Juliet by Cavetown

But I need to understand

When I can power through

And when I need some help from you

When I should stand my ground

And when I need to just sit down

BOOK 2: Awake, Tethered, and Utterly Catastrophic

CHAPTER 56: Ties That Haunt

March 22nd, 1980

Ivy lounged on the Greengrasses sofa, feet dangling over the edge of one armrest, with her head propped on the other. Humming a quiet tune, she bounced a foot to the melody, her long cerulean robes spilling onto the floor. Her hair, similarly unruly, cascaded around her. Curling a white strand around her finger, she stretched it out, noting that she was due for a trim. It now fell to her waist and the length was becoming increasingly bothersome.

When the grandfather clock in the corner chimed loudly to signal noontime, she sighed and rolled off the sofa. Standing, she stretched her arms overhead, fingers grazing the ceiling. Staring out the window, she willed her adoptive parents to return. She'd already rifled through their knick-knacks in the sitting room and wandered aimlessly around the house; the boredom was starting to get under her skin.

As though she'd summoned them, Sere and Reginald warped into existence beneath the monstrous ash tree in the backyard. Reginald stayed rooted to the spot, looking around nervously. Sere, with her beech wand in hand, had two translucent ropes stemming from its tip. The ropes were connected to similarly semi transparent harnesses, which allowed her to control two medium-sized Thestrals. The length of the ropes extended as the black, skeletal creatures began to roam Sere's prized yard.

Her adoptive parents conversed tensely, gesturing towards the house. She couldn't read their expressions well, but from their posture, they didn't seem to be arguing.

Heading for the door to the yard, she stepped onto the slightly overgrown lawn and shut the door behind herself. Making her way to them, the daytime chill of spring enveloping her, she tugged her robes tighter around her slim frame.

As she approached, Sere nudged Reginald in the ribs. He looked over his shoulder at Ivy and their discussion ceased by the time she arrived. She towered over them, but Reginald especially, as Theya had received her short stature from the wizard.

"Thank you for doing this," Ivy said.

Now that she was in the Thestrals' general vicinity, they flocked to her, one giving a shrill shriek. Their height was only up to her chest, as they weren't fully grown just yet, and they knocked their fleshless heads against her affectionately.

She'd heard about two Thestrals being sold on the black market a few weeks prior, but her attempt to gain more information proved futile. No one was more connected than the Greengrasses, so she'd gone to them for assistance. It had only taken them two days to sort things out and purchase the Thestrals on her behalf.

"I suppose we can do away with these now," Sere flicked her beech wand and the magical harnesses rescinded.

Reginald looked around skittishly, evidently unable to see the creatures. "Where should we bring them?"

"Oh, I'll take care of it," Ivy said evasively.

She gave the Thestrals' long black manes a friendly stroke. The smaller of the two released another sharp shriek and they headed for Sere's beloved pond. The larger of the two prodded at the water with a black hoof before descending into it. The other bent its skeletal neck down to drink.

"Will they be alright?" Ivy asked sceptically. "With the grindylow in there?"

"Somehow," Sere chuckled. "I think Henry would be no match for them. Why don't we go inside for a cuppa, before you bring them to you and Regulus's mysterious home?"

"A home we haven't yet seen," Reginald said pointedly.

"It's still under construction," Ivy lied easily. "Really, it's barely fit for Regulus and I at the moment. I'll be sure to invite you over for a housewarming party once the renovations are complete."

They exchanged a look.

Ignoring it, she headed back towards the Greengrass home.

The Haven was proving to be more of a social dilemma than she expected. The Greengrasses had been suspicious for months, and rightfully so, as magical renovations rarely took long. Death Eaters who had routinely made house calls, before Selwyn Estate turned into a deadzone, had also started pressing her for an address. This was why she and Regulus were currently in talks with an estate agent, trying to secure an official home.

Reentering the house, she passed through the sitting room, making for the kitchen.

Reginald and Sere followed her at a distance, whispering amongst themselves.

Upon arrival, she put the kettle on and looked for a chair. She took the seat at the far end of their large dining room set, as it was being bathed in sunlight, and a distinct chill had befallen the home. Her adoptive parents sat themselves on either side of her.

Aside from the light bobbing of the kettle, all was silent for several long moments.

Glancing at Sere and Reginald, she realised that they were having a nonverbal conversation with each other. The golden-haired wizard's face went slack into normalcy when he realised she was looking.

Sere cleared her throat. "There's something we wanted to discuss with you, Ivy."

"Oh?"

"To put it plainly," Reginald said solemnly. "We wanted to inquire about your, er, dark dealings."

She leaned forward to peer down the corridor that led to the sitting room.

"Theya's not home," Sere told her.

Her shoulders tensed involuntarily, a tight coil of anxiety winding within her. "What exactly do you want to know?"

"How involved are you?" Her adoptive father asked.

"What makes you think I'm involved at all?" Her words, miraculously, came out steady. But inside, fear churned in her stomach, making her shake ever so slightly.

"The fact that you know what we mean by dark dealings and involved." Sere's eyes contained a mixture of worry and suspicion.

Denying it was pointless, it seemed. "I'm probably more involved than you'd like me to be. What brought this on?"

"We heard recently," Reginald said evenly. "That the Minister for Magic, Harold Minchum, will be questioning magical folks in the coming months. He's going to round people up to ask about their involvement in the war. About their involvement with You-Know-Who. It seems as though your name has come up."

Her voice, when it came, was unsteady. "So I'm to be interrogated."

"Perhaps," Sere pursed her lips. "We know definitively that Regulus and Severus's names are on their list. Because of Theya's association with you all, she may be as well."

"Worried I'm going to influence your daughter, are you?" The words came out with far more rancour than she intended.

" You are our daughter," Reginald grasped her hand atop the table, his touch kind but failing to calm her inner turmoil.

"We're worried about you," her adoptive mother said firmly.

"Not Theya?" Ivy challenged.

"Theya has never had any interest in…" Sere trailed off.

"The Dark Lord," she finished for her bitterly, though her anger wasn't aimed towards them. She'd always known her involvement would bite her in the arse in ways she couldn't anticipate. "You can just say it. I'm not going to spontaneously combust."

"He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named," Sere said shakily. "We have nothing against the Dark Arts on their own, they can be educational at times."

"In moderation," Reginald released her hand and she felt the motion in her chest.

"So you want to know how heavily I'm involved," she spoke warily. "How disappointed are you going to be if I'm honest?"

Sere exchanged a look with Reginald. "Just tell us, are you one of them? Are you a…" She stopped short to take a deep breath. "Are you a Death Eater, Ivy?"

Veins going icy, she swallowed thickly. Her throat was dry and resistant, skin positively crawling. She always felt guilty about her dark dealings, as they put it, and she always regretted her actions, no matter how necessary they were. But it had also always been comforting, knowing that they hadn't seen that side of her - that there were people who didn't know what she was capable of.

"What if I am?" Tears pricked at her eyes, her insides squirming. "Will you regret adopting me?"

"What is it exactly that you do?" Her adoptive father had a tremor in his voice.

It wasn't lost on Ivy that they had not answered her questions. Hot tears broke the surface, so she blinked up at the ceiling, wishing them away. She didn't know how honest she should be. She certainly didn't think it wise to let them in on what she did behind the scenes - the extent of her Dark Arts practise or her truest of intentions.

"I think you already know what I do." The words and her body went sour, heavy. She didn't often let the weight of her actions press in on her, as it was akin to opening Pandora's Box. But sometimes, opening the Box couldn't be avoided. "I do as I'm told. I do what I must."

The implications of her words were clear and dense in the air.

Sere stared at her for a long moment, eyes filling with tears. When their gazes met, her adoptive mother turned away, tilting her head to create a curtain of blonde between them.

She feared what she would see when she looked at Reginald, but she did so anyway. His hazel gaze was unfocused and cloudy, fixed straight ahead. His jaw slowly clenched and unclenched as though set on a rhythm, and his hands were balled into red fists atop his thighs.

"It's not what you think," the words spilled out of Ivy, as she was unable to stop them. "I'm not- I don't- I… I'm trying to help."

"By hurting people?" Sere's voice was muffled, as though she was covering her mouth.

"We know what Death Eaters do, Ivy." Reginald sounded as though he was trying to be stern, but his voice wobbled. "Why would you involve yourself in such nasty dealings? Why?"

"I didn't have a choice." She wiped her eyes and she got to her feet. She moved to the wall opposite of them and leaned against it, arms folded over her chest as though this would allow her to shrivel out of sight. "You know what my parents were like. You know the hand I was dealt."

In unison, they looked at her.

Their red eyes were laden with disappointment and… betrayal. The betrayal was intolerable, it sliced through to her very core. A fresh wave of tears burst forth and her breath rapidly quickened at the thought of them abandoning her. She couldn't help the visions that burst forth in her mind's eye, visions of them disavowing her.

"Don't look at me like that," she spoke around a sob. "I wasn't raised like Theya. I didn't have parents like the two of you - I would've been better off with no parents at all. There was no other choice. I would've been killed if I resisted."

It wasn't the whole truth, but it was still true. Her parents had regularly beat her within an inch of her life and had disposed of Hazel with glee. She'd had ulterior motives in becoming a Death Eater, but it truly was, kill or be killed. It had been the only way forward, and strangely, the only way towards something worth living for.

"Don't you see?" She cried. "They killed-" Ivy stopped short and swallowed.

Slumping to the floor, she squeezed her eyes tightly shut, as she couldn't bear to continue looking at them. She couldn't stand their expressions, even as they burned in her mind. They were the parents she wished she'd had, the parents she had been so fortunate as to gain. They were kind and good and warm, everything she was not. Losing that would be… devastating.

"Please don't tell me I've lost you too." Pulling her legs to her chest, she dropped her forehead onto her kneecaps.

Now more than ever, she knew that no matter how much Marlene had thought she could be like Sirius, she was wrong. Sirius had been rebellious since birth, had established himself as other from a young age, had an escape plan, had people to fight for him. And most importantly, he had parents who were unwilling to murder their own child.

Ivy had none of it.

She'd had nowhere to go, no one to support her in fleeing.

There was always Marlene, who had promised that her parents would take care of her, but they had been children. Could Ivy really have chanced it and come out the other side unscathed? Especially considering what she knew about Hazel's death, she was certain that her head would have rolled if she'd resisted the path laid out before her. Even as a child, she'd known this. As an adult, she knew it all the more adamantly - she had seen firsthand how cruel and inhumane the war was, as she was unmistakably complicit in it. She would have been nothing but another casualty.

And so, she wept.

She wept her bloody heart out at the unfairness of it. The weight of her life slammed over her head, making her dizzy. That was the thing though - it was all her. It was all decisions she had made. She would not shy away from holding herself accountable, even if it meant that she was perpetually disgusted with herself.

Suddenly, she felt the wall tremble.

On either side of her, there was the sound of Sere and Reginald leaning against the wall, then sinking to the floor. She felt them embrace her, felt their own tears fall into her hair. Their arms curled around her, tucking her in close.

"Who did they kill?" Sere asked softly, shifting to wipe tears off her cheeks.

Reginald rubbed her arm comfortingly. "It was your sister, wasn't it?"

"We always suspected," her adoptive mother added. "It was a rumour for years, that she had been disposed of. Because of the timing of her death, many believed she was a Squib."

"I can't talk about it," Ivy's voice was muffled from the embrace.

"I understand," Sere said emphatically. "We won't speak of it again… But I want you to know that you haven't lost us."

"You will never lose us," Reginald's voice was tight with emotion.

" You're our daughter," she pulled her in and Ivy's head fell onto her chest as she continued to cry.

"We're your parents, through and through," her adoptive father said gently. "We understand you better than you think. And the fact of the matter, is that we love you. We love you as much as it's possible to love another person."

Ivy had rarely been held like that before, with such gentle and compassionate care. No one else had ever treated her like glass, like the fragile thing that she was deep down. It was all she had ever wanted from a parent, to soothe her and warm her and make her feel like the weight of the world was not only on her shoulders alone.

Just like that, Ivy's tears dried.

April 2nd, 1980

Snuggled up on a dark blue armchair, Ivy let the fire warm her. She'd pulled the seat directly in front of the Haven's hearth and curled into the cushy chair around an hour ago. A nice woven blanket over the lower half of her body, the heat from the fireplace was delectable on her skin.

The Ways of Inferius was in hand and she was taking care to read it thoroughly. Although, she wasn't quite sure what she was looking for. Information on Death Magic, she supposed. Perhaps answers as to why she was able to command the Inferi who watched over the Dark Lord's Horcrux.

Not for the first time, she pondered how much easier things would be if Death Magic wasn't an art almost entirely lost to time. The information it taught could certainly be deadly in the wrong hands, but that hardly mattered to Ivy's unpalatable frustration, nor to her curiosity. She supposed that was the Ravenclaw ancestry in her, making her thirst for unattainable knowledge.

Even so, she had to admit that she probably knew more about Death Magic than anyone alive. At least, anyone on the continent. As she continued to take Severus's Blood Magic potion religiously, the practise was before her eyes constantly. There was far more murder around her than she ever could have known. Or, perhaps, it was simply due to the less than pleasant company she kept.

The grey ashes had become like to background noise over time, as she had grown adjusted to their appearance. It was still interesting to note, however, when she came across someone unexpected who had committed murder. There was an unsettling number of government officials and politicians who had grey ashes lingering about their form.

But what surprised her more, was that there were several Order members with them as well. She was especially curious about them, about what precisely had happened. She knew from experience that accidental murder could mark you just as easily as intentional murder, but the ashes didn't differentiate. Had any of them done so on purpose?

The idea fascinated and haunted her to no end.

Shifting in the armchair, Ivy set the black book in her lap and continued to read, massaging her wrist as she did so. Thus far, she'd seen Death Magic mentioned a handful of times by name, which was the main reason she kept reading so keenly. Even so, there was no guarantee that she would get anything useful.

Flipping the page to the next, which marked number 187, she read on. She had nearly finished the page when she came upon a section titled Creation. It was lengthy, and to her great surprise, it mapped out a spell familiar to her. She knew immediately where she'd seen it, in That Which Is Natural and That Which Is Not. The old tome she read at Hogwarts had multiple spells listed in it that she'd taken upon herself to memorise. Apparently, she now had an answer for what the most complex one of the bunch was - a guide to creating Inferius.

It gave her pause, and she indeed did just that, leaning back in the chair to stare at an unfixed point above the hearth.

The Creation section had been very clear that the spell could have disastrous consequences if performed inaccurately, though it didn't specify what precisely would happen. It was a relief she'd never attempted that particular enchantment. Though, she had very good reason for not doing so, as she'd always known the spell required a dead body.

Wincing at the morbidity of it all, she went on to finish the section.

The creation of this spell has been definitively traced back to one person through past, now destroyed, works about Ancient Times. The legend speaks of a sorceress, Clymene, who sought to make humans as powerful as the Ancient Greek gods and goddesses of old. She is thought to have created Inferius, or ζωντανοί νεκροί, as they would have originally been known. Gods and goddesses of the Ancient Grecian world were to be feared, but they were also known to derive pleasure from trifling with human fortunes and fates. Clymene is said to have sought equilibrium between sorcerers and their mightier counterparts. Through this line of thought, her aim was to enhance the ability of Omens of Death, known in Greek as Οιωνός θανάτου. Through creating Inferi, by way of the dynamic art of Death Magic, Clymene forever tied them to the abilities of Omens of Death.

Other creatures related to Death have been similarly tethered to Omens of Death, though none as intentionally as the Inferius. At their basest form, Inferi were developed specifically to serve practitioners of Death Magic. As great and terrible as this idea may seem to recent societies, Death was not often considered a fearsome thing in Ancient Times. Practitioners of Death Magic were often seen as both spiritual leaders and as the most powerful of sorcerers. It was also seen as a revered accomplishment to complete the life cycle. To be an object of necromancy would have been seen as an honour by some - certainly to Clymene.

It is to Clymene that we can credit the term necromancer, or νεκρομάντις, as she indeed made this sorcery possible. While Inferius can be controlled by most anyone who can cast the creation spell formidably, it should be no surprise that this skill comes easiest to Omens of Death. The incantation of Duco Mortem allows for control over Inferi, though Death Magic practitioners have historically been able to retain control over Inferi without use of a wand. The stronger the magical aptitude for the practise, the less effort with which an Omen of Death would need in order to exert control. In this, the mastery of wandless magic as a general art proved most useful.

April 9th, 1980

The dining room of the Lestrange home was just as morbid as ever. The jars on their mantlepiece reflected the medium light of the chandelier overhead the table, the eyes staring into Regulus. Every now and then, he swore he saw one of them twitch, as though they were still somehow sentient and aware of their predicament.

Averting his gaze from the jars, he focused instead on his company around the Lestrange's long table. All the usual folks were there; those with Dark Marks were in attendance, as the lower ranks weren't trusted enough to attend. He was admittedly thankful that the Dark Lord had never called on he or Ivy to use their home as a meeting place. Typically, all Death Eater gatherings were hosted by the Malfoys, Lestranges, or Mulciber Sr.

"Tell me, Regulus," Lucius Malfoy said from his seat to the left. "How's the job at Borgin and Burke's treating you?"

"Well," he cleared his throat and shifted in his seat. "It gives me something to do; I dislike being unoccupied."

"I feel quite the same," he dipped his head of long blonde hair. "But surely, you could do better than a lowly position like that of being a shopboy."

"Perhaps," Regulus said evenly. "But handling rare Dark objects means I'm the first to know of their whereabouts. Having first pick has proven most beneficial."

"Oh?" He seemed unconvinced.

For the first time, Regulus had a real reason to feel smug about his job. "At the moment, we're handling a Merlin artefact."

Now that seemed to impress him. He raised his brows and looked on in interest. "A genuine artefact of Merlin's?"

"Indeed, I'm afraid I can't give much more information than that at the moment but-"

It was then that he felt intense, unyielding pressure on his mind.

Something like an all-encompassing swarm of insects enveloped his mind, and he felt them crawl through the crevices of his thoughts. Regulus knew instantly that Legilimency was being performed on him, and that he would be no match for fighting it off with so little time or preparation. He knew, too, that it was Lord Voldemort who had set upon him. The Dark Lord had combed through his thoughts a number of times, the sensation always like creeping bugs, though never as intentionally aggressive as this.

He could sense that he had fallen silent, that his body had tensed up, as he was mentally incapacitated. It was all he could do just to keep upright, as Lord Voldemort rummaged through his mind. Although his innermost thoughts and desires were ripe for the picking, the Dark Lord didn't bother with them.

Instead, he dug into Regulus's most recent memories, as though sifting through a card deck. Most interactions that flashed into his mind were discarded without so much as a second glance. He saw them go by so quickly that he himself could only catch a handful of what they were: Regulus was alone, watching the sun come up over the horizon, as he sipped his Earl Grey tea in the dewy grass… He and Narcissa were engaged in an animated conversation about their favourite books over a dinner of roast and boiled potatoes… In the middle of the woods near the Haven, he watched Ivy throw a chunk of raw meat in the air, a Thestral catching it in its mouth skillfully… Borgin was standing over Regulus and Longbottom, bragging about his successful acquisition of the Merlin artefact…

Suddenly, the insects crawled away, and the unfathomable weight of pressure vanished.

Lord Voldemort was gone from his mind.

Regulus found himself just as he had been, though his surroundings had changed somewhat. It was really all that he could comprehend at the moment, as his head felt thoroughly violated and ransacked. He couldn't seem to get his thoughts in order beyond what he was seeing around him.

Lucius had turned in his seat to speak to Rabastan Lestrange, who was on his left. It seemed that he'd abandoned the conversation with Regulus at some point, presumably when he'd stopped responding to the world around him. If Lucius thought much of this strangeness, he didn't show it.

Regulus's hand felt warm and he looked down to see that Ivy had seated herself beside him. Nott Sr., who was across from her, was speaking to her about something, but her hand held to his tightly beneath the long table of the Lestrange's home. She stared at Nott Sr., giving him the occasional nod, though he had the distinct sensation that she was looking at him from the corner of her eye. She didn't say anything or acknowledge the fact that he'd just come back to earth, but he would bet anything that she knew. Her posture was stiff, and her hand gripped his hard enough that one squeeze could've broken his fingers.

Looking beyond her, his gaze met the Dark Lord's.

Lord Voldemort sat at the head of the table, staring at Regulus with those bloodred snake-like eyes, his lipless mouth curved into what was perhaps his version of a smile. His long, skeletal fingers were atop the wooden surface, toying with a caramel-coloured wand. He looked satisfied, though by precisely what, he didn't know.

Regulus quickly dipped his head to show acquiescence and averted his eyes.

His thoughts were slowly coming back into order, but he knew that even once they realigned, he was in no place to do hard thinking on what had just occurred. And so, he set his focus on his breath and surroundings, unwilling to think beyond those things for fear of another invasion.

April 18th, 1980

Having found a quiet corner table at Madam Puddifoot's, Ivy tapped her manicured nails against her teacup. The steaming Black tea before her was untouched, as it had burned the hell out of her tongue when she tried it two minutes earlier.

Waiting on Doe's arrival, she looked about the shop. It was just as violently pink and lacy as ever, but as it was a Friday, the place was relatively empty. In fact, she'd never seen it so vacant; she was the only one there aside from one doting couple seated at the other side of the shop. The rest of the round tables in the terribly cramped space were set with their doily-like napkins and frilly tablecloths, ready for customers.

The front door's bell tinkled and Ivy looked over to find Doe.

Her chin-length reddish hair had been tucked into her pointed hat, and she wore a light blue cloak that nicely matched the periwinkle robes underneath. Drawing the cloak from around her shoulders, she draped it over an arm and waved at Ivy from across the shop.

When Doe arrived by her side, she bent down to kiss her on the cheek before tossing the cloak over the back of her chair. Seemingly winded, she took her seat and a deep breath.

"Alright?" Ivy raised a brow.

"Certainly," Doe said. "I merely had a bit of a trek."

"Did you come by broom?"

"No, I came from the castle."

"What were you doing up there?"

"Oh, well," Doe looked around the near-empty shop. "Having a conversation with Dumbledore, actually."

"I see," Ivy assumed it was an Order matter of some sort and thought it best not to pry.

"We were actually speaking about you," she added.

"Nothing good ever comes after a sentence like that." She sighed and tried to sip her tea. When it scalded her mouth once more, she jerked and set it back down again irritably. "Are you planning to tell me why you were discussing me? Or must I guess?"

"Well, maybe you-" Doe stopped short as Madam Puddifoot, a stout woman with black hair, arrived to take her order. The two exchanged brief pleasantries, Doe ordering a cup of chamomile, before they were left back to their own devices. "Apologies. Why don't you cast that spell that makes our conversations unhearable?"

"Lovely, it's one of those talks," Ivy groaned and drew her wand. " Muffliato!"

Tucking the scuffled up hazel wood back into her sleeve, she watched as Madam Puddifoot returned. The witch placed Doe's teacup before her with a sweet smile, before wandering off towards the other couple in the shop.

"You mentioned," Doe began without touching her chamomile tea. "That Dumbledore is aware of what you and the others get up to, so I went to speak with him about it."

Ivy went still. "What did he tell you?"

"He wasn't willing to divulge much," she smiled reassuringly. "So I didn't come out with a lot of new information. But what I did come out with, was approval. In discussing things with Dumbledore, we agreed that perhaps what might work best for us all, would be if our two groups worked together, in some capacity."

"Oh?" Ivy cocked her head.

"His suggestion is that I be a liaison between the Order and your group. He informed me that over the years, you and he have already exchanged useful information at times. This could be a way to keep that line of communication open. He believes himself privy to information that you would find helpful, and vice versa."

"I'll admit," Ivy said slowly. "That would likely go over better with the others than your previous proposal."

"I had the same thought," Doe sipped at her chamomile tea and winced at the heat. "So I'd like to suggest that we have a meeting between myself, you, Theya, and Regulus."

"I think that can be arranged. But I should add that Severus would also be in attendance."

"I thought you said he wasn't involved?"

Heaving a sigh, Ivy tested her Black tea with a sip. It was just cool enough to drink, and she downed half the cup in one gulp. "Theya has seen to it that Severus is now rather heavily involved."

Doe looked her over with those piercing blue eyes. "You seem upset by that."

"Upset," she laughed bitterly. "Doesn't even begin to cover it."

"I take it he didn't receive the information well?"

"Not in the least," Ivy scowled.

"Are you worried he's going to tell someone?" Doe asked quietly, fingers curling around her teacup as though to warm them.

"No. Theya's just put us all in a very bad spot by telling him." She leaned back in her chair, folding her arms across her chest angrily. "But clearly, Theya gets what Theya wants."

"Perhaps if you went to her first-"

"No," Ivy interrupted harshly. "She can talk to me once she pulls the stick out of her arse, and once she's ready to apologise. She knows she's in the wrong, Doe, she's just too proud to admit it. And I am having absolutely none of that from her, after the damage she's done."

"I see." She quietly sipped her tea, though she didn't take her gaze away from Ivy.

For once, she didn't feel squirmy under Doe's knowing gaze.

This was likely due to the reminder of her rage towards Theya. The hot, boiling sensation of anger hadn't eased in the slightest, despite it having been nearly four months since they'd had a civil conversation with one another.

Ivy wasn't letting this one go easily. She deserved an apology, as did Regulus.

Theya had single-handedly turned their lives upside down by telling Severus, who hadn't softened to their secrets by even a centimetre. In fact, he'd only hardened to them further. Ivy had begun dreading the biweekly meetings because of this. She thought she would feel better if Severus were to speak to them, but she'd been wrong about that. He'd finally broken his vow of silence the week prior, which had only resulted in him being outright nasty with them all. He was just as rude and unpleasant as she remembered him being back in first year when she accidentally brought up the word Snivellus to him.

Ivy angrily drained the rest of her Black tea from the cup.

"When do you anticipate setting up the meeting between us all?" Doe asked, evidently knowing better than to push Ivy on their previous subject matter.

"It may take a while," she said gruffly. "With Severus behaving the way he is… I'll do my best, but it may take some time."

"I understand."