[Tuesday, January 28th, 8:43 PM]
I will take your persistent silence as a hint that you are once again angry with me...
[Wednesday, January 29th, 10:50 PM]
Please tell me you love me. Tell me you'll wait.
[Saturday, January 31st, 2:30 AM]
I love you. Please.
[Sunday, February 1st, 12:02 AM]
Do you not want me anymore, Dahlia?
[Monday, February 9th, 3:46 AM]
I love you, Dahlia. I always will.
— — — — — — — — — —
Don't.
February's crisp bite drank the last of the love she had to give to a ghost and sucked her dry as the days passed on in a dreary routine of classes and sleepless nights. The midnight chill rattled the lean windows of Ravenclaw Tower. Lately, the wind only served as a brutal reminder of how it danced for Theo, ruffling his curls and doing his more honest bidding. She often wondered if it looked after him as an extension of her own heart, doing what she couldn't.
Dahlia tugged her fur blanket around her shoulders and pulled her knees into her chest more tightly. It was the worst of winter, but spring was around the corner. She tunneled into her suffocating light, hoping the blinding blackness might fix her where Draco still couldn't.
She turned her eyes to the empty spot in her bed. She was sure he would sneak in from the shadows any second now and warm it quickly. She could often feel his own anxiety heightening at this hour, worried another day had passed on and left them behind. He held her more tightly at night as if she might replace his soul once it was fully lost to the coiling serpent on his arm.
Dahlia sighed. Draco could handle it — the demons he would bear. The cost. Theo couldn't. His heart was too soft although he couldn't see it. He would lose himself entirely to cope, and love was nothing but a withered rose, a dying dahlia, to a soul-lost man.
She remembered him in the Astronomy Tower, alight like a knight. She hadn't believed him then. "You won't like what I will become."
She hadn't dared to open her journal until now. It lay in front of her, bare and blank, hoping she would write a new page of their story and not the ending. She surmised empty pages were all they had to show from always beginning again.
She released a shaky breath. The question kept her haunted, paralyzed since she had first read it upon the aging pages — how many lovers had used these bound journals before them?
Do you not want me anymore, Dahlia?
She could hear the question rolling in his mouth, slow like the plunge of a knife. Sharp and serrated like betrayal. His golden eyes dulled for her when she imagined him asking her if this was the end.
Don't, she thought as she touched the page. Nearly wishing her hand would fall through the bindings to touch his face again.
It's too hard, she argued with herself. I'm tired.
Tired of wishing he would make the right choices. Tired of him haunting her.
A tear rolled from her cheek and she let it hit the page. It faded slowly, magic falling apart at the seams by and between the forsaken and forlorn. It lost its will as they lost their love.
In no time at all, the words appeared like smoke from the fire that had burned her home. Him.
Don't cry. I miss you too.
— — — — — — — — — —
[Thursday, February 13th, 6:05 AM]
My Dahlia,
I've been in the Northeast for some time now, but today I will return for you. I must say, your stars are far kinder to me here. They shine brighter as if they know my heart belongs to them — you. I love you. Even when we are stars ourselves, I'll cross the universe if only to be laid to rest in the night sky by your side so the mortals and gods might write tales about us.
I know you've stopped reading my messages, maybe even burned your journal, and I know forgiveness is not in your nature as I once warned you that it was not in mine either, but please know that I am forever sorry. I am sorry that I left you behind and I'm sorry that I've disappointed you, and I'm most sorry that I spilled your tears. I've only ever wished to give you the love story you deserve. Be a greater man that might be worth your heart. I can live without your forgiveness, but I cannot live without your love.
You will come to inherit a dragon if something should happen to me as her heart already calls to you through my own. Her name is Valeria as you once told me your mother dreamed of vast dragons.
If I don't return, know that I will still find you — somewhere out there in a different time or another life. I'll be in your sky above, forever leading you home.
And lastly, know that I wasn't afraid. Only villains fear death, and you always believed I could be a hero.
Nevertheless.
TN
— — — — — — — — — —
Of three things Theodore Nott found to be true and tested when orchestrating a heist amongst men and stars.
One, a successful plan was a backup plan. The first plan was far too predictable. Two, a plan could only be as oriented to detail as its orchestrator and luckily he always preferred to observe the finer details, whether it be the freckles on his girlfriend's hip that revealed she preferred to lounge naked in his sun or the shaky cursive of his brother's handwriting that had revealed he was nervous last night.
Finally, and of this he was most certain, the success of an impossible heist was a simple consequence of if its orchestrator feared death, and Theo had often waved to his shadowed friend who had long lingered behind his step. His lack of fear made him entirely unpredictable, which was his greatest asset and truly the only thing he had ever really been proud of.
With the wetted stone smothered beneath his boots, he glared out into the boundless North Sea from the shores at the ends of the Earth. Azkaban was beyond, but that was no matter for him. Valeria hovered at his side, her talons sinking deep into the heart of the sea stack for which he stood proudly upon. Her colossal, leathery wings were outstretched to protect him from the crashing tide as she roared with the rage beating in his own heart.
It was another day that Theodore had woken up feeling particularly murderous. The dreary morning wind ripped through his long black coat, vowing to keep him safe at all costs for the sake of its star-making master. He lit a cigarette, rallying his awfulness as he let his Dark Mark bleed into his bones. Fuel the hatred he had left for the world as he spun the bone ring upon his middle finger. All goodness — her— abandoned.
"Shall we break the earth before the stars?" He called up, although he was certain she couldn't hear him over the pounding forces of nature as it beat against them, attempting to hold them back as it always would for the greater good. A pointless action but a valiant effort. He was inescapable. A demise of nature.
The dragon emitted a low sonic rumble that had his hair raising — a true hunter. Like calling to like. He grinned nice and slow, madness becoming.
He squinted in the direction of the hidden sun. It emerged like a beacon as if summoned, breaking through the clouds. He held up a galleon. It was the same one he had intended to use to purchase the journals from Tomes & Scrolls all those months ago when Dahlia had been nothing but a fresh hope. He had wanted to be good and proper and buy them for her instead. He had thought then that she might have wanted a more honest man, but he had stolen them all the same that day; unable to help himself.
Now, that same galleon was held up to the sun in his thieving hands on the brink of a larger heist, glimmering painfully in the eyes of his dragon as he found the proper angle.
"Only when you are blinded, love," he called. "That will be the sign."
His ground grew unsteady as the beast shook off the sea mist, almost bristling that she had the simple task more than handled. This wasn't her first battle of sorts, he was sure.
"I know," he voiced beneath his breath apprehensively.
Theo turned, finding her enormous set of amethyst eyes. She peered down wisely, warning him not to push beyond his means since he had little luck. Those who didn't fear death, heroes, were fools — and Theodore Nott was anything but foolish.
With a terrorizing gleam in his own eyes, Theo gave his goodbye for only a short while or forever. He shook his head, defiant and proud.
"Neither by chance nor destiny."
Then he disappeared between the salt air and the screaming sea. The abandoned cry of his great dragon swallowed the sound of the bending of time as chaos ensued.
Theo appeared within the cavernous mouth at the base of Azkaban, falling into step without pause next to Alex. He checked his watch, confirming his timing had been impeccable. By the looks of his brother who strolled casually at his side, injury-free, he had made it through the brief fall of the wards flawlessly, as well.
Theo opened his mouth to comment, but Alex brought his fingers to his lips. They halted like stalking cats, falling quickly into rugged corners of the cruel earth in sync. The colossal stone groaned above. Echoing, imprisoned cries overtook the scream of the ocean below their step.
Rain-soaked and violent, Theo's gaze looked skyward to find their voices as they trudged through the proper entrance of Azkaban only hours ago. Their former selves followed a bald and plump man dressed in midnight blue robes through an endlessly tall, broken set of wooden doors. They were water-logged and rusted by the unforgiving salt mist. The doors alone were now all that separated him from the shallow breathings and cursed moans of some of the darkest wizards known to time — his own father. Here, the prisoners might as well be locked in the cages of their minds, dying slowly in a place where time was meaningless.
Theo watched as the old man simply shut the doors behind him with a slow wave. They began to creak to a close. He had noticed earlier that the man hadn't even locked them as they strolled into the heart of the prison. The dementors and madness were binding enough.
Theo had forgotten the ugly man's name, not caring enough in the first place to even try to remember. He was under the Imperius Curse after all, so he didn't see much of a point in committing a minute fact to his memory. He would be dead soon anyway after he served his purpose as a witness.
Devereaux had placed the curse himself since the rather harmless, naive man was one of the only wizards capable of lowering the apparition wards as the caretaker and spellmaster of the grounds. He had escorted Theo's own father behind these walls as he had been chained to the sides of annoyingly righteous members of The Order only last summer. His father rotted high above his head now, deservedly, but not for long.
Alex counted the seconds in his eyes; footsteps to the worn staircase carved by blood and sweat into the earthly monolith. He nodded. They were gone, and so they began.
—
That morning, Theo had impatiently paced the restored halls of his manor in the somber, clouded light. The step of his black, scuffed boots resounded quietly in the peaceful home he had worked to breathe life back into only recently. This home was meant for Dahlia — even Bria. It was meant to be a paradise for all of those who were unlucky enough to be loved by a Nott. Never to be a nightmare, a different kind of prison, as it had been for his mother, ever again.
His father was returning. It sunk into his reality like a sinking ship — abandoning all hope.
His mother wouldn't forgive him for this, for unleashing him, but he prayed to her regardless. The sacred invocation was unfamiliar on his tongue.
"Please understand," he whispered to the morning. "She comes first."
The Order. The Dark Lord. He would serve them both to serve himself — to save her. He had both everything and nothing to lose, worried Dahlia might already be lost.
"Please..."
He reasoned with his mother's ghost; the warmth in his heart. He took a soothing breath and reckoned she understood as the sun's reflection heated his closed eyelids. He let himself be nurtured in the soft light. Cleansed already for the crimes he had yet to commit. She was both here and gone; alive in his bones and another star in the night.
In a moment, Theo realized how quiet the home had become.
Peace.
His expression turned pained, knowing it wouldn't last. He rolled his wand in his hand, quickly sickened by how loud his thoughts had become.
He opened his mouth to call for Tatters, but couldn't. He suspected the fidgety elf already knew he had arrived but chose to stay a distance away as family never risked saying goodbye. He nodded as he placed his journal on the side table, knowing his elf would know where to store it for safekeeping in the meantime and who to return it to if he himself never returned.
Theo glanced around once more, expression hardening, then abandoned the refuge in a slick crack, leaving his black mist to scorch the walls.
He ripped through the world like thundering smoke until he reappeared within the small, wobbly inn that had become home over the past few weeks as they worked nightly to whisper counter charms to the wards that surrounded the prison in the days ahead of the heist.
Theo took a step into the room. The grey, rotting floorboards groaned loudly. It was a dreary space with little furniture — entirely beneath him. It was chronically dark as the sun never showed here despite the tattered black windows that were opened wide. The chipped dresser was covered in a thick layer of dust and Theo had taken it upon himself to smash the mirror shortly after arriving. The innkeeper had been furious, already pushed to her limits as Valeria insisted on eating her goats.
Theo lit a cigarette, staring at the piss-poor paint on a sign that read "Wizards must not smoke!"
His gaze steadied on the flame as he held a breath. He shoved the memory of her starry eyes in the orange glow somewhere safe below his rage and blew out the nicotine as the sign hissed. He grinned in mockery, but his expression quickly died as he heard heavy footsteps.
Theo rolled his eyes and leaned against the paint-peeling wall as Alex entered his quarters without knocking. He quickly waved a magicked hand and the bed began making itself. It would be nothing less than horror if the mangled bedsheets revealed how lovesick he still remained.
Alex narrowed his eyes, suspecting he had been elsewhere but not daring to ask. His brother slowly strode to the nightstand, reaching for the only textbook he had brought.
"The Diseases of The Soul?" Alex mumbled. He quickly snorted. "You think your soul is diseased?"
Theo shook his head, not elaborating on the conclusion he had come to. His brother stared back, his amber eyes drifting to the starlit ring upon his hand, then up to the half-crafted time-tuner chained around his neck.
Last chance.
Theo could practically read the offer in his eyes. He would return to Hogwarts hours from now — at this very clock strike if all went well.
Theo shook his head once more. He couldn't risk killing Dahlia — not yet. He had to return to her. He had to be certain it wouldn't kill her to kill the gods. He had everything he needed, the potential to break time and the stars, safely secured in his pockets. He could roll the dice at any moment, and that was a thrill in itself.
Alex sauntered near and placed a heavy hand on his shoulder.
"I'm proud of you," his brother sighed, squeezing tightly as if he thought he made a courageous, selfless decision for once.
Theo rolled his tongue across his cheek, ready to roar for the evil he would still commit in her honor.
"Don't be," he chuckled.
The inn shook beneath their feet with the arrival of the long-awaited fool below. They felt the front door creak open as the bones of the home groaned. They said nothing, not needing to plan anything more or reopen anymore wounds. The heist was flawless. Their hearts content. Goodbyes now only promised death and unluck.
"I love you, brother," Alex churned with a painful smile across his face.
Theo nodded, rolling his cigarette across his fingers until it disappeared completely. Parlor tricks that Dahlia used to adore. He kicked off the wall, leaving the textbook behind for the next poor soul who might find solace within its pages.
Alex's hand slipped on the knob as he opened the door. Theo followed after him in a disrespectful fashion, only pausing to restore the mirror before the door closed.
He grunted down the stairs behind his brother, quickly spotting the man whom this plan was completely dependent on. The fat man beamed politely, his cheeks jolly and red from the cold as he fumbled with his rumpled handkerchief and pushed it back into his sapphire robes.
For fuck's sake.
Theo squinted his eyes and raised the corners of his lips in a faux smile. He was certain Deveraux had wasted his effort putting this man under the Imperius Curse. It would only take a lobster dinner and a lollipop to bribe this idiot.
Theo came to the foot of the landing, hands in pockets. The inn was entirely made of grey wood with pink quilts here and there and an assortment of tiny wooden picture frames on the wall. He strolled down the modest foyer, stopping a less-than-polite distance away from the plump man as his gut threatened to brush his coat. Theo smiled down in an intimidating fashion, as he often did to the small first-years back at school.
Alex snorted, hanging back by the frail, elderly innkeeper. She groaned as Alex placed a weighted pouch of gold in her bony hands. It was nearly too much to keep her standing straight, or straighter with the hump in her back.
"Mr. Nott, and, er, Mr. Nott."
The warden of Azkaban fumbled for his wand.
Theo's smile widened as he stepped back, pleased he hadn't lost his unnerving demeanor in the cold weeks he had thinned out. Alex crossed his arms, his mask of bitter arrogance far more vicious with age.
The weathered floorboards cracked beneath the warden's weight to spare the warden an awkward silence.
"First, I would like to extend my sorrows," he said after clearing his throat.
He paused, stumbling over his next words.
"Your father was— is, a great wizard," he added if only to be polite.
Theo sneered. "My father is a cu-"
"Shall we leave immediately?" Alex chimed, placing firm hands on both his and the warden's shoulders. "We cannot be certain just how much time our father has left. We can only hope we aren't too late."
The warden grimaced as he led them out of the inn and into the colder world.
"I do apologize as I don't believe I introduced myself..."
Theo looked back, nodding to the lonely innkeeper. He had written the name of a particularly grisly book on necromancy he had borrowed from Lucas and left it on her desk last night should she ever wish to see her deceased husband again. He had spotted the man in several pictures scattered around the bed and breakfast when snooping.
"Goodbye then," he called to the woman. "Luck be with you, Cecille!"
Theo revealed a smile and a dimple as the old lady waved back. He then took large strides to catch up to his brother who waited patiently in the green cliffside amongst the grey skies. A darkened shadow swiftly moved overhead as Valeria hid within the thundering clouds. She preferred the pelting of rain and how she blended into the worst storms.
The three men stood in a small circle. Theo pulled his coat tight as the wrath of the North Sea found them a short distance away. He kept a careful eye on his watch, noting the precise time the warden inhaled, lowered the protective ward of his making, and took hold of their arms to escort them to the merciless prison.
They appeared in a moment. Theo nearly gasped as he felt the wards tightening once more around the back of his coat in the breaking of a second. He looked up, unable to pull in another breath at the sight of the enormous stone earth that nearly reached the kingdom of stars, well hidden behind the unending clouds of a ceaseless storm. The prisoners of all sorts of creation wailed to the wind. His blood ran cold. Theo wondered what it must be like to nearly reach the heavens when doomed for hell.
"Come, come." The warden called, waddling towards the jagged base of the smooth monolith. "We don't have much time for you boys to give goodbyes."
"We'll take as long as we need," his brother quipped as he strolled through the rotting doors and into the towering halls carved into the earth. Single-flamed sconces lined the dampened walls.
Theo followed quietly, committing every small detail to memory as the doors closed behind him.
"How do the wards work?" Alex asked brazenly, although he already knew the answer. They had been working for weeks, mumbling into the sinister night until their noses bled to weaken the charms that protected the prison. Theo might have wolfishly grinned under different circumstances as he began climbing the thin stairs that winded up the center of the tower like a coiling snake. He too appreciated a game of cat and mouse.
"That I cannot say," the warden answered, fighting for air as he pushed up the stairs. There were no rails to grasp shall he stumble. Theo wondered how many prisoners may have simply been pushed or jumped as they climbed higher, forced to climb to their patient death.
"There's truly not a lift?" Theo growled, displeased to be breaking any sort of sweat over his father.
"My apologies, sir. Afraid not. We are almost there," the warden wheezed.
An anxious pit filled his stomach. Theo began to wonder if this was all even real. Was he dreaming? Might he find himself waking up on Christmas day with Dahlia snug in his arms without a thought for the rest of the world besides him?
Theo pulled at the fabric in his pockets as they made it to a small landing, hanging high above the filthy ground below. He could hardly make it out in the far distance. He turned back to face a hollow that was carved smooth into the stone. He was slick with nausea as they passed through the arch and into one of the narrow tunnels of the prison.
They halted in front of a section of stone that had been sanded and polished. Curiously, there was no door in sight. Only the number '213' carved into the wall could be read in the thin torchlight behind them.
Theo held his breath once more, smelling something foul — death.
"You go," Alex glared. "I have nothing to say."
His brother wouldn't meet his eyes as he spoke. He fidgeted as if terribly panicked, not only nervous. Something unsettling stirred in Theo's gut and he almost believed for a moment that their father might be dying. He almost bought into the rouse that had been crafted to get the wards lifted if only just for a moment so they might abuse it with their time-turners.
"And like I do?" Theo scoffed.
He had a million things to say, but nothing that might bring him closure.
Alex slowly turned to face him with steel in his gaze that threatened death if he ruined everything they had planned after coming this far.
"Go," he ordered almost silently. His authoritative tone was final.
Theo stepped back as his brother dropped his gaze, drowning in torment or grief. He couldn't quite place the hurt in his eyes that he attempted to hide. Theo didn't let on that he saw it at all.
Theo nodded, although he nearly shook from either the hike, adrenaline, or the terror. He hoped his father might look entirely different now so he wouldn't have to recall anything too unkind. He couldn't afford to spiral out when time was of the essence. He couldn't afford to upheave the conclusion he had come to on the nature of his heart and soul.
The warden nodded, holding his hands out to break an invisible passage into the stone. The outline of a door shimmered in the small light. They heard a man jolt awake from either a long sleep or a daydream. Theo balled his fist and leveled his temper. He hid his fears — doubts. He slipped on the worst of his masks yet to be revealed to the world as he hardened his expression with venom.
"You may walk through, sir," the warden whispered.
Theo didn't hesitate, couldn't give himself that moment to stop this from unfolding. He stepped through the stone, the barrier between bloodlines, monsters and creators, and into the cell that held his father.
"Theodore?"
His heart picked up pace, eyes landing on the wraith of his father seated on the floor. His hair was longer, knotted and brown yet still far from grey. He was thin with skin smudged in dirt beneath his withering, striped uniform. His eyes were as black as the deepest depths of the ocean with deceiving golden flecks. He had expected to find a shell of him, with maybe something closer to contrition in his eyes, but it seemed even Azkaban couldn't kill a demon.
"Are you here?" His father rasped, breaking the silence as his question echoed against the moist, jagged black walls. The sea screeched beneath a small, barred window as if the wind didn't like this.
"Yes," Theo found himself answering, unsure of how he could even process the scene unfolding before him as his expression fell for a moment.
"You're a vision of your mother," Tiberius Nott mumbled to himself, looking Theo dead in the center of his gilded honey eyes as if he saw a ghost — one that he might still love.
How could he even speak of her? Theo thought.
He sneered, towering over him as he stood wide-stanced and still spinning his rings within his pockets. He wondered how his father might kick him now, seeing how he had grown into something equally vicious and had thrown quite a few punches of his own.
"Shame you murdered her," Theo answered hatefully, glaring into the lost eyes of a loveless man.
His father left no room for pause, scoffing wildly with a grin.
"You're still telling yourself that after all this time?" He shook his head ruefully then met his glare again. "Do you still lie to others? Does Alexander still show you pity and nod in agreement?"
Theo shook with rage as he bent down, shoving his sharp angled features closer to the face of the man he used to fear. His father's own angular, hollowed points were scarred with years of cruelty, scratches, and slices.
"It's the truth," Theo hissed.
His father revealed a horrid smile that begged him to find the true light as if he might be as sick as his late wife. "You have the madness — our curse."
He eyed Theo fully, from his cropped curls to the mean unwillingness, the bloodlust in his eyes, to the scuffs on his pristine boots. He saw him fully as who he had grown to be as he hadn't properly cared to lay eyes on him in years.
Theo could have sworn he sensed his father shiver, and he had to remind himself that he was different from him. He didn't crave what his father did. He was only half of the man before him; his mother's grace filled the hope in his dark bones. She gave goodness to his wrongs.
"Theodore, your mother was sick. Melancholia took her," his father whispered, eyes softening for only a moment. "Not I."
Theo brought a fist to his mouth, terrified he might reach for his father's throat and ruin himself. He couldn't find the words to spit, but his father saw the retort in his trembling fury. It was an expression that was quick to beg the question of who was to blame for all her sadness.
Tiberius sighed, exhausted by his son's presence even though he had been rotting alone for nearly a year.
"You were such a difficult child, Theodore," he sighed. "You never wanted to please others as Alexander did. You were insufferable. Inconsolable. You drained your mother entirely of life and left no love for anyone else in her heart. You were always so jealous..."
He hissed as he smiled. "And I see it now — in your eyes."
Theo's stomach turned. The worst of his fears exposed like an unhealing wound that had bled out for years. It had painted his soul black for so long.
I killed her. I killed her, he thought.
It was why he couldn't risk killing Dahlia too. He was doomed to take the life of those he adored.
His father leaned closer, face wrinkling in disgusted approval. "Have you killed, Theodore? Did your greedy heart justify it? Do you like blood? Even hers as I did? Are you in love? Think yourself capable of it?"
Theo trembled. The worth of love was too high of a price as he had known the misery he had brought to his mother. He had killed her just as much as his father had. He wasn't sure he was capable of love, himself. He was a brutality. Love and obsession had always been so indistinguishable to his heart.
"Stop," Theo breathed, but his father was unrelenting. He showed no mercy.
"I see it now in this godforsaken cell, my second son. Now that I've really gotten to look at you for once, I can see the man you've become, and I can see that maybe you were truly born as I was — unredeemable."
"Stop," he breathed. Theo felt as if his heart was being retched and thrown aside. It made him furious. His own father, another reflection, hated him. Despised his unconditional love.
"Insatiable for power," his father whispered, eying his cell and knowing it took a great deal for his son to bargain his way here — all for nothing. There was no loyalty in this bloodline. No reunion to be had or peace to be made regardless of efforts.
Theo couldn't help himself as his building resentment coiled and lashed. He took his father by the throat as if he might choke him and stared into the depths of a different hate that resided in the black pits of his eyes. His father had cursed him the moment he was born, believing he had stolen all the love of his mother in his first breath. He believed he had taken her from him long before she died.
But that wasn't the truth. Theo released his father's throat with a shove. His mother had chosen to love her sons more, knowing that her pouring of love might make a difference one day.
This difference.
Theo settled and wiped his mouth with a falling smile, finding the purpose in it all.
"You don't know me as you believe — your own son. Isn't that sad?" Theo bristled.
"Unlike you, there is goodness within me and I choose to ruin myself to end monsters like you. I like blood as I like justice. My justice. I believe in something — someone. I have a soul, diseased as it may be, but you have nothing."
Theo stood, coming to the end of the road. He had often dreamed of fighting his father back, goading him so he might swing first only to discover that his son now had the upper hand, but that fantasy felt empty now. A weak, withered man who had hidden behind a mask was all he was. He was human, as the worst monsters often were.
His father smirked, showcasing rotting teeth. It was nearly pitiful.
Theo stepped back from the puddle of dirty fabric that was his father's and began spinning his time-turner. He had nothing else he wished to get off his chest. This was enough, he was enough, and this was as much as he would ever get from his father. This had to be closure, as ugly and undeserving of this cruelty he was. The fact that he spared his life was a mercy for his own soul — for Dahlia who might still care for it.
I am good. I do care. I will survive this.
He spun his time-turner with a nod, needing to return to Valeria and his brother so he might free more monsters in order to slay a worse evil. He gave no goodbye because at that same moment, Theo clutched his chest. His heart fluttered, returning to the present as he closed the temporal loop with seconds to spare.
He fought exhaustion, having spent hours in the past minutes within the underbelly of the prison. There was a rageful madness in his heart, but within it he found peace. His hands no longer shook.
His father's eyes narrowed and went wide. He laughed, cawing terribly as he realized something elaborate was underway as he spotted the time-turner on his son's hand. His eyes angled to the sleeve of his coat, noting the hint of poison ink, the Dark Mark, pooling at his wrist.
"You truly believe you're a Nott?" His father laughed, mocking him as if the ink only made him a fraud.
But Theo was a fraud. A rebel with a grander purpose. He didn't blindly follow the Dark Lord as his father did, using it as an excuse to exert violence in a name. He didn't believe in the Order, who would never have the guts to commit to the darkness that it might take to defeat him. He would fool them all if he had to if only to bend the world to his good will.
He founded his own beliefs. Paved his own path. He believed in taking hold of destiny — the great search for the light in the darkest nights. He believed that love could heal and forge souls. He was capable of it, even if obsession was his own sick way of showing it. His mother had loved him. Dahlia had loved him, and even it wasn't the real truth, it would be his truth. His father was a curse, now broke. Irreverence and violence didn't make him or his namesake. The grand strive to break the stars and the dream to break the wheel did. The perseverance to beat the odds with the clarity that can only be found in chaos was what earned him his namesake. Never settling and never quitting.
He was a Nott. The best of them only because he was his mother's son.
Theo turned, unbothered by his father as he found courage in his mother's grace. He held the galleon to the small window, summoning sunlight by some miracle. He knew Valeria was circling above in the thick storm clouds.
"I'm more of a Nott than you'll ever be, Tiberius."
Theo grinned, eying a shadow through the rusting bars. A terror in the sky. Her throat glowed, rumbling the heavens and shaking the sea as she readied to unleash the fire from her maw. Rasping cheers and horrified wails echoed up the throat of the prison. The dementors fled. Their cloaks blackened the sky and in their darkness, the growing fireball in his dragon's vengeful chest became the sun.
Theo looked over his shoulder, nonchalant. "And you should duck."
There was an unforgiving scorch of silver light cored with crimson and nothing else. Even the sea seemed to silence as the searing heat descended from the storm clouds.
Theo squinted, falling to his knees as Valeria drew magic from him as her flame tore through the wards that surrounded the prison. The same protective wards he had been working relentlessly to weaken for the past several weeks. The flames roared like molten waves against the thin, translucent veil that hung like Death's cloak over the monolith.
The fire receded as she took a breath. Theo wiped the sweat from his forehead and stood, exhausted from the magic her spelled fire exerted but he would never regret locking their hearts together. He quickly raised his wand and held a firm protective charm around himself and his father before she ripped open the heavens and tunneled into the well of his magic once more. He winced the air heating. The sky screeched as the charms broke like fraying rope.
His father's rhythmless laugh filled the cell behind him as Theo held strong, shaking as his magic spent. The heat intensified, bathing them in a red glow. The wards were ripping clean. The air grew electric with the breaking of binds.
In any second. In any second—
The stone beneath his step shook first. The prison groaned as the dragon powder that now filled the bones of the prison ignited. The same highly explosive powder that he had purchased from the Greys and had just spent hours turning time to forge it into the walls of the prison, brick by brick. The Dark Lord wanted a spectacle, terrorism, and so he would have it.
Theo reached for his father's hand behind him, but he shook him off.
Theo turned, quick and furious. "We don't have time for this!"
Was the old man really this prideful? So much so that he wouldn't allow his own son to rescue him. His father cackled deep from his gut, refusing his hand.
Fuck. Fuck.
A flash of vivid green-lit the sky as Valeria finally let up her flame — too early. The dragon powder. The intensity of the heat was growing unbearable. She soared high like a comet, roaring with anxiety that touched on grief.
I shouldn't be here. We shouldn't be here.
The blast shock came and landed like a freight train. It was felt before it was heard. Theo was thrown into the wall of the cell from behind as he held his hands to his ears. They rang, but not loud enough to miss the hell-raising roar from the sky. He saw through the fresh crack of stone as the side of the prison was blown to pieces. He saw as Valeria descended from the smoken clouds and banked left to circle the rubble on the other side of the tower.
Her high-pitched cry told him it was time to go. Abandon hope — abandon his father. She refused to let him die. Wouldn't allow it. He was all too young for it as she had seen a millenia; waited for him all that time.
An alarm wailed through the sky, erupting from the base of the tower that still stood. Transcribing and alerting the Ministry of Magic that something was wrong. She hadn't been able to raise the prison to rubble as he had remained here too long despite her promise to leave him behind if things went south, and now the Aurors would be here in minutes. Seconds.
The tower groaned once more as the stone fell upon him, but he couldn't leave. Wouldn't abandon his father as he had been left in the cold too many times.
Theo surged with adrenaline and roared as he ignited a protective barrier with his wand. He oriented himself as his vision finally centered and landed on his father who now stood on the exposed ledge of the prison where the wall had been pulverized. It was all that had separated him from the merciless sea below.
Tiberius looked down into the swirling tide, alight with green dragon-powdered flame and smoking black rock hailing upon it. He smiled at his son as the Auror's cries rang through the tunnels — closer.
They were frozen as seconds they hadn't passed them by. His father lifted his haunted eyes, contemplating a second chance he never thought he would be given. His expression darkened as he let his barefoot dangle over the sea. Theo's gut twisted on the edge of heartbreak.
Don't. Don't leave without me. Do something right.
Sparks of spells blasted past him. Theo ducked and fired back, pulled from his father's gaze.
"No!" Theo raged as his father jumped and shifted into black smoke as he escaped alone, without him, and into the night. The other prisoners were too weakened as they succumbed to madness, but not Tiberius. Never a Nott.
Theo screamed into the blackened sky, but his father wouldn't abandon him this time. A fury yet felt stormed through his veins as he cracked through the air and gave chase without hesitation.
"Theodore!" He heard Lupin's voice cry into the sky as he blasted into the cell behind him, desperate for him to make a good decision and terrified because he thought, knew, he wouldn't.
The Order broke into the heavens in plumes of white smoke, leaving the prison to fall as there was no hope against a dragon of Valeria's size as she circled close.
Theo raced as he kept pace with his father in a thunderous cloud. The rain soaked him to the bone.
He didn't have to look back to know that Valeria had unleashed her fire again to incinerate the last of the prison now that he was safe and gone. The heat of her breath found him in the sky and her roar shook his gut. She would finish the heist and return to him, finding his heart wherever he ended up.
Theo sensed the Aurors gaining on him and his father as he heard the cracks of air, and for the first time, Theo was truly horrified. They weren't supposed to be here. The Order couldn't be here. They would kill his father, but he gambled that they wouldn't kill him.
Theo moved in unpredictable chaos as he cut through the sky behind his father and between the flying spells until land was on the horizon. The cliffside was near and Theo wasn't sure if his father would make land and fight or continue to run. Theo surmised that he was probably starved for violence, but his father surprised him and barrelled into the dark clouds in an attempt to lose the Aurors.
Theo followed, protecting his father through the pelting of spells as the Aurors gained speed. It took great effort to stay focused through his wrath. He could strangle his father for choosing to abandon him too. Murder the stars for not being on his side after all he had done for them — her.
Theo glanced up as a gust of wind kissed his face and a low rumble echoed through the clouds.
Valeria.
He smiled in return as they raced the heavens together. He was alive. So alive, and furious. They dashed through the rain like gods, touching beyond the riled skies and reaching for daylight.
Until he gasped; heart squeezed and breath lost. Valeria cried out in a high squeal as a spell collided with his back. The moment's glance had cost him. He froze, stiff and tumbling to the earth.
He had made a bad bet. The Order would have him dead if it meant getting to his father. He was all but collateral damage as he plummeted towards the dirt as if he were flying, soaring through her palace of stars. Dahlia. The crush of death amongst the cliffs would only be a relief. He could be with her forever. Start over with her in another life. Be gentle on his mother this time and never doubt the good within himself.
"Theodore!"
He closed his eyes as a great wind took him, attempting to slow his fall. It was panicked, thrashing as it screeched aimlessly. He fell through its hands like water. Theo felt his dragon's heart crack as she bellowed, barreling down toward the earth like a falling star, now racing seconds.
It's okay, he wished to tell her, but couldn't. he was petrified.
I'm sorry, he prayed to the stars, hoping his apology would cross the universe to reach Dahlia one way or another.
The wind whistled as it whipped, still trying to save him as the ground neared. He squeezed his eyes shut as Valeria cried like she had been cut through the heart and demanded vengeance.
His own heartstrings pulled taught and he quickly opened his eyes to meet her great amethyst irises just a beat away. He thought he might be grinning but wasn't sure in the delirium. He had nearly forgotten they were masters of racing the clock as she bulleted towards him, beating gravity. They would always come out on top. They were a force, inevitably and undying.
He was snatched from the air by her great talons and slowed to the earth. Valeria released him from her great claws and he tumbled onto the grassy cliffside. He gasped for air as he sputtered a countercharm to heal himself and regain control.
Dad? Where is Dad?
His world righted as he shouldered off the shock. He looked up to the sky towards the south but saw no signs of him.
"Fuck!" He rasped.
He slammed his fist into the mud and shouted to the world. He had lost track of his father. He had left him for dead. Looked him in the eye and decided that he was still better off alone. He had escaped without him.
No. No.
"No!" He cried out.
"Theodore!"
Theo looked towards the sea and sat back on his knees, unbelieving of his eyes. His father soaked clean in his tattered uniform, terribly thin and barefoot emerged from the blackness of flame and smoke. There was an unrecognizable concern in his dark eyes. A wildness he was sure was reflected in his own.
Theo froze, unable to fathom it. His father wrapped his arms around him. A kindness that made him furious.
"Get off me!" He bellowed, shoving his father away. "You left me!"
Theo cared not for the plumes of smoke that materialized around them — Aurors. His gaze only caught on a black cloud emerging behind his father as his brother arrived. The Aurors hung back, circling from afar as if unsurprised.
This wasn't the plan.
This isn't right. His eyes grew wild as he spun around. Something is wrong.
His father took his face in his hands as if to soothe him like a boy and guide him home. He didn't care that the Aurors who had hunted him all his life were now closing in — again.
"Teddy," he cried, face pained at what he might have lost.
His eyes filled with an adoration, not for him, but for the only woman he had ever loved and what remained of her within him. He was as wild and hopelessly hopeful as his mother.
Theo grimaced, on the verge of fury bound by unconditional love as his father breathed in to speak. Maybe to apologize. Maybe to say that he had been loved, was loved, but his father never exhaled.
It came like a bolt of lightning, used to stop a heart instead of resurge it. His ears continued to ring, unhearing of the curse.
His father's face slackened into peace. His hands fell limp from Theo's dimpled cheeks and his eyes were lost, succumbed to the blackness of the dark seas within them.
No, Theo prayed to any god that would have him. Forever haunted by the words that hadn't left his father's breath. He closed his eyes shut, unable to see another set of eyes of someone he loved without life. He pictured his mother, eyes glassy and lips black with belladonna berries. Pale and poisoned as she died cradling him in her arms within their gardens.
He opened his eyes as tears slid down his face. He was truly without — alone in this cruel world. Mistakes now permanent and forever unforgiven.
A brutal, crack of a sob escaped him as his vision blurred and Tiberius Nott fell dead to his knees in front of his favorite son.
Theo fell to the ground to catch his lifeless father, the man who had held first at his birth. He didn't want him to fall to the earth as nothing more than meaningless flesh.
This...
His chest caved and he roared, condemning the world for taking one more irreplaceable thing from him. Valeria wailed as she made landfall behind him.
Through his rain-soaked curls and tear-stained eyes, Theo saw Alexander storm forward from the circle of Aurors that included Lupin, Mad-eye Moody, and Kingsley Shacklebolt. That's when he realized that his brother was the only one holding a wand.
His mind danced, piecing it together in a moment. Everything was understood in the cold creases of his brother's expression. Theo saw nothing but bright crimson and his emotions broke through the cracks, composure lost.
"What have you done!" He bellowed into the darkening sky as the rain continued to hail down. Nightfall was near.
"Theo..."
His brother started as he closed the distance, shaken and uncomfortable as his brother sobbed as he had as a child. He knelt before Theo, who showed devastation over a man who had only given him horrors.
"It was necessary," he voiced through the pounding rain, reaching for his father's frame. "We had no options. He couldn't walk free-"
"Look what you've fucking done!" Theo roared, clutching his dad's frame closer to his body. Alexander didn't deserve to say goodbye.
"You're fucking worse than him! He never did anything to you!" He rasped.
"Theo-"
"You did this with Devereaux, didn't you! This was why I was kept from meetings! You fucking planned this from that night at the Aldairs!"
"I did this for you! He hurts you!" Alex shook his head, pity coated his eyes. "I knew you didn't have the stomach for it...and I knew he wouldn't leave with you."
Theo hugged his father tighter. No one should have the stomach for this. His dad had gotten it wrong. It was Alexander who was unredeemable. Even his mother wouldn't forgive him for this. He had slayed his own blood, yet Theo felt the most betrayed. Naive.
"You fucking bastard!" Theo's voice cracked. "I was better off without you!"
"Theo please..."
Alex reached for his brother, but Theo spit in his face and kicked him back.
"You're dead to me," Theo hissed. "You fucking animal! I'll kill you myself!"
Valeria shook the ground with a warning rumble from her maw as she sensed the distress in Theo's heart. Alex fell back, pierced by the threat in her eyes. She extended her wings with a whimper and wrapped herself around her master. She mewled as she heated his bones from the biting chill and gave him shelter in the rain. He was so small tucked within her wings. Her chest slowly vibrated as she mourned to the falling skies.
Theo touched his father's cold skin, and memorized how the creases and scratches felt on his peaceful face as he choked on breaths. He was gone. Gone, and soon Alex would be too. He would have no one left in this world. This lifetime. He would inherit everything but have nothing but ghosts.
He was tired. Exhausted from always trying so hard all for nothing to show for it.
"Theodore..."
Theo wiped his nose and glanced up from his grief. Lupin bowed before his dragon, nervous to approach. Theo said nothing, and Lupin saw allowance to step forward in his wild, desolate eyes.
Valeria lifted her wing, sensing no threat from the werewolf. Lupin approached and for a moment, nothing was said. Nothing could be said that would make it better. Theo stared into Lupin's reassuring, sorrowful eyes. There was no way for Theo's clever mind to fix this — and for him that was the real tragedy.
"What do I do?" Theo breathed, unsure for the first time.
Lupin pressed his lips together and bent down. There was nothing worse to be seen, no better canvas for a monster to be made, than a boy lost and abandoned by all.
"In that book you borrowed, it says that a soul lingers for a short while after death," Lupin whispered.
Theo nodded, still frozen in shock.
"He loved you, Theodore. He chose to die for you the moment he turned back..."
Theo nodded, choking on an unwanted sob. He shook off his coat and even though it was useless and soaked, he placed it over his father's body. His dad was awful and cruel yet he couldn't be without him in this world.
He placed his head against his father's unbeating chest.
"I know you don't care for it, but I forgive you," Theo murmured.
"I have to forgive you," he choked. "I'm her, not you, and I'm sorry you hated me for it. I'm sorry if I took her."
He felt Lupin wipe the rain from his curls and he allowed it.
"Please. I hope you forgive me too."
Theo let his tears fall on his father's chest, hoping his ghost had stuck around to see what had become of his sons. He was right — the bloodline was cursed. There was no loyalty amongst Notts.
Lupin stayed until the sun fell and the stars emerged, shining bright and chasing off the clouds if only to give him hope. They sang to him the sweet lullaby of his mother although he could hardly hear it. They wept for him, their breaker.
Valeria whined as she brought her snout to Theo in a compassionate nature.
Theo knew she was right, they couldn't stay here forever. He finally lifted his head.
"You should go," Theo whispered to Lupin. "I want to be alone. To bury him."
His old professor saw a scheme in his eyes but nodded. "I'll wait elsewhere. I must ensure that you return to Hogwarts to keep you safe. It will be good for you to return. To be with Dahlia and your friends. They love you more than you realize, you know?"
Theo wiped his nose and nodded. He turned his gaze to the sea beyond, not wanting to meet the man's eyes. "Please, Remus."
Lupin stood wordlessly and slowly shuffled deeper into the hillside. Valeria unfurled her massive body from around him and he felt suddenly exposed, vulnerable once more to the horrors of the universe.
Theo placed his father's body on the wet ground, wincing at the emptiness. He wiped his face as he stood. The steam of Valeria's breath hovered behind him as he strode up the cliff.
Numb, he faced his dragon and fell to his knees. He threw his wand to the side and plunged his hands into the wetted earth and began to dig. He shook with exhaustion yet he persevered. He wiped his eyes with his sleeve, hands already turning raw.
Valeria slowly prowled forth. She lowered her head in grief then sunk her front feet into the soil and clawed into the earth, as well. Theo couldn't smile, but he knew then that he wasn't alone.
They dug a proper grave, one that was probably nicer than his father deserved. Theo mumbled a spell and carved his father's initials into a large stone that lingered nearby.
"May your soul be saved," he whispered as Valeria whimpered, carefully placing his father into the bottom of the burial pit.
"But I doubt it," he added beneath his breath.
He then returned the soil to the earth, hoping something beautiful might grow from his father's darkness.
I love you, he thought yet he couldn't voice it. He wasn't sure he could love anything now. There was nothing in his heart but grief and the desire to free himself of this mess — this life.
He tilted his head to the starlight when he was done, and decided then.
He heard the far footsteps of Lupin returning. Theo would prove him right. His soul was pure despite the color it had been painted. Theo would show him that and prove that he was a good man — someday.
Theo turned and Lupin halted as he spotted the mischief in his fooling gold eyes beneath the rising moonlight. Valeria spread her great wings as she readied to depart, following her master loyally in the dark.
"Theodore! No!" Lupin cried out.
Theo nodded then cracked into the night, returning anywhere but Hogwarts.