BETROTHED — PROLOGUE
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He hated her the moment he met her.
He remembered the day vividly. His mother had ordered Kreacher to make sure the house was spotless, to make it look as inviting as the cold, desolate home he'd known as 12 Grimmauld Pace could possibly be. The floors were swept, paintings were dusted, and cupboards were devoid of cobwebs, but it still didn't make it feel any more like home.
She'd reprimanded him several times that day, each to tell him firmly to be on his best behavior. But this was his mother and she didn't say it like most mothers would have. She said it like be on your best behavior as if she was ready to throw him out at any second. Maybe that's why he had been in a terrible mood.
He was young then, barely the ripe age of eight. Regulus was merely a year younger than him.
Sirius saw the Northcott family first - a mother, a father, and a sister, all reminding him uncomfortably of his mother's mannerisms. He didn't know how to explain it then - he just knew that the smiles they had plastered on their faces were as fake as his mother's.
He saw her last, her short body walking in carefully after her father's, fear settling in her bright blue eyes. Her hair was neatly coifed in two braids that framed her somewhat chubby face.
For one minute moment, he almost felt glad, because she didn't look like the rest of them. She didn't look wired to be perfect. No, instead she looked human, which didn't come very often when it came to pureblood families. He smiled, and she smiled back.
So maybe it wasn't in the moment he'd met her that he'd begun to hate her, but the moments were close enough that he counted it as just one. Because one moment he was smiling playfully at her and she was smiling tentatively back and then the next he wished that she'd never stepped foot in their house.
Because his mother had said, with a disgusting amount of pride that, "Regulus dear, this here is Elara Northcott. One day you two will be married."
Fourteen words was all it took for Sirius Black to hate Elara Northcott. Fourteen words. Because someday she'd take his brother away from him. Someday she'd force herself in between them and he'd lose his brother forever.
And he hated her for that.
So maybe it was his bubbling jealousy or the way that his mood was already foul or the way that Regulus was already looking at her with a head tilted in curiosity that made him do it.
Without even registering moving Sirius Black had
made his way to Elara Northcott, wrapped a hand around her long braid, and yanked.
And from then on he hated her.
Because he'd never forget the sharp spasms of pain and his screams that didn't seem real that came later that night after the Northcott family had left. It was the first time his mother used the Cruciatus curse on him, and he would never forget it.
Maybe in hindsight he shouldn't have blamed her. After all it was him who yanked her hair, she technically didn't do anything wrong. But that night, every time his mother would point her wand at him, all he would see was Elara Northcott's innocent-looking face and he'd only become angrier.
So he hated her, because by the time he'd realized it was him who had been at fault, it was too late. Because she too hated him, and they were stuck in this never ending loop of arguments, so for reasons of pride he couldn't apologize to her for hating her.
Even after he'd realized it, he eventually found actual reasons to hate her. As he grew, his anger grew tenfold. Anger at his mother. Anger at anything that had to do with his mother.
So anything his mother was fond of, he hated. And his mother was fond of Elara Northcott, oh so very fond. He took that to be the biggest offense, because if his mother was fond of someone, that someone had to be wretched, just like his mother. Right?
And even when his relationship with his brother slowly came apart he still hated her. Maybe because in the end she had nothing to do with their falling out, so he'd gone and yanked her hair for nothing. Endured years of traumatic pain for nothing.
Though, he was sure at this point that it wasn't her fault that his mother seemed to absolutely despise him.
But even though every other reason he'd had to hate her made no sense, there was one last reason that Sirius Black hated Elara Northcott that seemed perfectly reasonable to him.
She seemed to be everything his mother was. A duplicate exempted only of when his mother would point her wand at him and the familiar red sparks sting his body. Other than that she was just as snotty, just as pompous, and believed in pureblood supremacy with that perfect pristine smile always plastered so falsely on her face. It was as if she was made to be everything he hated all in one.
It never occurred to him that maybe if he paid just a little more attention he'd find out that he figured her out all wrong, but by then their relationship had been established, and he'd only seen the parts of her that he chose to see. The parts he hated.
They were Sirius Black and Elara Northcott, and they sure as hell would hate each other for as long as they lived.
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author's note; i reread the first chapter and realized that it might not have made sense without a little intro first so here's a quick little intro just to help clear things up