September 1979
THE CLOUDS JOLTED amongst each other in the dark sky, causing loud vibrations and flashes of lights, making out a young couple coming hastily out of a grim-looking building in a dark street in London. The young woman tugged her raincoat's collar to her neck while the rain poured over their heads, tangles of light blonde strands slipped from her hood as she rushed to the man's open arms for him to hold her to his chest, embracing her as though it was their last.
Perhaps it was...
"Must you stay?" the woman wept, her voice barely a whisper.
"Yes," he said firmly, breaking their embrace to gaze at her pale eyes, drenched with worry. He continued, "There's something left Regulus and I must do."
"But what if something bad happens to you? How can you tell me to go back to Italy for safety while you're here risking your life, Cepheus —"
"Carina, please... you and I both know that I won't leave my little brother to do this mission alone. He's only eighteen, he needs me."
"But what about —"
"Listen to me!" Cepheus yelled, taking Carina by her shoulders. "This is not just about Regulus and the Dark Lord. It's about myself too. I've done a terrible thing, and this is the only way I will atone for it."
Carina didn't dare speak. The message was clear and she understood fully well the meaning locked behind Cepheus' words, but it didn't make the burden any easier to bear. She shuddered, taking a silent moment to recall the tragedy that struck their family on that day — the day that it happened.
"You might have forgiven me, Carina, but I still can't. So please, go back to Italy and stay safe until everything ends. If not for you... do it for our child." Upon uttering the last words, he slid his hand to Carina's belly, caressing it tenderly.
Silence befell the young couple as tangible as the darkness engulfing them, heavy with the weight of their worries. The sound of the heavy raindrops on their shoulders and the lightning illuminating their warm embrace was the only sound to be heard on that moonless night. Then a cracking sound of a window made their heads look up towards it, revealing an 18-year-old boy leaning over the window as the rain began to wet the dark strands of hair falling over his face.
"Cepheus!" The young boy called. "It's time. We need to prepare to leave."
"Alright, Regulus, go back inside. It's dangerous. I'll be right there."
Regulus looked at him one last time knowingly before closing the window and retreating back inside. The young couple stayed silent for a little while before Carina broke it first, "So, this is it?"
"It won't be the last time you will see me, love."
"I know..." Said Carina, but there was a hint of uncertainty in her voice, conveyed by a single tear that slid down her cheek, to be masked by the raindrops.
With a last longing glance, they untangled their hands and Carina set off into the long evening, leaving Cepheus by the doorstep, gazing after his wife's silhouette as it faded into the shadows.
Somewhere in Northern Italy, July 1985
"Let's go over it another time tesoro, what is this in English?" Carina asked her six-year-old daughter, her carbon copy, seated beside her on the dining table. The warm light of the afternoon sun poured open from the doors overlooking the villa's garden and onto their faces.
"Pitcher?"
"It's 'Picture', and yes, but a picture of what? What's this animal?"
"It's a Niffler!" Her daughter cheered, a huge smile forming on her lips, happy to get the animal's name right in the foreign language Carina insisted on making her learn.
"Bravissima, Lux! You're doing great!"
In the remainder of Carina's little lesson, She noticed how Lux didn't stop averting her attention outside, and she was no longer focusing on the images of different magical beasts Carina lay on the table. Lux clearly got bored with the lesson, and now wanted to go play again in the gardens. Carina took out her wand and made the images vanish from the table.
"Alright, we're done for today. You may go."
Carina watched her little daughter jump down from her seat and run towards the open glass doors to disappear behind the bushes. Lux was her bundle of joy, and she was growing so fast and turning into a beautiful girl day by day. Carina watched her daughter running between the bushes, smiling and laughing on her own. She wished Cepheus was here beside her watching their daughter grow together. It's been six years since she'd last seen him, and four years since he stopped replying to her letters, saying it was dangerous to do so due to the risk of the owls being intercepted. Carina missed him so much. She never dared to talk about him to Lux, afraid she'd break into tears in front of her.
"You're still teaching her that language?" A firm old voice from behind her interrupted her thoughts. Carina turned around to see her mother, Teresa Volpi, coming down the stairs from her chamber after a long-needed after-lunch nap. "You still think he'll come back for you? He's dead for all we know, just forget about him. Lux is better off studying here at Giubiana."
"Mamma, we spoke about this. Lux is going to Hogwarts and don't you ever say that Cepheus is dead... please."
"Oh Giubiana mia, don't you read the news? It's been four years since that dark lord of theirs has been vanquished!"
Teresa went to the living room next to the stairs and picked up a copy of La Gazzetta Dell'Oracolo; the Italian wizarding newspaper. She approached her daughter and threw the newspaper in front of Carina with a huff. Carina turned her gaze to the paper, and read.
BRITISH DARK WIZARD VANQUISHED
MAGIC YET UNHEARD OF
A BOY OF ONE, HARRY POTTER, PUTS AN END TO BRITAIN'S REIGN OF TERROR... BRITISH MAGICAL LAW ENFORCEMENT ARE UPHOLDING A SEARCH FOR THE FLEEING CRIMINALS... FIVE OF THE DARK SUPPORTERS ARE ALREADY CAPTURED AND BEING HELD IN THE HIGH-SECURITY PRISON: AZKABAN, AWAITING PROSECUTION... REST ARE YET TO BE FOUND. 1981.
Carina's hands shook as she read the words, her eyes scanning over every letter as if unable to ensure herself that the news was indeed true, news that didn't even make the headline of l'Oracolo. She looked at the date of the newspaper — it was in 1981. That was the year Cepheus stopped sending her letters, and that could only mean two things. Neither of which was good.
This article was the last drop to flood the cup. Carina couldn't hold her tears any longer and burst into sobs, her cries growing louder and louder. Her biggest fear materialised: Cepheus was either dead or in prison forever for what he'd done.
"Now that you know, I hope you stop teaching my granddaughter that silly language," Teresa grunted, leaving Carina alone in her misery.
It was July and the countryside was in full swing of harvest. Lux passed her time in the garden, hardly taller than the bench she sat on, underneath a twisted piece of ivy that curled around the sandy walls of the Villa, nose often buried in one spellbook or another; her mother's insistence.
Sitting there, she could hear the distant cicadas in the trees, she could hear birds squabbling in the hedgerows, the warm wind rippling through the orchards, and the whisperings of the snakes through the tall and untamed grass.
They heard her, too.
One by one they came. From under the rocks, from the trees, from the grass, from the thickest ivy and the thorniest bramble. They were beautiful. With eyes of green and grey and black, their bodies long and lithe, and their little tongues forked in a greeting.
And with little else but the trees to talk to, Lux quickly found comfort in the company of her serpentine friends.
"Hello again, little one," the green-eyed snake hissed.
"Hello! I've been waiting for you for a while! Where were you?" Lux beamed, jumping from the bench to join her friends.
"Nothing that important. What'sss that in your hand?" asked the black-eyed snake.
"Oh, this? It's a book about snakes."
"About usss?"
"Yes! I was very curious to know why I could speak with you. I tried to speak to our family cat but he just never understands me, or I him." Set on finding the answer all by herself, Lux had spent that afternoon flipping page after page, but all she could find in that book was where snakes lived and what they ate.
"Maybe you're part Sssoutherner? Perhapsss one of your parentsss is from the Sssouth," said the red-eyed snake.
"Why the South?" asked Lux, very intrigued by his question. Maybe she was finally about to learn where her ability comes from.
"It's a Sssoutherner's trait to be able to ssspeak our language, and it isss very uncommon here in the North."
"In fact, the Northeners dessspise it. They think it'sss the language of sssavages. There hasss been a great feud between the North and Sssouth..."
"Well my grandma once told me that we're pure Northerners, my mum cannot be from the South."
"And your father?" The red-eyed snake asked. Lux didn't know how to respond. What about her father? She knew little to nothing about him. But she did once overhear a conversation between her mother and grandmother talking about a man whose return Carina had been awaiting from far away. That was about all she knew. Carina never told her about him, and Lux never felt curious enough to ask... until this moment.
"I... I don't know. I never knew my father."
"Then perhapsss he is a Parssselmouth."
A savoury aroma of dinner filled the air and Lux found herself back at home, pondering over her father's identity.
"Mamma, we're from the north, right?"
"Why, of course, Tesoro. Why do you ask?" asked Carina, busying herself by setting the table for dinner.
Lux joined her mother, helping her by sorting out the silverware; she ran her fingers over the delicate engravings on the handles of the spoons and knives. "All of our family?"
Lux took note of the way her mother glanced at her from the corner of her eye, nonetheless, she carried on casually, "Father, too?"
"Go fetch the wine, Lux, I don't have three arms," Carina replied briskly, "and put down those knives before you impale yourself!"
Lux obeyed with staggering reluctance, taking her sweet time with every step, angry for being dismissed like a child. She would make sure to ask again later when her mother was in a good mood.
January 1986
A thick blanket of snow covered the tile-roofed cottages of the small village, surrounded by trees and the mountains in the distance, a mist hugging them in a bleak embrace. The smell of damp pine trees hung in the air, soon to be replaced by that of acrid smoke as villagers began to gather in the square, each piling long and thick branches in the middle for a bonfire in celebration of the annual last Thursday of January.
The muggles in Italy held to the belief that the flames would bring them luck and good fortune, as well as predict the next year's bounty: yellow flames for plenteous grain, red for good wine and orange for an all-round good year — a tradition wizardkind found ridiculous. For witches and wizards, the bonfire symbolised something much more profound and important: Freedom.
Giubiana was put to the stake, her sacrifice protecting wizardkind from being exposed and meeting the same fate. It was an old belief — upheld in both wizard and muggle folklore alike — that those who honoured Giubana's sacrifice would that evening be gifted with the sight. One future unravelled by the flames and spoken by the village seer.
Sounds of boots crunching through the snow in a hurry were heard approaching the square where everyone was waiting for the completion of the bonfire. Lux ran behind two scruffy boys and came to a halt at her mother's side.
"Mamma!"
"Shush, don't scream! what's with you three?"
"She hit us!"
"No, I did not!"
"Yes, you did!"
"No!"
"Shut up, all of you! I don't want to hear any more, the celebration is about to begin and you two are all messy!" Carina took out her wand and with a swish, the two boys' clothes tidied themselves up. "Now, go to your father, he's been looking for you two everywhere."
As the two boys turned to go, Lux pulled her tongue on them, earning her a stern gaze from her mother. She muttered a small apology and focused her attention back on the square.
The sun had set, and the crowd grew larger still, forming a circle around the wood pyramid. Lux strained for a better view behind the crowd of tall adults towering over her. She tugged at her mother's dress and held her arms up; Carina obliged and hoisted her up onto her shoulders after whispering a levitation charm to ease Lux's weight.
Lux could finally clearly see the show and made sure not to miss the most important part. She spotted muggles at the back holding a huge puppet made of straw, with only a rag and a ridiculously large black witch's hat for clothes. They hoisted her onto the pyre with a ladder, secured with a metal chain, and Giubiana stood towering over the square in all her glory. With a crack of flint, an arc of bright sparks caught the tinder, setting alight the witch's straw hair and engulfing the rag in flames, making Lux's eyes widen.
She had always been mesmerised by the fire, yet the words her grandmother once said never ceased to haunt her: "Remember Lux, if muggles were ever to know of our existence this is what we would become; a puppet burnt for their silly predictions." She and Mother always made sure to remind her how cruel muggles were, even to their own kind. They were never to be trusted. And how could Lux argue? The fire right in front of her was evidence enough, and then there were the history books that Teresa had given her...
Once the silly muggle festivities were complete, witches and wizards of the village made their way to the Volpi Villa for their own celebration dinner.
The garden was decorated with floating candles and lanterns, round tables draped in white satin hosting plates upon plates of food. An array of enchanted cellos and violins could be heard through the chatter playing light tunes for entertainment. Lux's uncle, Sergio — chosen to make the year's prediction — beckoned Carina to hand him the golden chalice in her hands, and moved to the middle of the crowd to address the guests. He took the cup to his face, and one blow gave birth to an electric blue flame.
The crowd were on their toes, Lux one of them, her eyes sparkling with anticipation. Sergio was focused on the fire, whispering things audible to only him.
Then two unexpected things happened: the cup, as though smouldering hot, fell suddenly from the man's hands, and Teresa fell to her knees. Carina rushed to her mother's side immediately, followed by Lux.
"...already lost..." Rosana was muttering, as if struck by a fever "...He's already lost."
"Mother?"
"...Lost... The sixth year... It's the sixth year of the new decade..."
"Who is lost, mamma?" Carina was panicking. "Who? Is it... is it Cepheus?"
As if struck anew by their faces, Teresa gathered herself, quickly cleared her throat, and straightened back up. Her eyes locked with Carina's and she spoke in her usual stern tone, "How many times must I tell you! He is never coming back." And then she walked back inside unbothered, leaving everyone in shock.
The mist had thickened, the stars were no longer visible and the guests had one by one drifted away.
It had been a long day between preparing the house for visitors and handling Teresa's constant critique and insistence on everything needing to be perfect — the cherry on top of the evening being the mention of Cepheus. Her mother's words haunted Carina's mind as she lay on the sofa, caressing Lux's hair softly as she slept.
Her first memory of London was that of the Ministry. One day in England and Carina had already managed to get herself detained. It wasn't her fault nobody had warned her about silly British laws about extendable luggage charms; how else was she supposed to bring her wardrobe overseas?
Messy-haired with thick-rimmed glasses, Cepheus's utter concentration on the pile of paperwork in front of him served only to make Carina more uneasy. It was only for his colleague's calculated cough that Cepheus finally looked up from his desk to meet her eyes, and Carina was instantly struck by just how young he was, especially for an Auror Team Leader. Young though as he was, his eyes had a certain sagacious quality to them, and the lines in his pale, unshaven face told a story of sleepless nights and restless days spent in worry.
Though she never wanted to admit it, Cepheus occupied her thoughts constantly, clung desperately to the hope that her memory of him was keeping him alive somehow. Cepheus was a wonderful man, and she considered herself lucky to have had him as her husband...
To have had him...
A loud knock sounded in the doorway and startled Carina out of her reverie.
"Who's bothering us at this hour?" Teresa grumbled on her way up the staircase.
"Could be a guest who forgot something?" Carina responded as she wiped the tears from her eyes and straightened out her robe.
The night revealed a tall man dressed in travelling robes, his face obscured by the mist that still hung heavy in the air.
"Carina..."
He stepped forward, taking Carina into his arms. She recognised that scent immediately.
It cannot be...
"Let's go home..."