CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
— no one is without fault
UPON RHEA'S RETURN TO HOGWARTS AFTER EASTER BREAK she settled into her old familiar routine and steered clear from Tom. They would pass one another in the hallway and pretend that the other didn't exist. For the time being, Tom Riddle was dead to Rhea Hel. The rest of April passed her by without much trouble and she found herself at the end of May with O.W.L.s right around the corner for career advice with Professor Slughorn.
She drummed her fingers against the surface of the armchair she was seated in while Professor Slughorn made his way back to his seat. He pulled at his gingery blonde moustache and smiled widely at Rhea.
"Well, Miss Hel, this meeting is simply to talk over any career ideas you might have, and to help you decide which subjects you should continue into sixth and seventh years. Have you had any thoughts about what you want to do when you leave Hogwarts?" Professor Slughorn asked.
Truth be told, Rhea had all sorts of ideas of what she wanted to do when she was younger. At one point she had wanted to be an Investigator so she could travel the world and investigate creature-related cases for the Beast Division at the Ministry, but over the years she found herself becoming less and less interested in that. Becoming a dragonologist had crossed her mind too. She had always felt a connection or deep fascination towards dragons, but she always thought that had something to do with her family's ties to dragons.
But, like most things in Rhea's life, her career choice wasn't something she entirely had a say in. It had been something that was discussed at length with her entire family years ago. It was all planned out for her.
"I want to be a Hit Wizard," said Rhea. Slughorn's bushy eyebrows rose a few inches, obviously shocked at Rhea's words. She blinked at him and waited for him to recover.
"A Hit Wizard, really?" Slughorn asked. "It's just that . . . well, you don't see very many witches who want to become Hit Wizards, but times are changing, I suppose."
Rhea resisted the urge to roll her eyes, but she placed a pleasant smile on her face instead. Her family had been the one to suggest that she and her brother both pursue jobs in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement for the Ministry. Her brother was on track to follow in their grandmother's footsteps and join the Wizengamot and, originally, Rhea was going to go that route too before she proposed the idea of becoming a Hit Wizard instead.
A Hit Wizard was a Member of the Magical Law Enforcement Squad who were trained to deal with highly dangerous situations. It was also a field dominated by wizards and Rhea was determined to become the best witch for the job. She'd climb her way up the ladder until the Minister himself would be knocking at her door.
"In order to become a Hit Wizard, you'd need at least five high-level N.E.W.T. grades. I'd suggest Defense Against the Dark Arts, Potions, Transfigurations, Charms, and Herbology should be the ones that you aim to get no lower than Exceeds Expectations on."
Rhea nodded her head. She was going to get all O's. Everything she had ever learned at Hogwarts was information she learned when her parents tutored her. It all came naturally to her and she could do everything with ease, even if she didn't act like it sometimes in school.
Rhea finished her meeting with Professor Slughorn and made her way to the Hogwarts Library to get a book for Transfigurations. She walked down the aisle, searching for the book when she caught Astrea kneeling on the ground, shaking. Rhea ducked behind one of the shelves and crept towards the girl to get a closer look at the situation.
Astrea's hand was pressed to her temple and she was whispering incoherent phrases underneath her breath while her entire body shook with tremors. Admittedly, Rhea had never seen something like this before and she was well familiar with weird wizard ailments.
"Astrea," Rhea hesitantly placed her hand on the girl's shoulder. Rhea felt something — magic — creep up her arm and latch itself onto her. She dropped to her knees when unbearable pain filled her head. There was a loud ringing in her ears as the library began to morph into the beginning of a memory she tried to bury.
Rhea had never been much of a crier and she supposed that was another thing she got from her family. Growing up, Rhea heard the phrase 'Hel's don't cry' more times than she could count until it was permanently engraved in her brain. But, even then Rhea never found herself wanting to cry all that much.
Yet, there she was, sitting on a stone bench underneath the shade of Morgan le Fay's statue in the family garden, with tears streaming down her face. She was filled with an unbearable pain unlike anything she had ever felt before in her life. She thought that how she felt now was worse than dying — the grief of losing someone she had loved completely was terrible.
And she wanted it to stop.
This wasn't who she was. She didn't spend her time crying on stone benches feeling like her world had been yanked out from beneath her feet.
She could hear the sounds of laughter coming from the shed that was nestled away in the tiny nook in the garden. She heard her mother's voice, sounding happy and full of life as she spoke to a man. Rhea's father wasn't in the country — he was out helping Grindelwald with his revolution — so Rhea was aware that the person in the shed with her mother wasn't her father.
Rhea looked down at her hands and saw that they were shaking with rage when she heard her mother's laugh once again.
Caliope was the one who caused Rhea's grief and suffering.
Caliope was the one who took the one person Rhea loved away from her.
Caliope. Caliope. Caliope.
Her mother's name bounced around Rhea's skull while she sat in the garden. She wiped the remaining tears from her face and looked up to the clear summer sky. A wave of calm washed over as she took a deep breath and she was filled with a feeling that was different from the grief and sadness she was feeling.
Clarity.
Everything was so clear to her in that moment while she breathed in the scent of flowers and listened to the laughter of two people in the background; and then Rhea realized what she needed to do.
Rhea tore her hand from Astrea's shoulder to find the girl beginning to lean up against the bookshelf. Droplets of sweat ran down Astrea's face as she breathed as though she had just run a marathon and she leaned her head against the bookcase, staring at a startled Rhea as the girl tried to process what happened.
"Did you see that?" Rhea asked, feeling suddenly apprehensive. She didn't want Astrea to know anything about that memory of her crying in the garden or what happened after. Her secrets needed to stay buried.
"I saw something, though I doubt it was the same thing you just saw." Astrea shrugged. She stared at Rhea with a curious expression on her face. "That's never happened before."
"What hasn't?"
"No one who's ever touched me while I've been having one of my . . . episodes has ever had a vision too. What did you see?" Astrea asked. She leaned forward, intrigued.
"I didn't see a vision. I saw a memory." Rhea narrowed her eyes at Astrea and avoided her question. "You get visions?"
Astrea pressed her lips into a thin line, clearly not wishing to elaborate on that subject with Rhea, but Rhea could see the girl's mind working behind her blue eyes. She was wondering why that had happened when Rhea touched her and Rhea was wondering the exact same thing.
"Are you a Seer?" Rhea asked Astrea. Astrea appeared to be startled and the question and let out a small laugh.
"Don't be ridiculous." She scoffed.
"Well, you were whispering to yourself, you see visions, you have these so-called episodes . . . it sounds to me like you have the Inner Eye." Rhea said. Astrea's head snapped up when Rhea mentioned the Inner Eye and her eyes formed into slits.
"You know nothing about the Inner Eye, Hel." Astrea said Rhea's last name like it was a curse and the Ravenclaw girl scrambled to her feet. Rhea smirked at the expression on Astrea's face and she made a mental note to herself to do some more research into the Inner Eye. "Stick to your rituals and dark spells."
"What do you know about my rituals?" Rhea asked with an amused look on her face.
"I know that it's all just an act. I know you have the whole school fooled into believing you're an angel when you're nothing but evil." Astrea said. Rhea's grin became wider. "Your whole family is nothing but evil."
The mention of Rhea's family made the grin drop off her face in an instant. There was a dark look in her eyes as she looked at Astrea with an expression of indifference.
"Don't act so high and mighty now, Astrea. Do you think Tom is any different from me or my family?" Rhea asked.
"You don't know Tom. Tom will put all of this behind him one day and realize —"
Rhea cut Astrea off with an incredulous laugh.
"Is that what you really believe? If so, then you're a lot stupider than I originally took you for." Rhea climbed to her feet and faced off with Astrea. Astrea was red in face and looking at Rhea with an expression of loathing. Rhea sneered at the girl. "You are far too powerful to allow yourself to be this naive and foolish for a boy who will never feel the same way you do."
Rhea could tell from the expression on Astrea's face that she struck a nerve when she added the last bit, but she didn't care one bit. Rhea smiled sweetly at Astrea before she turned on her heel and walked away.