that the one suffering his curse cannot even bear to emit a sound. Valaena shakes in denial at the vision. Over and over and over and over again, he repeats the flick of that bone-white weapon. Three seconds turn into three minutes, seven minutes slip into a half an hour, and one full cycle turns into five.

He spares her godfather no mercy, no kindness. Without Catelyn nor Valaena, there is no buffer to protect Barty from his wrath—even despite all that the two men have shared in the near two years that came before.

The babe cannot exit her mind.

Not for anything.

I brought this upon us, she weeps in horror and in helplessness, this is my fault.

Lord Voldemort does not take heed of any pleas that tumble out of his servant's mouth. In one fell swoop, he has lost his wife and his daughter, unaware that both are in relative safety; though even the question of how long that would last was still up in the air. When Tom wakes her—gods, I can't bear to look at you, why must you carry his face, why must he resemble you so—in his tangle of silken sheets and feather pillows, she babbles and bellies off to nothing; pondering upon this blight.

The worriment does not subside—and it is all that she can manage to keep herself upright, pale and woozy as she is; playing with a grandfather who desired to make amends for the brood he longed for, plaguing upon what is supposed to be a calm period. The dog is attuned to her condition, ever so sharp, as commanded by its nature. Leigh's eyes droop as she pads to Valaena, sniffing and circling, as if offering a gesture of perceived soothing. Her scent drives her into disarray; that fucking fragrance of jasmine and plum reminding her so starkly of her mother that it takes a tremendous amount of self-control so as not to let her magic slip loose.

Valaena has no control over what is happening, not anymore—

—and she cries.

For the child that she is, for the child that her mother never got to be, for the child that formed within that girl's belly, for the child that her uncle wished he had, for the child that drowned in a cave, for the child with a crown of platinum atop his head, for the child that grew into a monster—

—for everything and everyone that she can never return to.

"I want to die," Valaena whispers to Leigh, when Clara is off to aid Tom in household chores, "I want to die."

The dog does not offer her any consolations, save for a nudge of her nuzzle into her side.

The silence is unbearable.

Even the humming would have sufficed.

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(Her thoughts were not that of enjoyment, but of sadness. She felt only emptiness as either one of her partners filled her void. As each night progressed, only melancholy brewed within her; and despite the high of having nothing but her lovers' touches, when each tryst was over, they left her. It consumed her very being the moment they were gone. It is unreasonable to believe that their arrangement would have lasted. Despite this, she yearned for more; it was the only connection she had to feel with the only sort of love she came to be familiar with.

She is a bundle of heat and heavy breathing; she is stuck, stupid, and happy; and this is the reality she contends with.

If neither of the two men could give her that, then nothing else would—and that is the ending that would kill her.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"How did you know?"

"I've always known."

"All of it?"

"That's all I've ever known."

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"I would've thought that you'd rather turn us away. Catelyn had her apprehensions."

Clara swings her legs back and forth as she sits atop a windowsill. Little blue Dellie Darling sways as she speaks, idling while her owner's grandfather plucked at the weeds in the flowerbed on the side of his house. He is far from the arrogant aristocrat he is quoted to be; beaten by time and age, and perhaps wisdom and experience. He is haughty, yes, but still humble; high and mighty with what he is given, true, and yet harrowed and moiling for what he has earned for himself. With a crack of his knuckles, he curled an arm over the soil and reached for another sprouting pest.

"I…I don't deny that I still possess some modicum of—er, caution. There's much I don't understand about your world, and would rather not understand for the sake of my sanity." Tom replied drily. "Though, I'll admit—ever since Jane and Abraxas came to me, I've been having questions of my own."

"Hm. If you say so." It harrumphs, casting a sneering disgust over his menial work. "You've gone low, Whitecuffs."

"Whitecuffs?" A huff of laughter. "Where on earth did that name even come from?"

"Weren't you planning to become a priest?" Clara asked, hitting the soles of her shoes against the adobe wall. Click-tick-clack-tack. "You're really something. From a mudblood ponce to a fanatic hopeful, to a sorry old man living in a state where the water tastes like arse."

"This place isn't so bad," Tom defended, smiling, "and I'm living comfortably. Disneyland's just a half-hour drive away, too."

"I've no clue what that is."

Valaena rests on the patio, listening with half an ear as she busies herself with a picture book Catelyn stuffed into the satchel with haste. She leans against Leigh, who is content to let her use her as a pillow.

It has come to pass that her magic is still as volatile as ever, despite the lack of the environment for it. Without the constant buzzing in her ears to distract her, she realised that her being-there is much lowner—with no invisible mocking to haunt and taunt her, she is allowed to be placider. But each innate ability, every mark of the supernatural, they remain regardless, only stomped upon by her unwillingness to burden her new companion. Tom does not mind that she is a magical babe—or, rather, he does not get to even think about it all that much due to her budding control. The fact that she now stayed somewhere so close to muggles probably helped as well.

Miscalculations are unavoidable, though. Even if she exercised tremendous efforts to still her unrulier side, it persisted; and when she is woken from her own fits, she would find that she has nearly lost her grip on reality. Interestingly enough, when she is asleep, Clara is the one to cage her in.

(Sometimes, when he does drink himself into a stupor, her father cannot distinguish the lines between his illusions. And on the unlucky days where she is caught within his trap, she is tasked with entertaining him, for fear of further repercussions should he have enacted his perversions upon another.

Soon, all too soon, her earlier years are shut off in her head as a series of memories to disappear. She does not wish to recall herself groaning on his lap; nor his palm on her cheek, and her beautiful face, marred by the mark of the same hand that held her as a babe.

"Seika," he would whisper, "come back to me.")

Valaena does not dream of Catelyn.

It is as if the gods themselves refuse to show her where her mother is—in spite or in scandal, in drag or in due, in rec or in rue.

But when she does—

Oh.

Predictably, it runs downhill from there.

When Tom relaxes in his rocking chair, later on in the afternoon, Valaena snuggles up against him to take a nap. She has done nothing all day—aside from watching her grandsire do housework, really—but she is tired. As her lashes flutter shut, she is pushed into another damnable torture, now forever ingrained in her mind.

It goes like this.

Shouts ring from the chambers, and the hallway is dark and long. Then, the image contorts and she sees an alleyway instead, and she is standing in the middle of a street. There are outlines surrounding her; all sorts of shapes and sizes, distorted and so very wrong. The confrontation unfolds in slow motion, as if time itself resisted the tragic tableau. Spells were cast, flashes of light illuminating the darkness; and as the watcher, as the one who cannot do anything but ghost around in immaterial inactivity, the odds of this enemy winning are overwhelming.

Her breath catches as she witnesses her mother being overpowered, her struggles in vain against that single relentless tide. With hands that reached out to nothing in particular, she dashes towards her; unflinching despite the larger chaos that loomed. She looks around for someone familiar—someone, anyone: be it Thomas, Barty, Abraxas, Lucius, Narcissa, and even the elves. The only other noise she hears—the one in empathy of her own begging—is a woman's snarling and sobbing. With growing terror, she realises that the cries come from Catelyn herself, pleading for something.

Valaena fully opens her eyes.

("You act as though I would disappear tomorrow," she grins at her elder cousin, "I'm much too great to be taken down."

"Ah," he rolled his eyes in playful humour, "the Witch of the Blue Fires would rather burn the world first, wouldn't she?")

She stumbles on the gravel, suppressing her own inconveniences even as pebbles dig into the soft flesh of her knees and hands. The babe gasps. This is the first time that she has ever truly touched something within a dream. From her position by a dumpster, she can vaguely make out the figures by the street. Down the path, two men take a hold of her mother, and the woman is pushed against a wall with a rough hand. The first strikes come, and she screams.

"No!" Valaena cries, voice still weighed down by the drawl of infant's throat; blood pumping in her ears as the woman turns to her in sheer horror.

To her own shock, so do the adults.

"What the fuck—"

"Get the kid!"

Oh.

A single, anguished wail echoes through the surprise. It is a manifestation of Valaena's subconscious despair. And in that moment, as Catelyn's lovely lilac eyes locked onto Valaena's cruel crimson—the inexorable tragedy begins.

"DON'T TOUCH HER!" The Lady of Sunspear struggles to keep herself upright in her state. "GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY CHILD!"

Yet, as dreams often unfold in ways both surreal and heartbreaking, just as any mortal prophet succumbs to forces out of their design; Catelyn, too, is taken away. She has said it before: the one thing that will never leave her, the one thing that she will always remember about living, is the idea of how painful dying is; that even despite the kindest transitions, even despite the sweetest mercies, there is an echo of loss to be dealt with.

Why would this be any different?

"Let go, let go, let go—LET GO—"

Her vision blurred as the momentum carried her forward, a helpless passenger on the unforgiving cement surface. The acrid scent of asphalt mingled with the metallic tang of blood. She tasted dots of grit on her lips. The air trembled. There is the calculated cruelty of those who sought to tear mother and child apart—and before long, unfamiliar hands are wrapping themselves around the babe's form to pick her up.

And Catelyn does the unthinkable.

(There is a dead man laughing, finding amusement in the sight of measly twin babes attempting to crawl towards him.)

Her mother's magic goes awry, and—

(She remembers the crack of her bones as his foot meets her hand.)

And—

(Eyes, threads, lilies—)

And then, what she remembers is Catelyn's mad rampage; a star-crossed beauty looking down at her with tears falling down her face. She cannot hear anything else. It is muted, like listening to things from underwater—thick and dense, and simply unintelligible.

(Stars upon graves, tombs within the skies—)

And then, darkness.

(She wakes, and the morning azure bleeds into a palette of red and violet. Then, quickly after a few minutes, it shifted into grey—and the rain fell down onto the roof with gentle taps. A little brown sparrow settled onto the windowsill, taking refuge from the weather; it faced the glass, and it tilted its head at her as if assessing her with curiosity.)

Valaena breathed.

Then, she turned to her side, and buried her head into her grandfather's chest.

She still hears everything, even when her eyes closed and sleep overcame her once more.

And that's the problem, isn't it?

The babe swallows everything down, until it is nothing but a sour mass in her chest. There is nothing to be done…not anymore. She knows what she had seen, she knows what she had just gone through. That was not a dream, not at all. Her mother freed herself from those restraints and crumpled to the ground; a wounded animal, howling in grief, all emotions pouring forth like a tempest. And all else—their little island, her nursery, their chambers; what was once a haven, now bore the scars of their disappearance: a shattered mirror, fluttering remnants of torn tapestries, and the lingering scent of their bodies on the pillows.

Gone, gone, gone; they are gone.

(Amaranthine, amaranthine, amaranthine; ashling, ashling, ashling. Born to the serpents, born to the fires. To the sun, to the stars, to the waters, to the fields. In blood and bone, to minds marked by madness.)

Sunspear is the island illuminated by an eye of the heavens, where Valaena is the weight of the wind-weathered granules sitting atop it, and they are declining—and together, with her home, they collapse.

(Voldemort and Valaena, Clara and Catelyn; parent and child, doll and dreamer, creation and creator. Oh, but the pattern is ruined, now.)

Her palms and her knees are scraped.

The salt from her eyes meets saline on her skin, and every wound stings.

Valaena makes sure to dust herself off, before Tom stirred.

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

(She nods slowly, reflecting on her lover's words. They are certainly much to take in. His compliment was quite sweet—quite refreshing, in fact! She never expected him to have such an admiration of her as a person, though she would not be shy to tell herself that it made her feel quite…humbled.

"I suppose so…" She whispered, looking back up at him as he waited for her to reply. The girl meets his eyes, but there is still a shame in her belly after his confession; and it proved difficult to even so much as accept his affectionate attention. But she did try, nevertheless.)

──•~❉᯽❉~•──

"I miss her. I miss myself."

•⸻•

•⸻•

Tell me about yourself, Valaena. How did you come by my diary? And why have you chosen to keep it? I don't mean to sound suspicious, of course, but the suddenness of you writing in it surprises me. Most of all, I'm curious as to the chain of events that've led to you even having it in the first place.

Well, well, well—now, aren't you curious, she thinks to herself, as she blinks down at the fading letters, but what to say?

Lucius gifted the item to her. She did not believe for even a single second that he meant to present it to her in such a way; after all, the ministry had been hosting inspections of its own around the same time she received it from him. What a funny coincidence, then, if such is the case. But no—this is no token of goodwill nor is it an item for reconciliation. This is merely the spectre he wanted gone from his home—the taint he considered unnecessary. She does not hold anything against him for it.

He gave it to her because he needed to…else his own son was at risk, else his House would be placed under worse scrutiny than it already had when the war ended. But she is happy, regardless, that she gets the book from him. Because this is a piece of her father, this is a remnant of his existence—and this is a reminder that, once upon a time, he had been as young and bright as she was.

It was by mere happenstance, I'll admit, is what she writes instead, unwilling to divulge the full truth just yet, I didn't think I'd actually get anything out of this curious little thing that drew me in.

Tell me more.

She is a Martell, his friend's grandchild.

(Hook.)

Clever enough to dance around his charms, clever enough to know how his personality works, clever enough to realise he was just as bored as she was, clever enough to invite him for a dance of wits.

(Line.)

With a prowess and a show to lure him in at just the right temptations; a temerarious rendition of Jane—lovely sheila she had been, powerful and well-favoured.

I suppose full introductions are in order. My name is Esther Valaena Martell. The year is 1992. This diary was…a gift, of sorts, for my twelfth birthday. The person who gave it to me says that Tom Riddle might've known my father, like my grandmother—and so, I have this.

And, pray tell, who was he? Your father, I mean.

A man named Thomas Gaunt.

Three beats of silence.

And then.

And then.

And then.

…well, well, well. That person who told you that isn't wrong. I knew him—oh, I knew him, alright.

(Sinker.)

Valaena laughs in the dead of the night, hysterical.