𝐆𝐎𝐋𝐃𝐄𝐍 𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐑

the prodigal daughter

"Don't be afraid to give up the good
for the great."

•••• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ ••••

ambition is virtue.

•

SHE MISSED HOGWARTS so much it was like having a constant stomachache. She missed the castle, with its secret passageways and ghosts, her classes (though perhaps not McGonagall, the Transfiguration teacher), the mail arriving by owl, eating banquets in the Great Hall, sleeping in her four-poster bed in the dungeon dormitory, learning sign to talk to the merpeople, tripping down the edge of the Forbidden Forest, and, especially, Quidditch, the most popular sport in the Wizarding World (six tall goal posts, four flying balls, and fourteen players on broomsticks). She couldn't wait to go back and tryout for Chaser. She could wait to be on the team with Bella, Andy, Cissy and Lucius.

Merlin, she missed her friends. She missed their careless banters, pointless debates about the various theories they came up with in the middle of the night. She missed Andromeda and Lucius marching in with piles of pudding they nicked from the kitchen, in the middle of the night. She missed Lucius and his confident beauty and brilliant brains. She missed Bellatrix, her glossy hair and translucent blue eyes. . . She was sure now that she was over Lucius Malfoy. Bellatrix was the problem now. But mostly, she missed her friends because they genuinely liked her. She wasn't so sure about her parents.

Ever since Meredith stepped into her house again, she noticed that her parents were attempting to make amends for treating her poorly in the past year. Although they weren't pro-strecromancy at all, they seemed to be coming around to accepting her being a Slytherin. Her father even asked her if she was fond of the color green and wanted to paint her room. She had said that she was fond of the brown hues of her room.

After a year of separation, reconciliation seemed strange. She had almost forgotten what it felt like to go to the park with her father and James. Or eat the Sunday waffles with honey made by her mother. She had forgotten it all. She partly believed the reason why they were accepting her being a Slytherin was because of the small trophy she put in her bedroom. All the students who had a significant part in winning the House Cup were given a trophy of valour. Alakay had been given one because of his class performance and first rank. Severus had been given one for excellent Potion making skills — he had participated in a preliminary inter-house Golden Cauldron competition and won. Narcissa had been given one for the Best Debut as a Chaser. Meredith had been given one for her excellence in Duelling Club.

She had joined the club the second the entry forms came out for two reasons — One, she needed to know how to defend herself. If anyone apart from those she trusted found out about her Strecromancy, there was a seventy-three percent chance they were likely to throw a nasty curse her way. Two, she needed to know how to use and master magic without her inherent strecromancy. As much as she loved the power now, she didn't want to be at the mercy of it. There was no guarantee — thanks to the lack of literature on it — that the power would stay forever. It could fade. And Meredith wanted a backup. So she had joined the Duelling Club and she had been the best candidate at the end of the year, mastering spells, jinxes and hexes from third and fourth year level. Professor Heavensbee, their Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher had been so impressed that he asked her if she wanted to move further to the higher forms of Duelling. That gave her a trophy. And maybe her parents realized that coming third in class and winning a trophy of valour actually made her as normal as it could get and she ultimately deserved appreciation and love too.