(02 : ERE WE MAY THINK HER . . .
RIPE TO BE A BRIDE)

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     ARIN FAWLEY WAS AN AMALGAMATION of his daughter's worst fears and insecurities — the embodiment of everything she hated about being a pureblood. From a young age, she idolised him, desperate for his approval and bursting with a desire to grow up to be like her father. However, that all changed one day when she found out ordinary men were not gods for a reason. If you cut one of his veins, red blood flowed and not ichor. It took her fifteen years to realise that, but she was glad that she did.

Sometimes people think there's a moment a little girl sees the men in her life as monsters, but there were exactly three moments that brought Juliet to that conclusion.

The first moment was when she saw the red, purple and blue bruises around her mother's wrist, she was eight and thought they looked pretty. It looked like rainbows encircled her wrists. Eliana always remembered to use a concealment charm after that.

The second moment was when there was timetable error in her third year and she had to attend Muggle Studies until it could be rectified. Charisma Hastings taught the class, she was a woman with bronze skin and kind, honeyed eyes, a woman that lost her job and struggled to feed her three children after Juliet's father had her fired. Juliet still felt guilty — she had lied to her father and said the class couldn't be dropped, so she could get an O.W.L in it. In truth, she simply liked the class. Professor Hastings was the woman that introduced her to Romeo and Juliet, asking her to stay behind one time because she wanted to introduce Juliet to the character of the same name. Although she turned up her nose at the teacher's battered copy, Juliet devoured the play in an entire night and had read it multiple times since.

The third moment was last year. Arin came home with the strangest tattoo on his arm and a vindictive smile. Juliet didn't think much of it, instead she grew her collection of muggle literature in secret, but her father thought she was too anti-social that summer, always reading. When he dragged his daughter from her room, she thanked Merlin she had the sense to charm the muggle book covers. It turned out him discovering her dirty secret was not the worst thing imaginable — no, the worst thing imaginable was watching the man that once twirled her around the garden as he loudly sang Celestina Warbeck crucio a muggle child. She threw up immediately after and lied about eating too many cauldron cakes on the train back from Hogwarts.

When Juliet closed her eyes, she could still see a small boy with corkscrew curls and chipmunk cheeks screaming in pain as her father laughed. That was the moment it dawned on her how despicable she was — all those years she hated muggles when they wrote stories to rival Merlin and Morgana, when they had children who couldn't control the fact they had lesser, non-magical blood, when they did nothing to warrant an attack by Arin Fawley and his Death Eater buddies. With all that in mind, Juliet was a Slytherin with a reputation and she knew better than to preach about muggle rights amongst the darkest house. For that reason, she remained the ever dutiful pureblood daughter on the surface whilst a rebellious storm brewed beneath her alabaster skin.

Albeit, her mask was starting to crack.

"Liquorice wand," she said to the gargoyle, the redhead's face void of any emotion as she entered Dumbledore's office.

Dumbledore was waiting for her, stroking his phoenix at the desk as he talked to a man who had his back to the teenager. Juliet was unnerved by the note she received in the middle of Potions because being asked to go to Dumbledore's office was rarely ever good. Either she was in trouble or something tragic happened. Considering it was only October and Juliet had yet to do anything worthy of much beyond a detention, she could only presume it was the latter. The headmaster's features were pinched into a grave expression when she entered, only solidifying what she already knew.

Readjusting her satchel over her shoulder, Juliet frowned when she saw he was already in an appointment. "Should I come back later, sir? The note said to come straight away."

"That's quite alright, Miss Fawley. Please, come in," Dumbledore beckoned. "Now, I tend to permit parental visits only under extenuating circumstances, but your father has assured me the situation is quite dire and should not be said over owl." The elderly man stood from his place behind the desk, peering right into Juliet's soul through his half-moon spectacles. "In the mean time, I must speak with Minerva about something and will leave you both to have some privacy."

"Father?" she squeaked, paralysed on the spot when the man in the chair turned around and revealed himself to indeed be her father. His once dark hair had greyed considerably since she last saw him, his delphine blue eyes had dimmed and his entire face was sunken and pallid. He looked like a ghost.

Arin shot the girl a wan smile. "Juliet, take a seat. I have much to discuss with you."

She took Dumbledore's previous seat, careful to mind her posture in front of her father. "Is everything fine with Mother?"

"Oh, of course," he waved off her concern. "I'm here to discuss a . . . betrothal. You will be of age in December and —"

"You know I have immense respect for pureblood traditions," she lied, "but we had this conversation already. If I have no say in who I shall marry then I at least want to decide when. I have no desire to be married straight out of Hogwarts, Father."

Arin narrowed his gelid eyes as he scolded, "Do not interrupt me." He cleared his throat. "Certain situations mean that you no longer have the luxury of that choice. You are to be married next year and will spend the next twelve months in the press, showing the strength of your blood and it will make me proud should your performance be believable, of course." Juliet softened at this, but was chilled to the bone as his voice dropped and he added, "The Dark Lord is in need of a distraction and there is no better distraction for the wizard community than the union of two esteemed pureblood families."

Lowering her own voice, Juliet asked, "Why would he be in need of a distraction?"

"You are but a woman, such dealings do not concern you," Arin remarked. "You have been chosen by the Dark Lord to serve a greater purpose, it is an honour and you will treat it as such. It is instrumental you are on board with this plan, Juliet," he emphasised the importance of her role. "Even if it is not what you want, it is a sacrifice you must make for a better, purer world."

Juliet shifted, knowing that she didn't really have a choice in the matter. "Who will I be marrying?"

Being a pureblooded woman, Juliet always knew she wouldn't be able to marry for love, but she never expected to be married so young either. If it was up to her, she would want a small, intimate wedding with close friends and the person she loved waiting for her. Except, it would now need to be an elaborate affair where she'd be forced to give interviews about the event to The Daily Prophet and talk about the difference between ivory and eggshell white swatches to Witch Weekly. All because some serpentine tyrant wanted a distraction.

"Regulus Black," Arin answered, wiping his brow in relief when she conceded. "I believe he is in the year below and Merlin knows that family needs some good publicity after Cygnus' girl fled with a mudblood and Sirius was ousted as a blood traitor. I heard he's living with the Potters now." His words were layered thick with disgust, his nose wrinkling at having to verbalise the names of such unworthy wizards alone.

Numbly, Juliet nodded. Satisfied, Arin grabbed a fistful of floo powder and saw himself out through Dumbledore's fireplace. Only when she was sure he was gone did she slump deeper into the leather seat, her head in hands. She didn't know how long she was in that position for until light footsteps padded towards the desk.

"Lemon drop?" Dumbledore inquired.

The Slytherin girl popped one into her mouth and stood to leave, spinning around at the last second. "You're all-knowing, right?"

Dumbledore's lips quirked at the insinuation, but refuted it. "I do not believe even seers are all-knowing, Miss Fawley."

"Oh." Juliet deflated. "No words of wisdom for a snake then?"

"I do not believe even seers are all-knowing because the future is a fickle thing. It is not set in stone and neither is fate. Both are malleable — you could go left instead of right and change the entirety of your life's course," he explained in that slow, wise voice of his. "It is seemingly the most insignificant decisions and the smallest acts of bravery that can change your destiny for the better. It would do you good to remember that, Juliet."

The significance of him using her first name was lost on her as she scoffed, leaving to return to lesson. Dumbledore was definitely not all-knowing because if he was, he would have known Juliet Fawley was no Gryffindor and she was most certainly not brave.

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A.N: Admittedly, I said James would be in this chapter, but I've decided to go for shorter chapters with this book and he got cut for the sake of consistency with length. Oops. But, we can now see the plot kicking in a bit and there will definitely be James next chapter. I mean it this time. Do feel free to fact check me if I make any mistakes — some details for the Mauraders Era are blurry. I do my best to fact check things, but not a lot of information is known and sometimes I don't know where canon ends and fanon begins.