I SPY || 𝕝𝕦𝕔𝕚𝕦𝕤 𝕞𝕒𝕝𝕗𝕠𝕪

Chapter 41. Reward

"Muggle studies? You're joking?" Alecto spat.

"The Dark Lord see's it fit that you teach the students of Hogwarts how lesser Muggles are than us." The voice of Severus Snape drawled. Astrid was listening carefully from behind the drapes up the stairs.

"What's he get?" Alecto asked, her voice laced with attitude and distaste.

"Defence Against the Dark Arts." Snape said with a sigh.

"What!?" Alecto spat. Amycus could be heard laughing in the background.

"Look sis, maybe if you were less of a cockroach you'd get the good jobs," Amycus sneered with humour on his tongue. The two siblings started bickering and that's when Astrid lost interest in the happenings of the headmaster's office down the stairs. She dropped the beaters bat on the bed and padded over to the marbled bathroom where she stared at her reflection. She still had some mascara stains on her cheeks, her lips dry and cracked, her hair greasy. Her skin felt uncomfortable, unclean.

With a long sigh she stepped out of her red dress, balling it up and throwing the dirty garment in the sink, she undressed further and threw her underwear in the sink too. With a sigh she pumped some hand soap onto the soiled clothes and filled the sink with water, allowing them to soak.

She looked over her body in the mirror, a few silvery stretch marks scorched her skin below her belly button, only visible in some light but they were there. Her ribs were lightly visible, her collarbone jutted out more than ever. She had abused and mistreated her body in her recent dark times, eating very little had caught up with her, and she was beginning to look almost poorly. The thought of eating though... made her sick to her stomach. How could she indulge in food in a time like this?

Astrid slipped off her emerald ring, carefully setting it aside on a small dish and stepped in the shower, she allowed the hot water to run over her head and down her body. Washing away the dirt and sweat that clung to her. But even here she felt guilty, enjoying the way the water fell on her skin, caressing it.

When she got out, she wrapped a white towel around herself tightly and re-entered the chambers. Opening the armoire, she wasn't quite sure why she expected to find her own clothes in there, instead she was faced with a lot of black robes, trousers and jackets, and the odd white shirt, Snape had clearly claimed the hanging space. Astrid sighed as she realised her trunk was still at the Weasleys, and in it all her possessions, and by extensions, her clothes.

She sat for a moment on the bed as she contemplated putting on her now soaked red dress. She could hear conversation down the stairs, something about how the Carrows couldn't be bothered hosting quidditch this school year, and they should host duels in the Great Hall instead. Astrid switched off to it, the more she heard the more annoyed she grew.

With a huff she moved back to the armoire and took a white shirt from a hanger, and in the drawer below found a pair of black boxer shorts. She groaned inwardly as she stepped into the shorts, pulling them up under her towel. Whilst she felt disgusting for wearing his clothes, it was the most comfortable of the options available to her. Behind the vintage screen she allowed the towel to eventually drop whilst she pulled the ironed shirt over her body. She buttoned it up quickly and glanced to the mirror, it was ridiculously oversized, and more like a dress on her petite frame, the hem reaching her mid-thigh and completely covering the loose boxers that she covered her pride with. Still, it was better than the other two alternatives: towel or soaking red dress. She pulled her still dripping hair out of the neckline and allowed it to trail down her back in soft wet waves, the damp hairs clung to the crisp white shirt.