Soldiers and Serpents //Scorbus

27 Soft Touches

"I know." He replies, feeling like her voice was jabbing into his ears painfully. "Migraine." He sat up slowly.

"Here, let me help." Raven offers, coming over to him. She pulls out her wand. Scorpius is about to reject her help but she already casts the spell. "Lenio." It was a rather simple pain relief spell, and it started to slowly work on Scorpius's head. Enough where he wasn't squinting to keep out the light from the window. "How's that?"

"You've been practicing." He muses, slowly getting up and looking for something to change into.

"Christine has been tutoring me and Ashton is good at magic so sometimes he shows me things. I pick up on them." Raven answers, waiting while her brother changes into his uniform. She busies herself looking out of the window between Scorpius's and Potter's bunks, watching as owls fly too and from the Great Hall. Scorpius didn't put his tie on, just pulling on his Slytherin sweater over the white collared button down and called it a day. He grabs his scarf, knowing it was bound to be cold in the castle. The boy leaves his sister waiting while he fixes his hair, brushes his teeth, etc.

"Okay. Ready." He comes back to the dorms, and Raven smiles, leading the way happily out to the Great Hall. Scorpius knew breakfast was well over, but he was going to at least grab a coffee before class. He was exhausted. Eyes droopy, legs dragging. Other students were already waiting outside classrooms for their professors. Raven falls into step beside him. She wasn't wearing the Slytherin skirt today, but had traded it out for black jeans. It was too cold for even Raven to dress fashionably. Her hair was done in braids, and then pinned up on her head. A few strands were pulled forward to frame her face. Makeup was on. No one had an inkling of knowledge that only a couple days ago she looked like a druggie.

"Why are you so quiet?" She asked as they walked. Scorpius shrugs. "Tell me."

"Had a dream about when Daniel and... when they cornered you." Scorpius let's out a shaky breath. They never mentioned the Cruciatus curse. Even Daniel never told anyone, and Scorpius often wondered if Daniel had obliterated that memory from his friend's mind. Scorpius wished he could obliterate it from his own mind. Raven clearly didn't want to have this deep of a conversation this early in the morning because she answered only with a short 'mmhmm.' "He's my brother. Isn't it weird that I tortured him?"

"Siblings torture eachother. It's not weird." Raven teases, clearly not referring to the same kind of torture that Scorpius was. "He deserved it."

"Yes, yes he did." Scorpius agreed, and that was the end of it. He still felt a twinge of guilt. Perhaps not over the actual pain it caused, but the power and rush he got from it. What kind of monster would like that? The one descended from the darkest wizard to ever exist, perhaps? Scorpius hated that he had to think that way, but he couldn't stop. Everything he did that people looked down on, thought was evil, was that because of his lineage? Was that more sinister than he thought?

Scorpius grabbed his coffee and headed towards class, trying to ignore the thoughts swirling through his mind.
—-

Scorpius yawned at the lunch table, finishing everything on his plate as Raven and Ashton shamelessly flirted with eachother across from him. Luckily, they kept the snogging to a minimum. It was halfway through lunch hour when Albus finally joined them. "Where have you been?" Scorpius inquires, but his eyes caught the disheveled appearance of Lysander Scamander hurrying to the Hufflepuff table, and his question was answered. He clenched his jaw. Albus didn't tutor him until after classes- why were they now meeting at lunch? Jealousy burned in him like a flame.

"Helping Lysander with flash cards for his next class. There's a quiz." Albus explains. Raven greets the boy with a smile but quickly returns to her conversation with her boyfriend. Albus sits beside Scorpius, starting to fill his plate with food. Scorpius looked at him, but the boy looked perfectly groomed like always. Uniform was straight and smooth, tie on. Hair combed neatly. Still, it did nothing to appease his jealousy. Was Albus running his fingers through Lysander's messy white-tipped blonde curls? Scamander definitely had the appearance that he had been in a compromising position right before entering the Great Hall. "Oh, you're pissed." Albus finally looks up from his food to see Scorpius's face.