◤ ❝Does it terrify you to think of how similar we can be?❞ ― Andromeda Erebus ◢
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CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO: ORPHEUS
April 2, 1997
"Abintus Enimde."
Two sparks of blue flashed in the Room of Requirements, and the accusers watched with unimpressed stares as the Cabinet in front of them stayed just as ugly and frustratingly-broken as it was the last twenty spells they'd tried before. Although, Draco Malfoy and Andromeda Erebus would be lying if they said that particular spell gained special care from them. They were lying down on the dusty, old rug when they aimed their wands at the Cabinet. Draco was on his back and Andromeda using his chest as a cushion, making a perfect 'T' with their bodies. It didn't help that Mia had blindly pointed her wand when she tried the spell, her face covered by a different book she'd checked out earlier in the week. Madam Pince barely batted an eyelash and only rejoiced in her enthusiasm to read so much over the break.
Draco stared blankly at the Cabinet for a few minutes. "This is pathetic."
"This is pitiful, is what it is," she huffed out from underneath the book, frowning when it disappeared as Draco's fingers reached to pull it off. Her eyes adjusted to the light, and once they had, she tilted her head slightly to look over at the Cabinet as well. "Looks the bloody same to me. May as well have just thrown my book at it."
"Should've let Atlas have a piss on it. 'Least it would have some use to someone."
The two of them were quiet for a while, brooding at the Cabinet which had caused their Easter holiday (and their entire sixth year, if they were honest) to be the bane of their existence. Quite literally. Draco's hand fell off his wand and moved to fiddle anxiously with a piece of Mia's hair splayed on his white polo, curling the wavy piece around his fingers. She didn't even notice, too busy digging the palms of her hands into her eyes to try and ease the growing migraine. After a few minutes, her hands fell loudly to her side and called Draco's attention.
"What aren't we thinking of?" she asked, her jaw tightening as she grew irritated. "We've gone through nearly every possible Reparation spell that has been practiced since Merlin himself. The spells we thought needed to be cast together, we've tried those and failed―binding spells, duel-magic, all of it―" she scowled at the damned thing as she spoke "―how is it possible for the Weasel twins to have rightly fucked up something so much that not a damn thing on this miserable Earth can fix it?"
Draco scoffed. "Apart from being blood traitors, one of their few talents, it seems, is ruining things."
Another cast of silence fell upon them. Draco could tell that Mia was thinking. Usually when she found herself intertwined deep with her thoughts, they were loud enough that he could sense the strife they were causing her. That, and the familiar crease between her eyebrows that he'd recognized when she was thinking appeared on her face. He frowned, his head shifting slightly so that he could see the side of her face.
"Your thoughts are deafening," he said, tugging slightly on the piece of hair he had wrapped around his hands. "Out with it before I start practicing Legilimency."
She waited a few seconds, her mouth molding around the words. When she realized that there was no way to say her thoughts out loud easily, she gave up and just spoke. "...if we fail to repair the Cabinet, what does that mean for us?"
His hand stilled on her hair, the piece falling flat just as his chest did. When Mia could no longer feel the rise and fall of his breathing, she pulled herself up into a sitting position and moved next to his lying figure. He watched her for a few seconds, his hand falling on the exposed flesh of her thigh where her skirt ended. She was surprised that her body didn't jump at the contact, but welcomed it with as much as it could be. He slid up slowly, his face absent of any emotion that would indicate what he was going to say back to her. Then, just when she thought that he never would reply, he turned to look over at her. The first thing she recognized was the hesitancy in his grey eyes.
"Then we'll have to do it ourselves."
Mia knew what he meant. If they did not repair the Cabinet themselves, there was no contingency plan at the end for them―no way to transport the other Death Eaters into Hogwarts to aid in murdering Dumbledore. They would be left to their own defenses. Left to spark the war. Left to deal with the blood on their hands. Left to handle to consequences that would come from killing one of the greatest minds the Wizarding World had ever seen. Left knowing that they saved their families' lives in the process of ending Dumbledore's.
Mia's eyes glazed over, feeling that string of detachment snap inside of her as she thought about what was coming soon for them. April had come just as quickly as March left. School would be letting out in June, and the only plan they had to complete their number one mission and kill Dumbledore was a stupid one. A foolish one―one that surely wouldn't work. Cornering Dumbledore, catching him off guard in a moment of weakness after he returned from his late excursions off campus. One of them would distract him while the other fulfilled the mission. With it came a million things that could go wrong.
"We need a better distraction than one of us standing there minding off to him," she muttered, glancing down at her hands and gently tracing her thumb along the line of the scar on her palm. "If it comes to a fight, both of us need to be prepared."
Draco watched with withered eyes as she traced the scar. "Something with Rosmerta?"
Mia hummed quietly, letting him know that she heard his suggestion. Her eyes traveled up from her left palm, landing on the exposed Dark Mark sitting parallel to Draco's just next to her. They had gotten too comfortable letting them show in the privacy of the Room, and while neither enjoyed gazing too much at it, the option to not cover their arms constantly was nice. Her brows furrowed in thought, tilting her head to the side and taking her bottom lip with her teeth as her brain started to weave through a possibility.
"Why not make him fear his own death?"
"What?" Draco asked, confused. "What do you mean?"
Mia grabbed a hold of his left arm softly, her fingers dancing around his black Mark. "Make him see his own death. There is nothing that Dumbledore fears more than seeing this Mark hang over the head of his prized school. Why not cast the Mark of his death for him to see? Let him wither in the feeling. It would be enough of a distraction. If we did it at a time when he was returning from one of his late night retreats..."
"...he would see it and come running to where it was cast..." Draco finished breathlessly, looking at her Mark with growing recognition in his eyes. "He would be too worried about how a Death Eater found their way into the castle, too fearful of it being his precious Potter―Romy, you bloody genius! I could kiss the daylights out of you right now―"
She pressed a hand to his chest, giving him a look. "There's still a lot that could go wrong...but perhaps we could still use Rosmerta. Have her tell off that the Mark was cast, spread the rumor and then cast it at the right moment so that no one will come to stop us before him."
"What about Snape?"
"He has no choice but to follow our direction, it's this or his life. His Vow upholds that. He values his miserable life too much, for whatever reason that may be. If we continue to avoid him and his quest for information, he should not be a problem," she said, shaking her head and pursing her lips in thought. "Once I've spoken to Slughorn and swayed him on my side...the only person who will have any reason to think anything of us is Potter."
"No one has believed him all year," Draco dismissed, scoffing. "Doubt he'll be much of a problem."
Mia met eyes with him. "They would have, you know. If we had been forced to complete these tasks alone, I wonder if we would have been caught already. The only reason no one has placed a second thought on our odd behavior is because they think you're a cheating git and I'm the slag you are doing it with..." she was surprised to see that the comment didn't make Draco smirk, but instead made him frown. "It's the honest truth. I worry I would have killed Potter already, had I been asked to do this alone."
"You mean to tell me I calm you down?" he asked a bit boastfully.
"Not in the slightest. In truth, you only trigger my frustration," she said blandly, making him roll his eyes. She sent him a look. "What I meant was...you were right―when you said that this partnership started out as nothing. You were a classmate. An acquaintance. I tolerated you because I had to. Trust has never been my strong suit―" a dramatic scoff from Draco that made her glare at him. "If you'd like, I can stop. You are the one constantly trying to know my thoughts."
"Carry on."
She rolled her eyes at him like he did to her. "I believed you would hold me back from getting my revenge on Potter at the beginning of this―in September, I had endless doubts about you and how much I could rely on you...but I wonder, sometimes, if the anger would have gotten the best of me had you not been there. There was a time when I stopped feeling. A time when I enjoyed it."
He was quiet for a while, his eyes never leaving hers. "And now?"
"And now I'm spilling my feelings to you as we conspire to kill our Headmaster, and trying so very hard to remind myself that it is for something bigger than myself."
"Funny, isn't it? How much everything has changed."
She peered at him with a blank expression. "You've changed."
"Hm," he hummed lowly, glancing down at their intertwined hands. She hadn't realized when it happened. A crack on his mouth made way for a small centimeter of a smile. "Suppose so. I'd say you're to blame for that one...you haven't gone and made me a better person so get that out of your head before your ego flies with it," he said with a pointed look when she started to smirk. "But you made me see things differently—fighting with me over the littlest things, forcing me to have some courage, showing me who I can be without Father's words hovering over my every move... and I suppose it's helped a bit that you're not too horrific to look at most days."
"The compliment would've been more appreciated if you'd left it without the backhand in suit. Merlin..." she huffed out in exasperation under her breath, a joke in her mind making her shake her head. "If there were a way for my younger self to see me now...carrying on a conversation with Draco Malfoy about my feelings."
"Who'd reckon I had any?"
"Certainly not me. I thought you were vile. Tolerable at most on your good days."
"At least I had a reputation. You barely existed to me until last summer. Forgot you were even int our year once or twice," he scoffed. A twinkle of something was present in his eyes when he looked at her. She could see his lie as he told it, even without her Legilimency. "Come on, since we're telling all. You've been fancying me since we were children, haven't you? Just waiting for your chance to get my attention and now that you've got it, you're playing cat and mouse with me..."
Mia smirked at him, playing mindlessly with the gaudy Slytherin ring pressed against her index finger. "I very much fancied a certain Slytherin for nearly five years...unfortunately your big head got in the way most times I tried watching him out on the pitch."
Draco looked rightfully offended, his face twisting into an emotion that she had seen on his face before but never truly accepted until then—jealousy. Her brows quirked in interest, the expression only making the smirk rise fuller to her lips. "Jealous, Malfoy?"
His head shot back when he looked at her, appalled. "You think I have any reason to be jealous of a half-blood like Vaisey? He has the personality of a broom cupboard and the intellect of its door handle. Mind you, half the time he kisses Urquhart's arse when he should've taken Captain instead of moseying around doing all the labor and getting none of the reward...don't know how he managed to get into Slytherin—"
"He is a good snog, though, so I'd understand—"
"Mia."
Her lip twitched again and she looked innocently at him. "Yes?"
"You aren't sly," he commented dully, his eyes hooded and dark. "I know what you are trying to do, and I'd rather be eaten by the giant squid in the Black Lake than admit to being jealous of him... besides, he's off having his wedding made with your cousin."
"Yes, well, he is still rather nice to look at."
"I find it remarkable that the world had me paired with the most bloody irritating witch alive."
"Perhaps they thought I was a good punishment for you."
"Oh," he said with a loud scoff, his head turning to face her. The grey in his eyes had warmed up significantly, and he sent her a dangerous look that fell momentarily to her lips. "You are certainly punishing me."
――――――――――
April 6, 1997
"My Mia!"
Andromeda stopped mid-step into the common room, realizing that she had chosen the worst possible moment to retreat from her dorms. The bustling sounds of all the students returning back from break made her internally cringe, having grown so accustomed to the silence after two weeks of it. To make matters worse, the infamous nickname that only one person had the courage to call her aloud still managed to ring over all the noise.
Before she could attempt to figure out where the voice behind the nickname was, already fully aware of who it was, something came toward her full-force and swept her off her feet. A yelp escaped her lips and she clung to the shoulders of her assailant, trying to find any support. Andrew Vaisey had a tight grip on her waist, grinning up at her from where her chin nearly touched his nose. The height that she was sailing at nearly made her ill, being well above six feet now.
"Put me down, you oversized buffoon," she hissed, gripping onto his shoulders tightly.
Vaisey sighed dramatically and let her fall to the ground, mindful of the long trip she had down. When he did, she thought that he was going to release her entirely, but his hands lingered around her waist and he pulled her into a longer embrace. She resisted the urge to cringe at the affection, her skin curling despite how much she truly enjoyed his presence—hell, she'd been hopeful of this moment for years. Now, he was as good as family.
"It went well," he suddenly muttered in her ear, and she understood why he was still hugging her. His hands tightened around her waist emphasizing his next point. "Your Grandmother, however, is a very wicked witch. I believed no one could usurp Umbridge's place as victor of backhanded compliments, but she unpleasantly surprised me."
Mia rolled her eyes at the mention of her evil Grandmother, sliding out of his arms with a pat to his upper arm. "I presume there wasn't a murder over dinner?"
"Nearly," he said, and he raised his fingers up to pinch the air. His green eyes focused down on her and she saw the seriousness behind them. Another pointed look in her direction and he closed the space between his fingers a bit more. "Very, very nearly."
"Speaking of, where is my..." she paused in her question when she noticed the lanky-limbed boy towering over the rest of their housemates. A bright, genuine, and overbearingly-relieved smile appeared on her face when she noticed her cousin making his way over to them.
Andrew huffed. "I'm offended. You didn't look nearly this excited when I walked in."
Before Mia could give him a snippy reply, Theo had tumbled his way through the suitcases of a few first-years lingering awkwardly around and gossiping. One sharp, threatening scowl from Theodore and they were grabbing a hold of their things, flustered. Andrew snorted under his breath at the act, but Mia only grinned and finished the last few steps between them so that she could give her cousin an invasive hug. His long arms wrapped around her instantly, squeezing tightly, and unlike Vaisey's, only spreading a warmth down to her feet—her family was home.
"Separation anxiety is a real problem, you know. So is codependency," Vaisey commented casually from behind them, although the way his eyes brightened while they hugged showed that he was just as happy to see the reunion. "Only two bloody weeks, and you'd think it was nearly two years, wouldn't you?"
"Oh, bugger off," came from both Mia and Theo as they separated from one another.
Theo squeezed her left arm briefly, just above her Dark Mark, and she met eyes with him at the attention to the specific spot. Their unspoken conversations had always been easy to understand. Mia knew he was asking if she'd read the letter. With a reluctant pause, she shook her head slowly and ignored the way Theo's face dropped in disappointment to find that she hadn't touched it over break.
"Mother told you not to bring back more of your things, Tori—"
The sound of Daphne Greengrass's voice was enough to make three heads turn in her direction. Mia saw Theodore's body react negatively to the sight, his shoulders tensing uncomfortably at a mere glance at the girl he'd been inadvertently leading on the entire year. Her sister, Astoria, was flailing behind her with a suitcase too heavy for her light and frail self. Only when Daphne glanced up from scowling at her little sister did she realize the small trio she'd come face-to-face with.
"Oh," was all she said shortly. Her face flushed immediately when she saw Theo, who had positioned himself safely behind Mia to hide. That led to Daphne facing Mia, her lips falling down into a frown. "Mia—"
Mia only gave the girl a short nod. "I hope you had a good break, Greengrass."
"Oh, yeah...yeah, of course," Daphne said, her eyes lighting up with a little bit of hope that the last conversation that they had was not the end of their complicated friendship. "I hope you did, too. Both of you—hi, Theo."
Theo's body twitched uncomfortably and he shot the girl a quick, polite smile. "Hello, Daphne."
Daphne smiled at him, her eyes beaming, before she caught sight of Andrew lingering to the right of Theodore. "Oh! Mia, did you introduce Andrew to your family over the holidays? I'm sure your mother loved him—"
"No," came a quiet voice from behind Mia's shoulder. "I did."
Andromeda froze, her blood curdling when she heard Theodore's confession loud and clearly in the midst of the chaos in the Slytherin common room. Daphne had, too. She could not see her cousin's face from where he stood behind her, but she was absolutely certain it resembled the horror on the Bloody Baron's when he realized he had killed Helena Ravenclaw. Instead of turning around to face Theodore, she just took a careful step closer to him and started to lift her hand protectively behind her back—waiting for Daphne's response and anticipating the worst.
The girl in front of them looked confused by the revelation, her brows furrowing. "What? Why would you take Andrew home to meet Mia's family?"
Daphne wasn't understanding what Theodore had just revealed to her, and to be fair to her, it was not something any of them expected her to. However, Mia watched as Daphne's blue eyes slowly blinked and lowered to look at something past Mia's guarded left arm. The scuffling of shoes told her what was going on without her needing to glance back. Daphne's face fell, dropping blankly until there was not a bit of emotion left.
"Oh," was all she said.
Mia could practically feel Theo's pain at her reaction. "Daphne. I—"
Before Theodore could say anything more to her, Daphne turned quickly on her heel and darted in the direction of their dormitory. Her items traveled hastily and blindly behind her, and if Mia looked close enough, she would have noticed the beginning of tears fall down the girl's face. The urge to comfort the girl was something that surprised Mia, considering she had never been much for that sort of thing—but, then again, she had found some kindness in her heart to feel bad for Parkinson when her and Draco had broken up at the beginning of the year, and she disliked Parkinson. Daphne was actually a friend.
Slowly, Mia turned until she was facing the two boys behind her. Her suspicions were correct. Daphne had noticed that Theo and Andrew were holding hands, interlaced tight enough that Andrew's circulation was being cut off by Theo's tight hold. She glanced slowly between them, her attention focusing on the calm expression Andrew had before focusing solely on Theo. He looked torn up, his face twisting as he fought the dilemma to chase after Daphne or leave her be. Only when Mia grabbed a hold of his forearm and squeezed it did he finally look away from where Daphne disappeared.
"Give her time. She'll come around. You've done nothing wrong, Theo," she comforted quietly, nodding encouragingly at him with a kind smile starting to sneak up on her face. She squeezed his arm again. "I'm proud of you. What... what brought this on, though?"
Theo took in a deep inhale, glancing over at Andrew who only smiled at him. "Decided to stop worrying about what other people thought about how I feel...doesn't matter much anymore, does it? Not with all that's happening in the world. Besides, Aunt Cece was very convincing in telling me to not fear loving someone, no matter the costs...she'd know better than anyone."
Mia would have been more overwhelmed with pride if his words hadn't hit her in the face hard. She stopped, the smile slowly dripping off her face. Of course, there was no doubting what he was doing, and she shallowed her appearance down to a blank stare. What was left of his anguish over Daphne was replaced with his familiar sense of nepotism when it regarded scolding her. Theo's brows raised when he noticed her sudden change of affect.
"How is it that you managed to turn this into a lesson for me?"
Theo gave her a shrug. "One of my many talents as the older cousin...did he tell you?"
"Tell me what?" she asked, confused. There was no need to ask who he was talking about, that was plenty obvious. Her eyes glanced warningly over at Andrew before returning back to her cousin, making sure that he was not going to reveal anything that should not be spoken in public. "What are you on about?"
"Malfoy and Parkinson," Andrew blurted out like it was as obvious as the sun, his eyebrows raising. "You didn't know? You spent the whole holiday with him and he never told you?"
Andrew's words only sent a shiver down her spine, thinking of the thousand different things that Draco could have kept from her. In the midst of her confusion, Theo's face broke into genuine surprise when he noticed how she was reacting. "He didn't. He never told you."
"Tell me what, Theodore?" she hissed, suddenly impatient. "Stop dancing around the question—"
"Malfoy broke things off with Parkinson the day everyone left for Easter break, just before he found me and brought me to you." Theo watched as her face fell, frozen. "Told him before I left that he should mention it to you, that's what you saw me speaking with him about before... Parkinson was a mess the whole way home on the Express. The whole school knows by now. I'd have thought he would tell you the moment he had the opportunity."
Andromeda's head whirled around, ignoring her cousin in search of Draco somewhere in the hectic common room. Surely, he'd be there. They had left the Room of Requirements together, trying to ignore the sadness creeping up on them that their time together over the holiday was coming to an end. Theodore went to grab her arm, to reel her back into reality, and she only just barely managed to glance back at him and Andrew before she was leaving them behind.
Getting through the hoards of students was more difficult than she expected, and with one too many harsh shoves and "Piss off's!" to the younger years, she had finally managed to pull herself out through the door of the common room—and she thought to herself, of the millions of places that Draco could have gone, surely he would not be an idiot and go back to the Room. Not with so many students roaming around the castle. Where had he gone?
"Mia, hey!" Tracey Davis was walking through the long corridor in dungeon, grinning brightly when she saw her friend. "How've you bee—"
"Have you seen Draco?" she interrupted, frowning as she glanced over Tracey's shoulder to see another group of students arriving. None of them were anyone she cared much about, faintly recognizing some of them as Astoria's friends. "He's left the common room, and I need to speak with him. Urgently."
"What? Why are you—" Tracey stopped her confused interrogation, her eyes widening briefly in realization. "Oh. You only just found out. I thought—well, Daphne thought that you might have already known after Parkinson blabbered on and on for an hour about how it was your fault he'd dumped her again...did you know that she's messing about with Urquhart? Mid-breakdown, she basically admitted that he was a better shag than Malfoy, and then Vaisey went off on her about hypocrisy and some other nonsense—your boyfriend's quite a lad—"
Mia blanched at the thought. Being the subject of any conversation, especially when she wasn't there to listen to it, never suited her stomach well. However, the girl's rambling were not on her list of importance, and she reeled the girl back into the question. "Tracey. Did you see him?"
"Looked like he was heading up when I saw him last. Had a ruddy ugly attitude on his face."
Surely, he was an idiot.
"Thank you. We'll talk when I get back, I promise."
"Mm-hm. Have fun snogging your dragon-breathed bad boy."
Mia had only gotten a few feet in front of Tracey when she said that, but it was not the comment that had her suddenly stopping. She had gone the entire year listening to the snide remarks about her relationship with Draco, and hearing Tracey send another her way was nothing new. Instead, she turned around to face the parting girl for another reason, stopping her before she got through the doors of their House.
"Tracey?"
Tracey glanced over her shoulder in confusion. "Yeah?"
"When you get in there, go to our dorm. Daphne's upset, she'll need a friend right now."
Tracey's face morphed into something that Mia had seen before—on her own face, on Andrew's, and Theodore's, and even Draco's at some point in time. The teenage girl had twisted to the door again, a flash of concern writing itself on her face. Mia couldn't help the broken, weak frown from appearing on her lips. Tracey glanced back at her. Mia didn't need to use her Legilimency in that moment to understand the thoughts ringing through her clouded mind.
"Ah...all right," she agreed, nodding and clearing her throat. "I'll see you in a little bit then."
Andromeda nodded in agreement, and the two girls parted ways. Mia expertly avoided the large hoards of students collecting in certain areas around the castle—in front of the Great Hall, in the corridor outside of it, in the courtyard, and to her displeasure, certain places on the Grand Staircase which garnered them a foul look from Mia. Her movements were quick, but she was in no real hurry to get to Draco quickly. The frustration collecting in the back of her mind did better when it festered for a while, so she took every passing step, and student, and floor with a heavy grain of indifference and indecision.
She felt sick by the time she reached the sixth floor, her mind racing with the million different things that she wanted to shout incessantly in Draco's face—not like the actions were uncommon, but she had been on a good streak of maintaining her anger toward him. All of that was halted when she turned down a corridor and found herself stopped in the middle of the seventh floor.
"Miss Erebus, what has you running off so quickly?"
Similar to how he ruined most things in her life, Snape also managed to ruin the rest of her day by making an appearance. The weeks had passed easier without his words hanging like threats over her shoulder, his wisdom sprouting doubt in all of her actions and making her sense blurry—he'd told her to abandon two of the most important men in her life, and she was so obviously doing much better with them than she would without them. She stopped instantly, her body curling into itself as she built the layers upon layers of protection needed to face off against Snape. With a jaw so tight she feared it would break, she glanced up to face the man with a sinister glare paving the way of her anger.
"Besides the sight of you, Professor?" she asked, coldly. "Off to murder a student. Then perhaps torture a professor. Might get around to skinning a cat or two just for fun."
His weathered eyes only darkened at her sarcastic response. "Andromeda—"
"Save it for the likes of someone who will listen, Snape. I lack the desire to hear any of your false wisdom right now," she interrupted, her face setting with an expression so much like her father's—slated, unforgiving, and uncaring. "Nor will I find that desire until I leave this wretched school, so if you would pretend as though my existence is a mere fabrication in your mind until then, I would sincerely appreciate it."
She went to walk around him, a scowl dampening her face, only to be stopped when she felt a hand shackle itself to her wrist. Whirling around, she faced his dark glare. "You have fallen back into your childlike mindset, Andromeda—fallen in love—" he twisted in disgust, spitting the words out so coldly that she froze "—and it will do nothing but bring a burden of pain if you do not grow up—"
"Just because you turned your life into a pathetic tragedy does not mean the rest of us are destined for the same," she sneered venomously, her brown eyes discoloring into a terrible shade of black. "You caution me to grow up, to abandon my childlike mindset, but the hypocrisy dances on your tongue. You still fantasize the happy ending you ruined—the childhood crush that ran away with your heart and left you nothing but a dead man walking. Do not tell me to grow up when you cannot even begin to see the sickness in your own head, Snape. Do not put your past on me like I am the same kind of miserable vessel you inhabit."
Andromeda could feel her sanity blurring, the terrible voice that existed in her mind urging her to do bad—to harm, to dig deep into the wounds, to inflict pain—and she thought that she was getting rid of that piece of her. Snape stood in front of her, a perfect victim of her rage, and yet it was not enough. In the haze of her wrath, she noticed a body lingering behind Snape, trying to sneak their way past without being seen eavesdropping. That was when she could no longer see at all behind the heat dancing in her eyes, hands beginning to tremble.
"Want to have a round with me, as well, Potter?" she hissed coldly, her attention falling off Snape and turning instead to the willing victim behind his shoulder. "Because I'm afraid I'm in a bit of a mood, and the sight of your face is enough to make me unforgiving of what I may do next—"
Snape's eyes darted dangerously to the side of her face. "Miss Erebus."
"Why is it that you always linger in the corners when you are wanted least, Potter? So used to hiding, so great at finding yourself in places where you are unwanted because of the filth you were raised to be?" she snarled, taking a step closer that Snape only intercepted with his larger frame. It did not do much, and she still glared at the quiet boy in front of her. "Why so quiet now, Chosen One? You have spent the entire year talking of me, telling everyone what a wretched thing I've become—why is that when you have the opportunity to tell me right to my face, you cower? Do I remind you too much of my father? Does it cut into the wound you have for a man you knew only a second of your life?"
The fury was palpable. Andromeda was unaware of just how palpable it was, and that students were dipping out from the corridors the moment they heard the sound of her voice cascading darkly across the lit path. Nothing could stop it though—the words filled her lungs and breathed out of her like poison, needing to be released and there was no one better to test her talents on that the cause of her pain.
"Andromeda, I..." Potter stopped, his face blank of any response. Just like always.
She seethed, his silence only igniting her higher. "You what, Harry?"
"You aren't going to do anything about this?" Potter asked anxiously, his attention going to Snape with a glower suddenly flickering on his face.
"She has not raised her wand at you, Potter," Snape said, emotionlessly. The glance he took over at the girl, however, was not comforting. Somewhere in his expression, his sentence silently finished with the word 'yet'.
"Look at you, searching for others to fight your battle for you like always," she scoffed at him, turning her nose up in disgust at the mere sight of him. Another step, and Potter's eyes darted down to her hand which was now wielding her wand. "Pathetic, aren't you?"
Potter narrowed his stare on her. "At least I'm not using my father's death like a pawn—"
"Because you never knew yours!" she interjected, leaping forward with vicious intent past Snape. "You never loved yours, Potter! Never had the chance to. No one has ever stayed alive long enough in your life for them to matter one bit, and the ones that do stay only treated you like scum!"
"Because your father raised you right. A daughter of a Death Eater, after all, aren't you?"
That was the last stone thrown in her direction. Andromeda shook with rage, losing all understanding of her senses. Her hand raised, wand wielded and the worst possible, most Unforgivable curse loaded in her mind—and just when she noticed Potter raise his own in alarm, already suspecting a duel would ensue, her wand was being ripped out of her hand and someone was wrenching her entire body behind them. That only set her off further, whipping her head to the person insane enough to try, only to see the flicker of white hair.
"Raise your wand to her, Potter, and it'll be the last thing you see," Draco warned darkly, one hand gripping onto her wand and using it as his own defense while the other clutched her arm tightly behind him.
Potter's eyes lit up with mock humor, darting dangerously between them. "Can't even fight battles for yourselves, anymore? Talk about hypocrisy—"
"The threat was not coming from me," he sneered, his glare only darkening on Potter as the man dared his bravery again. "As I am currently the only thing holding her back from showing you how she fights her battles. Walk away before my senses return and I let her."
Potter must have understood that Draco was not lying, his face hardening for a moment and his jaw clenching in frustration before he slowly backed off. Not a single breath had escaped any of them until he disappeared around the corner of the corridor. Then, finally, everything bustled around them as though the exchange between Mia and Draco never happened.
Andromeda's eyes were still burning with silent anger when Snape turned to look between them, outright disappointment casting shadows in his dark irises. "Your destiny is running parallel to mine, Miss Erebus. Right your rage or you'll find that anger of yours becoming your worst enemy yet."
He walked away without another word, leaving them behind with a dramatic swift to his long robe. Mia watched after him as he left, scalding the footsteps that he took with her abhorrence to his existence. The darting glare did not last long because Draco was stepping in front of her line-of-sight, ducking his head so that he could make eye contact with her. In those grey eyes, she saw a perplexing amount of emotions.
"What in the bloody hell was that, Mia?" he asked, baffled. "I could hear your shouting all the way in the Room. I thought you said your anger was getting better—that things had changed."
She clenched her jaw, avoiding eye contact with him. "Perhaps some things are better unchanged."
"Fine," he said bluntly, bringing her stare to his face finally. "Piss off the rest of the world, then, but don't you direct your anger at me when I've done nothing to deserve it—"
"Why didn't you tell me you ended things with Pansy?"
Draco stopped, taken back by the change of subject and her interruption. "What?"
"You had every opportunity to tell me that you were no longer with Parkinson over the break," she said, her eyes flashing dangerously on him. "But you didn't."
"There were more important things happening, Mia. My relationship with Pansy was not a large area of concern considering everything else that we are dealing with. Telling you two weeks ago would not have changed a thing—"
Mia's eyes darkened. "It would have changed a lot, Draco."
"Oh, fuck that, Andromeda," he retaliated, his eyes suddenly turning cold as he stepped away from her. He pointed an accusing finger her way, scowling. "You do not get to pin this on me like you do everyone else. Whether or not I had a label with Parkinson was not the reason you pushed away your feelings for me—you were scared, and don't act like a single damn thing would have changed had I said things were over between us. Mind you, you gave a fucking list of reasons why we could never happen, and I was kind enough to respect that."
Little did Draco know, Andromeda's heart was breaking rapidly and the anger from earlier had fused uncomfortably with every other feeling inside of her body. Draco paused, waiting for her response, and when she did not give him one, he scoffed under his breath and turned around to go back in the direction of the Room of Requirements. She stayed there for a few moments, letting everything sink around her and drown, and she couldn't help but feel as though there was quite literally nothing she could do to stop from suffocating. She just wanted something to stop.
She moved carefully on her feet as she made her way down the corridor. If there was one person she had to apologize to—to make her feel some sense of relief—it was the boy currently running away from her. The blank wall at the end of the hallway cursed her to the day, hidden behind it the Room of Requirements. Draco's head lifted when he heard her footsteps, his scowl only growing deeper on his face when she came closer to him. The door to the Room had appeared by the time he'd made his third pace around, but he waited to enter.
"Come back for more?" he asked blandly. "I'd have thought picking a fight with me, Snape, and Potter in a matter of minutes would wear you out for a few—"
Mia was not sure how it happened, but she was plenty sure that it did, in fact, happen. Draco's lips were pressed against hers without warning, cutting him off mid-sentence and sending a surge of electricity through them. Perhaps it was selfish that she fell so easily into his hold, his hands shooting out instantly to grab any part of her flesh that he could manage in the haziness of the kiss. The air suffocated them, months and months of unacknowledged lust and passion and need coming out in one fell swoop.
Draco broke the kiss to her dismay, but it only lasted three seconds as he gripped a hold of the door behind his back, his mouth settling back on hers as soon as they were both through the threshold. They moved urgently, rushing against every piece of each other like ravaging children wasting time. Mia could feel his breath hot on her own, his tongue dipping dangerously against her mouth and taunting her with its presence. A low moan escaped her throat, and she bit down on his bottom lip just enough for him to feel a pinch—and he did, his teeth clashing with her own when he smirked against her mouth.
Draco's hands lingering over every inch of her body, pulling up her shirt to reveal the exposed flesh of her waist, was all it took—all it took for the noise in her head to stop, and the aching in her chest to settle, and the anger in her gut to dust away. She welcomed it openly, welcomed him openly, and when he reluctantly pulled apart from her lips to catch his breath—long enough for his head to press against her own, their inhales and exhales getting caught somewhere between the other's, his hooded and lustful eyes caught a glimpse of hers momentarily.
"I need you to tell me right now if you want me to stop," he whispered breathlessly, his hands going up to the back of her neck, getting tangled helplessly in her curly hair. His eyes were constantly flickering back down to her lips, licking his own in anticipation when her body rolled against his. "Because I won't let you run away after this, Romy. I won't wait until then."
She nudged his nose with her own, tilting her head as she closed in on his lips again. "Then don't let me run."
That was the only permission Draco needed to grab a hold of her by the waist, bringing her up, and pressing her against the wall where the door had disappeared behind them. With his body bound dangerously to her own, and his mouth connected hotly with her tongue, nothing else seemed to matter—not the Cabinet lingering behind them, not the Dark Marks burning furiously along with the rest of their skin, not even the letter that was still shoved somewhere between a book. If everything else had changed, Andromeda was tired of pretending like she had not changed along with it.
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Author's Note:
(---:
ORPHEUS: Determined to retrieve his love from the Underworld after her untimely death by stepping on a SERPENT, he went to Hades and requested the love of his life back. The only condition being that he cannot look back at his love, Eurydice, on their way out. Fearing she would not follow, he turned back. Cursing Eurydice to hell and banishing him to his sorrows until death, unable to live without her forever.