Surviving Malfoy _ Part II : Anger and Depression
Billie Eilish 'ilomilo' - I just wanted to protect you.
Chapter 2:
Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day, under normal circumstances, is the day all the Salem girls are picked up by their parents and taken home for the summer holiday. As this would cause too much of a ruckus for Madam Fox not to fear for my safety however, she's arranged for us all to be escorted home one by one by a teacher and anyone old enough to apparate on their own is allowed to leave whenever they are ready. Except me.
My mother has me supervising the day, making sure all the younger girls have all their belongings, tearful goodbyes are being held swiftly and without much drama and no favorite stuffed animals are getting abandoned for the summer. She's been nervous all morning, actively blaming it on the stress of the day, but really, I know she's scared of going home with me.
We are due to leave last as my mother is still working until the end of the day. Madam Fox paid her house a visit the day before, making sure the protective charms that have been put up around it will hold through the summer. It's under a Fidelius Charm with my mother as the secret keeper, so I wouldn't be able to access it without her by my side just yet anyway. So, I spend my day throwing leftover laundry onto various beds, waking children and brushing hair.
The chaos of it keeps my mind off the coming two months. I love my mother, I love her house, but it never feels nearly as much like home as Salem does and the prospect of being scooped up inside it for an entire two months makes me groan internally just thinking about it. She laid the rules down early: I'm not to leave the house on my own, I'm not to meet anyone she doesn't know and who hasn't been properly vetted, I must be home before sundown, and I am to call her if the slightest problem presents itself. There's only one other place in town that has been given the all clear to go to if I need distracting - the house Debbie is due to move into today.
Originally, she was told she would be spending the up-coming year at Salem working under Madam Zollner, the Defence Instructor, to make up for her offences. She will still be doing so, however she's now being housed in Touro, not far from Salem, and with two roommates: a Swedish magical historian on a twelve month research sabbatical and a newly graduated MACUSA agent working in the Louisiana Investigation Department. Madam Fox hasn't given Debbie much of a reason for this, but she doesn't really need to. I had a hard time keeping my eyes from rolling back into my head when she told me the news.
I am to spend the summer under constant supervision.
I am torn between gratitude and annoyance. I'm grateful they are willing to put considerable amounts of energy into my protection, yet more than just a little annoyed that they would restrict my freedom to this point. Still not much has happened, although the news has broken about a mass-breakout from Azkaban prison with various known Death Eaters now on the loose in Britain. But nothing much is happening on our side of the world. Voldemort is still in hiding, he hasn't started a single attack so far. The situation is tense, but not yet worrisome for me so far as British Magical Law Enforcement is still on our side. And yet I will be forced to spend the summer in one place, barely leaving my mother's side.
She's doing her best not to show it to me, but I know it puts her under immense pressure. I'm old enough to look after myself, a month away from being of age and she has always regarded me as independent. But she's feeling responsible for what happened to me at Hogwarts and I know she would never forgive herself if anything more were to happen to me. Her lack of magical abilities weighs on her more than ever before. I know she feels defenseless, she doesn't have to tell me.
"Have you seen Lizzie's toothbrush?" My mother huffs, coming to a halt next to me.
"It's in the front pocket of her suitcase with the rest of her toiletries, mom." I'm in the middle of twisting little six-year-old Ella's hair into a bun. She squirms. "I packed it with her this morning."
"You're hurting me," Ella wails as my mother rolls her eyes and turns back around. "Front pocket, Liz!" She yells up the stairs.
"Don't even try, you're not getting out of this one," I say just as Lizzie shouts back "It's not, I checked already!" I sigh. "Yes, it is, we packed it together!" I silently vow never to have children, tying the knot on Ella's hairband. "All done." I nudge her off the chair and she runs off with barely more than a wave as a thanks.
I throw her hairbrush into the suitcase that's laying open on her bed and leave the room. I've barely had the time to pack my own things together, I've been too busy packing everybody else's. I'm not in a hurry though, anything to delay our departure. I spend the rest of my morning helping Martha prepare the last lunch of the year, before falling onto one of the white chesterfields in the front parlor with Debbie, trying to make plans for the summer we both know my mother will squash instantly.
Lunch is unusually quiet and colorful. It's the opposite to the black and white uniformed sea of giggling girls we have all year, yet my mother prides herself in it. It means they are reluctant to leave and she's done her job. We bid the younger ones goodbye first as they slowly trickle out one by one until only Debbie and I are left. She's never even been to the house she's due to move into and as such Madam Fox has asked one of her new roommates to come pick her up.
We are sitting at the bottom of the right twin stair in the entrance hall, in our muggle clothes and sulkier than we've been all day when the doorbell rings. Debbie groans, she would've preferred the extra year living here.
"Shush." My mother rushes out of the kitchen and down the front hallway to the door. Debbie gets up, rolling her eyes at me behind her back as I stifle a laugh.
"I've heard much about this place." A deep voice follows my mother's footsteps and I exchange a look with Debbie at the accent.
"Shouldn't Mr. Wallace be picking up Deborah?" My mother asks our exact question. The MACUSA agent was supposed to be picking Debbie up, not the Swede.
"Austin was called away on a mission this afternoon," comes the answer as they both come into view and neither of us care anymore. "So, I took it upon myself to accompany Miss Zabini home."
"Very well, that should be no problem," my mother says. "We've got all her stuff ready here. This is Debbie," she said, pointing at her. "And this my daughter, Jolene."
I raise my hand in salutation, but I don't trust my voice to correct my name just yet.
"Delighted, my name's Casper. I'll take care of the luggage," he says with a handsome little smile and the second he turns to pick up the suitcases my mother is pointing at, Debbie whips her head around to me and mouths 'Oh. My God.'
I try holding my face as neutral as possible. The man who just walked in must be in his early twenties and as handsome as his smile. He has slick, jet black hair and the highest cheekbones I've ever seen on a human being, slightly puckered lips and protruding eyes of the deepest blue. I press my lips together tightly, watching him straighten back up, suitcases now firmly in hand. His body proportions itself quite nicely over the full 6'5 he's easily reaching. I would probably look like a toddler next to him.
A scar-faced toddler.
"Call me!" Debbie says, raising a hand in goodbye as she follows him out of the house. She has a stupid grin plastered on her face that causes just the slightest twinge of jealousy to mix in with my already miffed disposition.
"Ready?" My mother asks and I follow her out of the door, where she takes hold of my hand and I apparate us away into the front room of her little blue house in Metairie.
My summer isn't starting out too bright. I feel irritated and I'm sure if this is down to being stuck in a house my mother isn't ready to let me out of, or the approaching full moon. I religiously drink the Wolfsbane potion every evening as prescribed by Madam Vincent and hated every minute of it. If this was supposed to ease the pain of the full moon, it certainly isn't helping in the days leading up to it. I cursed my existence every time the disgusting liquid burnt its way down my throat.
The fact that neither of us have much to do doesn't exactly help the situation either. My mother, so used to caring for twenty plus girls from the end of August through to late June for the past fifteen years, has always had a particularly tough time being in a quiet house for the remaining two months of the year. The previous summer, she went as far as to renovate her entire kitchen out of boredom. Although I have my suspicions she might also have been trying to avoid facing the fact that I was about to leave for, what we thought at the time, good.
I, on the other hand, used to welcome having some alone time with my mother. I normally have to share her attention with an entire school and these two summer months used to be the only ones where she would be looking after just me. We'd spend our days together, lazing around, cooking, playing board games or she'd take me out shopping, swimming or to a museum. We'd take Debbie along from time to time, even have her over for sleepovers.
This summer will be different. We both want to leave the house, yet no matter how insistent I am that I would have it under control if anything was to happen, my mother won't allow me to take her anywhere. I'm not of age yet, the rules aren't as strict as in Britain, I am allowed to do minimal amounts of magic outside school, but needing to defend us both would cross that line. Plus causing a scene in the possible presence of a muggle isn't exactly legal here either.
Tensions start running high quickly. I'm aware that I have developed a short temper, yet I can't help but let it run loose sometimes. I grow increasingly more nervous the closer the next full moon draws. I keep on being told most likely nothing will happen - but what if it does? What would it feel like? How dangerous would I become, to what extent would I be able to control it or myself?
I've tried introducing the idea of going out to the swamps during the full moon on our first evening home, but she's declining categorically. Too risky, too dangerous, too unsafe. No matter how many trained wizards are around. I'm on the wolfsbane potion and I'll be safest shut away in my room.
I've tried every day over the course of the week to convince her to just let me go and each time our rows grow more and more intense. Anger I don't want to direct at her pours out of me until I eventually reach breaking point on the day of the full moon. In a last-ditch attempt at getting out of the house I say the one thing I know would get to her, yet have never truly believed in.
"Why the fuck did you send me there, mom? We wouldn't even be in this situation if you would've just let me stay here."
Her nostrils flare just the way mine do when I get angry. She drops the pan she's holding back into the kitchen sink and props both her hands up on the kitchen counter, gripping its edges. She looks seconds away from slapping me, yet she reacts the exact way she always does when one of her girls threw a tantrum.
"Language, young lady," she points a finger at me patronizingly and I huff at her half turning away. "I've had enough of this. You know exactly why I won't let you go into a deserted swamp in the middle of the night unsupervised-"
"Unsuper-?!"
"Yes. Unsupervised. You can't think I'll-"
"Mom! Cassius would be there. He's perfectly capable-"
"We don't know that," she says with a finality I am more than ready to challenge.
"What, because he's not a Hawthorne Wizard?!"
"We haven't checked him in any way."
"We've known him for years! He's Martha's dad for Tituba's sake."
She huffs and turns away to pick the pan back out of the sink and start scrubbing at it again. I wait for a response, but I know I'm not going to get one.
"Are you planning on doing background checks on every single person I'm going to be around in my life?" My voice is still angry, but I do my best to keep it at a decent level.
My mother inhales deeply before she answers. "For the foreseeable future, we might need to."
I rub my forehead with the palm of my hand. She isn't going to back down.
"I'd feel safer if I weren't in this house," I say calmly. The pan clanks back into the sink and she throws the sponge after it. "Mom-"
"It's fine," she says curtly, her voice high-pitched. She turns around and walks right out of the kitchen.
"Mom!" I say hot on her heels. "That's not how I meant that."
"No, you did," she turns back around. I've hit a nerve. "And you're right, I can't protect you. Not in this situation. But I'm doing the best I can-"
"I know that," I say as softly as I can. "But I don't think I'm in any imminent danger right now and I'd feel much safer in case I do…" I pause. "… transform tonight. I'd rather be somewhere far away from people. Somewhere where you don't have to see or hear it."
My mother's lips are pursed, I can see the tiny tears in the corners of her eyes, but now is not the time to make things sound prettier than they are. She takes another deep breath.
"Nothing's going to happen," she says softly.
"Why have you been making me drink that potion all week if you're so convinced?"
She bites her lip at that and, clapping her hands together, lets herself sink into her old leather wing chair. "Just to make sure. Well, maybe I want to make sure nothing happens to you tonight. Any werewolf, even under wolfsbane, can be unpredictable, especially if it's their first turn."
She hides her face in her hands, and it takes me a second to realize she's started crying. "Mom…" I make my way over to her, crouching in front of the armchair. I don't have time to do much more as she pulls me towards her.
"You're right," she says, enveloping me in an awkward embrace with me still half sitting on the floor. "I can't protect you."
I sigh, about to respond but she interrupts me before I can do so, shaking her head. "I can't. I never could, I don't understand why they left you with me in the first place."
I frown, the hand I have on her shoulder pausing and she pulls back to look me in the eye. She senses the question. "That's a story for another time," she says, patting my cheek.
I feel my jaw tighten, a little bit of my earlier annoyance returning. "Mom-" I start, but I am interrupted yet again.
"Another time," she says firmly. "You go to Warbeck tonight. Stay alert and come back here the minute it's over. I'll go fetch a few things to show you tomorrow, okay?"
"Thank you," I say after a short pause.
That little promise means I have something to look forward to after the full moon. I've been nothing but nervous and stressed up until now, with nothing much else on my mind but the amount of pain I might be in in a few short hours. I still have that fear, but the wonder about what my mother could have to show me takes over for the rest of the day. I spend it in my room, trying to distract myself with my new Hawthorn wand. It has a unicorn hair core and still feels a little strange.
Sunset is only a few hours away, and I grow increasingly more restless the closer it gets. Hermione sends me a message around seven, just to ask if I am alright. I've marked her coin with a little dent on the side to make sure I don't make the same mistake Draco did a month ago. I tell her I am, even though I'm not.
The moon is due to come out at 8.06pm, so at 7.45 I grab my wand and leave the house. Out of habit, I stuff both coins into the back pocket of my shorts. I apparate close to the water, not far from Lake Lery and sit down below a cypress tree, leaning my back into the damp moss covering it. I cast a repelling charm around myself to keep the mosquitos away. The heat is still pressing down on me, and the amount of water around does not help the humidity. But it is the first time in a year that I've felt this, so I drink it all in while I still can.
It doesn't take Cassius very long to find me. Barely a few minutes after I've made myself comfortable, I suddenly find him leaning against another tree ten yards away, his beefy, red pit bull by his side. We exchange little more than a look for a greeting.
His presence somehow makes what may be about to happen all the more real. He is here to look out for me, simultaneously protect me and protect others from me should I really turn. I suppress a shudder, a small lump of panic slowly forming in the pits of my stomach. The fact that I've forgotten to bring along a watch isn't exactly helpful. The sun seems to set slower and slower, the moon takes its sweet time showing itself and with every minute that creeps by, my stomach ties itself deeper and deeper into that all-familiar knot of anxiety.
Until finally, over the edge of a few far away trees, I see the edge of the full moon peak out. I instinctively hold my breath, hyper-aware of how sticky and damp my skin has become, whether it be from sweat or humidity I don't know. It creeps higher and a ripple seems to take over my arms, goosebumps spread out down my back and I stay as still as I can, letting the moonlight bathe me.
Nothing happens.
I sit frozen for a moment longer before I finally release my shaky breath, and with it the tension I haven't consciously realized took up residence in my shoulders since I met Fenrir Greyback just over three weeks ago. I bury my face in my hands and draw in a few more shaky breaths. A large, warm and wet tongue prompts me to look back up. Brandy has started licking my face in compassion, slobbering up my tears of relief.
"Come on, kiddo," Cassius is standing right next to me, extending a hand to help me lift myself to my feet. "I'll give you something to take the edge off."
The Warbeck's house glows faintly green in the emerging moonlight. It stands on stilts with a set of stairs at the back leading down to the river. Today however, I follow Cassius' shortly cropped, white-blonde head through the front door and into his kitchen, where he lights two old oil lamps before pouring a large amount of Blishen's Firewhisky into a glass and putting it down on the table for me to drink.
"Brandy, couch," he says, and the dog obliges readily, leaving us alone in the kitchen. I sit down on one of his old, wobbly kitchen chairs and watch his tall frame move around the kitchen. "Drink it," he says, noticing I haven't touched the glass. "Trust me, it'll help."
I take a small gulp, coughing a little at the way it burns down my throat, still miles better than the wolfsbane potion. "Thank you."
Cassius grunts. "I'm just glad I don't have to spend the night looking after a loose werewolf." His voice is kind and sure enough, when he turns around, he has a mischievous grin in store as he sits down opposite me.
I smile back. "I'm just glad I don't have to be a loose werewolf."
He huffs. "Just let me know when you want something a bit bloodier on the table. I know your mother's not too fond of making that stuff."
I grin back, but it vanishes quickly off my face, and I take another sip. "She almost didn't let me come here tonight."
"Martha mentioned you might not show up." He carries on when I don't respond, "don't be too hard on her, she's just worried about you."
"I know. Can't really blame her." The Firewhisky sears its way down my throat, slowly bringing heat back into my fingertips.
"I would have flipped out way worse than that if it had been any of my kids."
"They all did, to be honest. Flip out, I mean." I grimace. "Mom's barely letting me out of her sight, Salem's under complete lock-down and I can't leave the house without constant supervision. I'll be of age in a month, and it feels like I'm back in kindergarten."
"And they're right." I look up at him, a little taken aback. "Those guys you had a run in with a month ago? Don't underestimate them," he carries on as my eyebrows pull into a frown. "I guarantee you that Malfoy boy will not keep his mouth shut and the second they find out, they'll come hunting you down. You're Harry Potter's sister. If they can't get him, you'll be like the holy grail to them and from what I've heard, your brother's not stupid. He's been outrunning Voldemort since he was a year old."
"How do you-"
He gives me a half smile. "Martha talks." I don't respond. "Look. I don't know all that much about what's going on on the other side of the big pond, but as soon as I heard the name Malfoy, I had alarm bells ringing. They're notorious for causing more than just trouble."
"What do you know about them?"
"Look at me," he says it so matter-of-factly it takes me a few seconds to fully realize what he means, and he gives me every extra second I need to let it sink in.
I haven't seen Cassius since before I went to Hogwarts a year ago and I've known him for so long, I've never given his looks a second thought. He is tall, his eyes are a kind, dark grey. His face is full, his nose straight - his hair white blond and his chin distinctly pointy.
I inhale sharply but don't get the chance to ask what's on my mind.
"We're very distant cousins," he says. "But please trust me when I tell you to stay away from that boy. If he's anything like his father, he's no good."
I frown again. "And what do you know about his father?"
Cassius' face darkens. "Repeatedly marrying cousins doesn't have the best effect on your mind. I've had one interaction with him in my life - he's an elitist, choleric dick. He's the one carrying the Malfoy name and that makes him think that gives him the right to control and command around all of us."
"How many of you are there?" I cock my head to the side in wonder. He's piqued my curiosity.
"I'm aware of one other cousin, somewhere in the south of France," Cassius sighs. "And then there's us. We're descendants of Ophélie Malfoy, younger sister of Brutus Malfoy. She in herself was an oddity, Malfoy's don't tend to have more than one child. She disgraced the family by marrying a muggle and Brutus, true to his name, disinherited her, burnt her of the family tree as they say. So, she did what most French people looking for a better life did back in that time and she moved here. But they like to keep close tabs on their relatives, just in case we step out of line."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm the first in generations to have more than one child," he continues. "With Ophélie, the Malfoy line turned into the Warbeck line and the name hasn't changed once all the way down to me. And then I come along and have three children. When my dear cousin got wind of the fact that I've fathered a squib, he couldn't stand the idea of anyone ever finding out."
An uneasy feeling starts spreading in my guts. I lean back in my chair, biting my thumb. I have an idea about where this might be going. I never asked Martha, I never bothered to even ask myself what might have happened, but the question now fills me with dread, and I know I'm about to get the answer sooner than I would like.
"He came around, all pompous and pretentious with his snobbish wife, turning up his nose every chance he got," Cassius pauses. "There's a blood-curse on the Malfoy family. I didn't know that until he cared to enlighten me. It dates all the way back to Armand Malfoy. Almost a thousand years back. He put a curse on his family tree to ensure a single, pure-blooded line of Malfoy's. It's my own fault for never wondering why it's been all Warbeck's since Ophélie.
"Every Malfoy's first born will always be male, to ensure there is an heir to carry along the name. The second born will always be female, an indulgence supposedly, one you can marry off and knit closer diplomatic ties to other pure-blood families. The third, will be a squib, to discourage further reproduction. Malfoys aren't frivolous. We're not rabbits, we behave with dignity," he says it with so much hatred I almost recoil.
Alexandre, Sophia and Martha. The boy, the girl and the squib. The feeling of unease begins to spread up my spine, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on edge.
"What did he do?"
"Made sure I stopped reproducing."
I take a moment to exhale. "Why didn't you report him?"
Cassius huffs. "It wouldn't have brought Catherine back," he says darkly. "Do you have any idea how much money these people have? He's paying me a handsome sum to keep my mouth shut. If I went to MACUSA, he'd be paying them a handsome sum to leave him alone. I'd rather that money went to my children."
The unease lodges itself firmly up my throat, making it hard to breathe steadily. "How old was Martha?"
But Cassius shakes his head. "She doesn't know," he says, avoiding my eye. "She was asleep upstairs with her sister. Alex saw, but I changed his memory."
I don't say anything for a while, letting the full weight of what he is telling me sink into my brain.
"He'll find you," Cassius carries on. "Sooner or later if he's got it out for you. Even Fox can't keep you safe. So do me a favor and stick to what your mother's telling you to do." I nod. "I'm not having another person vanish because of him."
"Does Madam Fox know about this?" I ask.
"Of course she does," Cassius looks me deep in the eye for a moment, before carrying on. "Martha's telling me you're getting twins next year?"
My eyebrows shoot up, unsure about the sudden change of subject, but I nod.
"Do you know their name?" He asks.
"Poppy and Violet."
He shakes his head. "Their last name."
"Avery, or something along those lines," I say. "I'm not sure."
"That's correct."
When I carry on looking at him confusedly, he turns around and rummages through a drawer in his kitchen cabinet. Finally, he pulls out an old edition of the Owl Times. He drops it on the table in front of me and turns it to page 7, the international news. It's a week old, the mass break-out at Azkaban prison is front and center. When I frown down at the page, Cassius taps his finger on the mugshots of escaped prisoners heading the article. There are seventeen different faces, but the very first is a man with the name Corban Avery. I look up at Cassius, confused.
"Fox has been taking in girls in need for years. She's known about your real origins since the day your mother showed up at her door. She's somewhat notorious for it, that's why I took Martha to her. Poppy and Violet are the daughters of this kind gentleman," he taps Corban Avery's mugshot. "His wife Mirabella supposedly had no idea what he was up to, but the second he got caught chasing your brother down one of the most high-security departments in the British Ministry, she's been setting up their enrolment at Salem with Madam Fox. To keep them away from their father and to make sure they grow up to be decent people."
I sit dumbfounded, struggling to take this all in. "And she can be trusted?"
"She passed Fox' questioning, I don't think you have anything to fear from her."
I swallow hard at the thought, but considering the lengths Madam Fox has gone to secure Salem for the coming year, I don't think she'd let any Death Eater's wife into the school if she doesn't have serious reason to trust her.
Regardless, I get very little time to digest this all. I feel something glowing hotly in the back pocket of my shorts. It confuses me for a moment before I remember the two coins still stowed away safely in it. It is barely 11.30pm, that makes it 5.30 in the morning in Britain. I frown and pull the culprit out.
Are you okay?
It isn't dented.