Over the next week, Aurora had little success in working out what her cousin might be up to, or if Theodore was correct in his assumptions, but it preyed on her mind constantly. Her dad gave her no update on Malfoy Manor, but that was to be expected — she doubted he would tell her or Harry until it happened, to save them worrying. It didn't work on her. She kept an eye on the Prophet, on Draco's mood, to see if she could tell. With everything going on, she half-forgot about her birthday until it arrived on Wednesday morning, heralded by Gwen, Leah, and Sally-Anne yelling happy birthday and throwing confetti at her the instant she walked back into her bedroom after her morning run. Aurora jumped back at first, reaching for her wand, before she came to her senses, and laughed as she closed the door behind her.
"You idiots," she muttered, going to hug the three giggling girls. "You gave me a fright!"
"It was funny," Sally-Anne said.
"It was not!"
"It was," Leah agreed, and Aurora laughed again, squeezing them tightly.
"Okay, fine, but I'm really sweaty so I am going to need to shower."
"All the more time for us to prepare our next surprise," Gwen said with a mischievous run, and she gave a withering sigh.
"I can't tell you no, can I?"
"Absolutely not!"
Aurora pretended to groan, snatching up her uniform robes and getting changed quickly, trying to deny the anticipation of whatever they had prepared. The girls' surprise was, it turned out, a very large cake, and a bottle of champagne.
"My mother says a lady's first legal drink should always be champagne," Leah explained, holding up the bottle.
"Your mum's a Tory," Gwen scoffed, laughing.
"What's a Tory?"
"People in Surrey don't like them."
"Yes, they do." Gwen stared at her. "Far too much. How would you know?"
"I know lots of things! Harry told me!"
"Harry's fucking with you."
That made sense. "The bastard."
Leah grinned. "Well, anyway, we'll save this for Friday or Saturday — whichever day you don't have Quidditch after."
"Oh, so now I'm going to be responsible for giving alcohol to children?" Aurora scoffed, hands on hips. "How'd you even get this in anyway, I thought everything was being checked by Filch?"
"Temporary Transfiguration into Butterbeer. My cousin Eilidh did it; hopefully she didn't fuck it up."
Aurora eyed it suspiciously. "Well, we'll find out on Saturday, I suppose — I have Quidditch that morning, but Potter's claimed the pitch on Sunday."
"Splendid," Sally-Anne said cheerfully, eyeing up the cake. "And we'll have this tonight? After Duelling Club, of course."
Aurora grinned. It wasn't quite like the usual birthday feast she liked to host, but there was something deeply endearing about her friends doing this, doing anything, for her, and a warm well of gratitude flared inside of her. "Absolutely," she said, voice slightly hoarse. "Thank you."
"Oh, God, you're not going to get sentimental."
"Of course not!" Aurora said indignantly. "When am I ever sentimental?"
Gwen laughed and slung an arm around Aurora's shoulder as Leah hid the bottle beneath her bed. "You're a big sap. Literally. An entire adult witch."
It was a strange feeling. Adulthood. She didn't feel grown up, not really. She felt just the same as she had yesterday, and more worried and out of her depth than she ever had when she was young. Maybe that was what being an adult was; knowing how scary the world really was.
"I hate it," she decreed, reaching for Leah and Sally-Anne to tug them in and link their arms. "I need breakfast to cheer me up."
The owl post was even later than usual that day. Filch was searching packages more and more everyday, and it annoyed Aurora to see how the wrapping on the gifts she'd been sent from her family had been tampered with, the bow on the box sent by her father lopsided and flat. Between the pancakes and waffles and sweet fruits Gwen insisted she ate in celebration, she slowly managed to unwrap the two boxes she had been sent from the Tonkses and her father.
The first presents she opened were the two jewellery boxes from her dad and the Tonkses. The longer of the two, deep blue velvet, contained a watch, which she already knew. She didn't know what would be inside it, though. Expecting another old piece of family jewellery, ornate and ancient, she was surprised to see a watch she did not recognise, its face dark purple and illuminated by silver stars which formed tiny constellations. It was not the real night sky, she could tell that immediately, but once she leaned closer to inspect it, she knew that it was something much better.
In the centre of the watch was the constellation Boötes, whose brightest star was Arcturus, gleaming pure white near the bottom. Beside it was Canis Major, Sirius blazing, and on the left side, the Andromeda rising with a greenish swirl around. Around them, but smaller, were other constellations: Leo and Draco and Cassiopeia and Hydra and Cygnus, twinkling out at her.
Breathless, she looked at the dials on the side; when she turned the top one, the watch face turned into a bright, blazing dawn, amber and gold seeping into pale, purple-blue cloud, washing the stars into the distance behind. Tears sprang to her eyes and her chest tightened as she turned it back and forth, changing the colours from dawn to dusk and midnight and then, eventually, into green and purple and pink dancing among the stars.
It wasn't a family heirloom at all. It was hers, for once, something wholly and entirely hers, made for Aurora but incorporating the people who had made her who she was. It was something she never would have asked for herself, but when she held it, it felt so right, like she should have known this was exactly what she wanted. And the watch itself was beautiful, the silver band so elegant and slim when she latched it round her wrist. It looked like it belonged there, and the stars on the watch face seemed to agree.
The second, smaller box, was tagged only from her father. Intrigued, she opened it up, to find three rings resting there, along with a small note.
My dearest Aurora, it read in her father's elegant hand.
I know it is sometimes typical for a young witch to receive a ring for her seventeenth birthday, rather than a watch, but we decided to do both, against family tradition. I hope you don't mind this, but it was important. In this box are three rings, two of which belonged to your mother. The gold band, with the diamond, was her engagement ring, and the plain gold band her wedding ring. The third, silver band, is the one I had designed for your birthday, but I want you to have all of them, if you wish. I know Marlene would have wanted you to have this, and I do too. You don't have to feel obligated to wear them — I'm not totally sure they'll fit, anyway, and I know you don't tend to wear gold — but I think you ought to have them, at least. Your mum would have wanted you to. As to the third, I really hope you like it. It should pair nicely with the watch, too.
I hope you have a wonderful birthday, sweetheart. I can't even begin to tell you how proud I am of you, and how much I love you. I'm still so, so grateful that I got the chance to know you again, and that you gave me your forgiveness. You've changed my life many times, always for the better, and I know that you'll continue to amaze me every day as you grow into the most incredible young woman.
Love you infinitely,
Dad
Aurora tilted her head down to hide the way her father's words made tears leap into her eyes, and a lump grow in her throat and a tight warmth in her chest. It was sweet and sentimental and just a little bit sappy, and she could not deny that she loved him for it.
"That from your dad?" Gwen asked, looking over curiously. "Damn, is he that indecisive?"
Despite herself, Aurora let out a wet laugh and shook her head. "They belonged to my mum, you idiot."
"Oh, shit, sorry—"
"It's fine." She waved a hand, swallowing. "The two gold are, the other's made just for me… He's just... Very sentimental."
"You know it's bad luck to cry on your birthday," Robin Oliphant's voice said from above them. Despite Gwen's discomforting glance away, Aurora smiled; she'd missed the sound of his voice, too. "Sugar quills cheer you up?"
Aurora sniffed, and tried to discreetly wipe her eyes without smudging her mascara. "Always," she said with a grin, accepting the terribly-wrapped box he handed over to her.
"Any big plans?" he asked, glancing down the table. "I'm always up for planning a party."
"Absolutely not," she said, "I can't think of anything worse than having dozens of people pretend to care about my birthday."
"Hey, I know at least ten people who actually do care. That's enough to get pretty wankered."
"She doesn't want a party, Robin," Gwen said, voice flecked with irritation. "Nott wants to talk to you — go sit with him."
When she saw the hurt look on Robin's face, Aurora's heart clenched. "I'll definitely be at the next big house party," she promised, "and hey, you can come and have a bit of my cake tonight if you want."
That cheered him up only slightly. "Yeah, cheers — I'll see you then! Try not to cry again, Black!"
He hurried away, and Aurora stared at Gwen, whose cheeks were flushed and pink, and her eyes glassy. "That was mean. You said everything was fine between you."
"It is," Gwen said in a tight voice that implied the precise opposite. Sally-Anne took a great interest in the conversation next to them, and Leah meticulously buttered her toast to the very edge. "He was annoying you."
"He's Robin," Aurora said, "that's how we are." She frowned. "What's really—"
"It's your birthday," Gwen said quickly, "just eat some cake."
Aurora didn't much feel like cake anymore, but she ate anyway, and didn't question Gwen further. They'd get into it at some point, but her friend didn't want to talk and she didn't want to pry. Especially not today — selfish as that was.
In Potions, her first class of the day, Aurora received birthday wishes from a very eager Ernie MacMillan and Professor Slughorn, and was greeted at her desk by Harry lobbing a box of chocolate frogs at her head, which she caught deftly, smirking. "Thanks for the Quidditch practice, Potter."
He shrugged, grinning. "Thought you could do with the practice — even things up, you know."
"Sure," she said sarcastically, slipping the present into her satchel as she withdrew her day's supplies and sat down. "I can't wait to pummel you."
"You might have to wait a while. Happy birthday, though. They should taste alright, soften the blow."
Aurora could only laugh, with a pretend glare, before they had to get to work.
The day's lesson was a fairly dull one, merely observing the progress on their slow-fermenting Nightshade Antidote, which Aurora had to go over on her own in the common room during her free period. Vaisey and Urquhart wished her happy birthday at break, hastily, as though they'd not known and mutually agreed it was best to get on her good side, and she laughed at them and told them to practice their goal feints.
She anticipated Duelling Club being a highlight, but from the moment she got there, she was also hoping to get back to her dorm, to sit up late with her friends and laugh like they used to, talking about everything and nothing. Her first duel was with Theodore, who greeted her at the very beginning of the club session in the Great Hall with a quiet, but sincere, "Happy birthday."
She flinched at the words, said in the tone of a mere acquaintance and replied, "Thank you."
Bothstood awkwardly for a moment, unsure of what to do. Aurora stepped to the side to walk past him and Theo did the same, and they stopped, staring at one another again. She caught sight of Harry and Hermione over Theo's shoulder, laughing. "Good day, was it?" Theo asked, in a strained voice.
She nodded, wincing. "Yeah. I suppose. Alchemy could've been worse."
"Rotten luck getting stuck with Snape on your birthday."
"The worst," she agreed, with a tentative smile. She felt off-balance with the conversation, a strange weight pulling on it. Aurora glanced at Harry for a way out, but received none; he was locked in conversation with Susan and Hermione, quite unaware of her plight. "Still," she went on bracingly, "at least he'll be gone by the end of the year. Defense Against the Dark Arts curse, and all."
"My bet's on disappearing in suspicious circumstances beknownst at only to a disgruntled Alchemy student," Theodore said with a bright grin, and Aurora laughed. It felt good to laugh at his jokes; it felt like some part of the world had righted itself again, and she could breathe more easily. "I'm talking about Terry Boot, of course."
"Oh, obviously. He's a menace to society, that one, anyone who saw his Draught of Living Death would know that."
Theodore's answering, easy grin made her heart flutter; but then he caught himself, and his face settled into stony, practiced indifference. He looked like he meant it, too, and that hurt. There must have been some part of him, at least, that didn't want anything to do with her, even if it was fighting with that other side of him, the side that could still smile and laugh and that felt like her Theo again.
You did this to yourself, she reminded herself. You did this to him.
And still, by the time Flitwick called them to the platform, she was still half-caught in the memory of his smile.
The whistle caught her off-guard; she was slow in pulling up her shield, and a Tripping Jinx caught her foot, causing her to stumble forward and have to twist around to keep her balance as she flung back a Stinging Hex, which Theodore narrowly dodged in favour of a spell she did not know but which caused the stage around her to smoke without flame. He grinned, eyes bright, and she settled back into her normal competitiveness as she hurled a Jelly-Legs Jinx and a Knockback Jinx in quick succession, causing him to wobble his way towards her and recover with a burst of blue light that forced her to turn away, followed by a sharp stunner which sent her sprawling backwards.
Aurora hastily cushioned her fall, but the time spent trying to get back up had Theo reinforcing his own shield. Annoyed, she snuck a stunner of her own towards his feet, knowing he was weak there, that he often forgot to encircle the wand movement fully and left himself open. He stumbled backwards and she rushed forward, with a Stinging Hex on the tip of her tongue; but he rushed back towards her sooner than she expected, and held the tip of his wand out towards her. When the Stinging Hex hit, he just grinned, but the words he whispered under his breath and the yellow light they blared out, had no effect on her.
They locked gazes, at a stalemate, and slowly, Aurora smiled. "Draw?"
Theo raised his eyebrows. "Nope."
She was glad. They both turned at the same time, moving away and then back again; she with a Disarming spell, him with a Depulso to tire her out. That was a good move, she thought dimly as she prepared her next attempt at a Petrificus Totalus. But they were locked together, neither getting past the other's shields, until, with a sharp lift to her heartbeat, Aurora feinted to the left, right in the path of his Stinging Hex. She ran right through it, gritting her teeth against the sharp feeling, taking advantage of his momentary surprise at her shields lowering, and ran past him, before he could turn, and shot a Flipendo at his back.
He twisted round, landing back on the crash mat with a grimace, facing the ceiling. Aurora counted to three as he did not move, and then asked with a victorious smile, "Surrender?"
He forced himself to sit up, eyes narrowed. "Surrender. Your cheek's swelling up."
"You're the one sprawled on his back in the middle of the Great Hall," she pointed out, and his tired grin widened.
"Give me a hand up, then."
She raised her eyebrows. "Is that you saying you surrender?"
"Yes, I surrender," he said, voice laced with annoyance. That was new. Aurora smiled.
"Fine then." She walked over, and hauled him to his feet. That familiar excited tingle started where their palms met, where his thumb moved absently over her knuckles. Her stomach flipped and her heart stuttered an she let go of him as soon as he was vertical again, tossed her ponytail, and said, "You've gotten better."
"I know," he replied, with a newly cocky grin. "So have you."
Aurora merely shrugged, heart racing. "I know. Have fun with Potter for me."
Then she skipped down off the stage and back to her seat between Hermione and Harry, who said merely, "You can't rely on gaps in a shield in a fight. You have to find a way to break them down."
"That's the sweetest birthday message I've ever received."
Harry just rolled his eyes.
She was still glad that evening to get back to her friends in her dormitory and tuck into yet more cake. Leah showed them all a nifty trick she'd been taught by her father, taking the cork off a bottle of champagne with a long tree branch she had transfigured into a sword, and the wine bubbles up and fizzed over the top, causing Gwen to squeal and tug the edge of her bedcovers away, even though they were nowhere near the champagne.
"It's fine," Aurora insisted as Gwen fussed, "it hasn't touched it — a simple cleaning spell'll get it."
"Just drink up," Leah told her, handing over a glass. Gwen wrinkled her nose.
"I've never had wine I liked. I'm used to cider at home. Or vodka."
"I can try and Transfigure it," Sally-Anne said eagerly, sitting up, "I'm getting good at the water to pumpkin juice."
"Because they're completely comparable," Aurora remarked drily. "Champagne's fine, once you've a taste of it."
"It's bloody posh." Gwen stared at it like it was poison. Aurora rolled her eyes.
"Well, cheers to me, I suppose," she said in a teasing voice, raising her glass.
"To Aurora," the girls said, laughing as they drank. Both Sally-Anne and Gwen grimaced, and Aurora bit back a small wince. She knew she should like champagne, and she did, but somethig about it was always not quite right on the first drink. But Arcturus had always said she would like it when she was old enough to drink it. Though, she supposed, what did he know about anything? He was dead, and a murderer.
Her throat crowded very suddenly as she had to put her drink down. She had never taken it for granted that he would be alive to see her turn seventeen, but the fact he wasn't, that Lucretia and Ignatius and Grandmother and all the rest weren't here, no matter what or who they had turned out to be, made her stomach twist.
-*
Regulus was in her dream. He was a spirit himself, pale in the gloaming, like mist rolling over the darkened hill where he stood. He was walking. Coming closer.
Aurora couldn't move. The sun deep on the horizon spilled red rays like blood, and when he inches closer, darkening, he was soaked in it, too. She looked down, held her hands out to ward him off; they were dripping blood onto blue grass and when she opened her mouth to scream, blood poured from her lips, hot and sticky.
"You're one of us," Regulus said and the spirits behind him multiplied, shades of people she ought to have known. "You'll always be one of us. Just make the sacrifice."
He put a knife in her hand. Its steel blade was the same shade as his eyes.
Her father lay at her feet, glassy-eyed; then Andromeda, then Dora, then Elise. "I can't," she said, and he pushed the blade into her own palm.
"You must," he hissed, "I did not die for you to turn your back on us."
"I can't." The blade pressed deeper, and he wrenched it to the side; incisions bloomed all over her skin, the blade turning her inside out as blood poured from every inch of her.
"Blood traitor," he hissed, as the knife plunged into her chest.
The sun set. The light died. Aurora fell.
She woke up with a pounding heart and a scream lodged in her throat.
It was dark outside the window, the barest of green light glowing through the water. Gwen was fast asleep, snoring soundly. It was only a dream.
Aurora's hand curled around the necklace on her bedside table and Julius's snake form. It pulsed in her hand, calming her as she held it to her chest. She was safe.
She closed her eyes but sleep would not come back to her. Instead, the dream replayed over and over again; all that blood, all those bodies, Regulus's face as he handed her the knife.
I did not die for you to turn your back on us.
She hadn't asked anyone to die for her. She had only been a baby, she wanted to scream, if she could ever get ahold of his real spirit.
Blood traitor, he had called her. It held even more meaning now that she knew her loyalty to the family — and their 'purity' — was to be sealed in blood.
When the water outside the window began to lighten, and Aurora knew she was not going to get any more sleep, she crept through to the bathroom and got showered and dressed, wishing she could go for a morning run — but students weren't allowed out on the grounds on their own anymore, and a look at the marauder's map told her Snape was on duty today, and the last thing she needed was to have to deal with him.
Instead, she went to the common room to read and try and make something productive. She was reading through a thick history book on eleventh-century rituals from the Restricted Section, which she had managed to convince Babbling would be useful for an Ancient Runes essay. It was giving her little of use, not that she had held out much hope. In truth, it wasn't the ritual that she felt she had to learn about; Arcturus had said she would have instructions. It was the aftermath she was worried about, what it meant to sign herself over to the will of a legacy, a dynasty.
Was it worth it? she wondered. Would it ever be worth it, when she didn't even know what she was signing herself over to? Once, she would not have thought twice about doing whatever Arcturus had wanted for her, would not have questioned what it meant to be Lady Black. But she was not that girl anymore, and perhaps that was the problem. Perhaps that was why Bellatrix had said, all those months ago, that the ancestors would not accept her, because she did not know if she could bring herself to bend the knee to them, unsure of what she was bowing to.
Spilling her blood did not scare her. She knew the house would not hurt her. But she saw herself in her mind's eye with blood on her hands that was not her own; she saw Arcturus standing over three bodies in the clearing she had played beside as a child. Was that her fate? Murder? Killing Bellatrix she could handle, but she was not certain that that was her fate. Arcturus wanted her to bring her father and Andromeda, and if it was the will of the house that she had to obey... There were forty-two Lord Blacks preceding her, and every one of them, she was sure, would tell her Bellatrix was the one worth keeping alive. The pureblood.
The sound of a door creaking open behind her made Aurora start, and turn round to see Draco slipping out of the boys' dormitory, flanked by Greg and Vincent. She caught his eye for just a moment, saw him catch his breath and doubt flicker over his face.
"What are you doing up this early?" he asked in an accusatory tone.
Greg and Vincent stopped, and Aurora raised her eyebrows. "Reading. What are you three up to?"
"Library." She looked at Greg and Vincent and laughed. "They need to pass Defense Against the Dark Arts this year. Snape's got me teaching them."
"I heard you just barely scraped an E in that O.W.L."
Draco's cheeks flushed crimson. "Where did you get that from?"
With a smirk, she sighed and drawled, "Rumours, dear." Blaise had made a comment about it in Slug Club the other night in what had seemed like a poor attempt to curry favour with her. "Good luck."
Vincent made a move towards her, face furious, but Draco held an arm out, keeping him back. "Watch your tongue, Black," he said, voice cold.
"Back to surnames, are we?"
He sneered at her, like she were something disgusting on the bottom of his shoe. "Enjoy your reading. Come on, boys. We don't need to waste our breath on filth."
The words still sent a cold knife into her stomach, coming from him. As they left, and she watched, Aurora felt hopeless, frustrated tears burn through her. It wasn't fair, that he was so cruel, that she had loved him and begged him to see her and it had never been enough, that he had been this person all along and she hadn't allowed herself to see it until it was too late.
She tried turning back to her book, but it was useless now; her thoughts were pulled back to Draco, and that look on his face, and the feeling that nothing of her childhood could ever return and be hers again. All of it was ruined by the shadow of the hatred that had run through the core of her family for so long.
Annoyed, she gave up on trying to focus and pulled out the Marauder's Map, searching for Draco's name. He probably lied to her. There was no way any of them were that bothered about exams.
She scoured it twice, thrice, cold dread spilling into her gut. There was no sign of Draco's name anywhere; Vincent and Greg were somewhere near the Defense corridor on the fourth floor, moving at pace. Perhaps they were looking for books, but that was unlike them, and Draco...
A sick feeling went through her then as it dawned on her. They were near to the statue of the one-eyed witch, which led to a passage into Honeydukes. She wracked her brain, trying to recap if she had ever mentioned it to Draco. Nothing stuck out, but still — she might have said anything to him, because when they were still friends. Out of ire at Harry for sneaking out himself, most like.
Unsettled, she closed the map up, aware of the stirrings of other students in their dormitories as the clock ticked towards eight. She had no proof he was doing anything, and no idea what that might be. It could be as benign as sneaking sweets into school — he was surely missing his usual care packages from home. But Aurora knew herself that she was just trying to be optimistic, blind to reality.
Her cousin was up to something. Vincent and Greg were probably covering for him. She should have gotten the map out immediately, she thought, annoyed with herself for the oversight.
But she would get him soon, whatever it was. And if he was sneaking out of school, he could be sneaking anything back in. That was the main concern. Filch's dark detector was no use if people were running through secret passages unbeknownst to anyone. A shudder went through her as she forced herself to her feet.
Once her dad spoke to her again, she would have to tell him this, too. Make him worry even more.