◤ ❝I no longer cared for the lives of others, muggles were scum beneath my shoe.❞ ― Alastiare Erebus◢

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CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE: ACHLYS

February 13, 1996

"Alastiare? What are you doing? It's nearly midnight."

Celicia Erebus had changed significantly in the last few months. The decades that danced around the end of the First Wizarding War were falling into their graves now, and among them was her family. Alastiare was hunched over his desk in his study, only a lingering silhouette in the dimmest light from the lantern. Still, she could see in the darkness that he was rushing away to write something on a piece of parchment with his favorite quill. Only when she came in did the room get brighter, omitting a light from his wand without ever having to say the word 'Lumos'. Nonverbal magic, a talent Celicia had never been able to perfect like her husband.

As she walked to him, she started to see what he was writing. Instantly, her heart plummeted into her chest and she stopped where she was. "Alastiare, tell me you aren't still―"

"Cease your worries. I will be the one to give them to her, Cece," he muttered hoarsely. She wondered how long he had been sitting in that very position, trying to find the right words to say. "She'll have a collection by the time she is of age to read them. But it is best to explain myself while I sit in the circumstances than to recollect the memories when I am filled with regret."

She raised her brows in disbelief, swallowing hard. "And you mean to tell me you feel no regret now?"

Alastiare finally looked up, and Celicia's heart shattered in two at the sight of her husband. The man she had been in love with since they were eleven―not so far that he was a stranger, but not so close that he was the same person she remembered back then. Dark, veinous shadows sunk his eyes to an age older than he was. The remnants of tears soddened the hollow cheeks of his pale flesh. Green eyes so dim they looked a burnt-out brown. Celicia saw less of a man, and more of what his shadow left behind.

"No," he said honestly, quietly, as he glanced back down at the letter in front of him. "Not when I see the futures of my wife and daughter being lived through this sacrifice. It is the later, when I realize how much of it I have missed, that I will feel the most regret."

"We never asked this sacrifice of you, Alastiare―" Celicia burdened, her eyes burning with tears "―and nor would we have ever done so. Andromeda wants her father. Not your letters. Not your teachings of Legilimency and magic. She wants you in her life, and you..." she croaked, stepping back and covering her mouth when the tears fell. It was silent for some time, but she finally recollected herself and faced him again with a painful expression. "This was not a decision we made together. Not as a family. You chose this for all of us. You returned to him when we could have fled. We could have walked away from all of this. We still can. If you speak to Sirius―"

"Celicia."

The use of her full name, and not the nickname that Celicia loved to hear so much from him, shut her up right away. She paused, blinking away the tears when she saw the broken expression on Alastiare's face.

"Sirius would rather see me dead than see me beside him now. He believes I'm one of the traitors behind the Potters' deaths, and I am no more innocent of that crime than all of the others he has asked of me to do ...you must know, I did not have any other choice, Celicia. Not like Sirius did. Not like all those who joined the Order. I made a vow to him, a mark upon my skin that I cannot just abandon―"

"And what of your vow to me?" she interrupted, choking on her words as she stepped forward. "Your vow to your daughter? She will be sixteen tomorrow. Only a year before she is meant to walk into the world as an adult, and we've hidden half of her life away from her! Are we easier to abandon than your Dark Lord, Alastiare?"

His jaw tightened, and his worn eyes reflected the pain. "You know this family has always come first to me. I have kept my vows with him so that you and Andromeda will be protected, so that you will be alive and so that Andromeda may find love―"

"She loves you. Why does she need to find love when you are meant to show her that as her father?" Celicia interjected sharply. "How can you expect life to have any meaning for me if you are just a remnant existing within it? He is going to be the death of you, and what would you have us do then? Grieve? Mourn? Or celebrate our lives and continue loving when the one who is meant to love us most is gone?"

A longer silence drawled through the air after Celicia finished sobbing through her last sentence, her pale complexion flushed from frustration and tears. Alastiare sat on her words, having felt the physical blow to them, and leaned back in his seat. His hand found its way to his left arm, and hidden underneath the long, black sleeve was the biggest regret he had faced in his life. The instinct to trace the cause of his family's misery was instinctual, and he found his fingers falling on the Dark Mark of his Lord more often than suspicions should allow.

"I would hope that you would raise our daughter to believe in the memory of me, so that she should never be filled with regret like I am. Let her learn from my mistakes, Cece, whether that be through these letters or through your wisdom..." Alastiare could feel a terrible pain ceasing his ability to speak, and he swallowed it down to say his last few words "...perhaps there would have been a different path for me―for us―had I known from the beginning that I had another choice. Always remind her that she has more than one...and if there does ever come a time where we must say goodbye to one another, remember that there was a time when someone else made a vow to this family, as well."

Alastiare's words did not need to be spoken in direct reference for her to understand that he meant the promise Sirius and Alastiare made to one another only weeks after Andromeda was born. Sixteen years later, and Celicia could still feel the weight of it. She knew it must be the weight of a thousand worlds on her husband's shoulders.

"I will not give up on you," she promised, uncompromising, as she took another forceful step nearer. "This is not a discussion of acceptance, Alastiare, and I will not lose you to this wretched pain when I have already fought it and won once before. He will not take you from me again."

He glanced down at the letter, his heart suddenly hollow. "Perhaps you should. This time, we are not fighting for one another, Cece. We're fighting for her."

"Are we? If you were truly fighting for her, you would stop writing those blasted letters as a way to forgive yourself for giving up on us..." Celicia stopped when she saw her husband's face fall, and she looked away to wipe the tears that had fallen down her face. When she looked back, he now shared her expression of grief "...write her another then, but I can't promise you that she will be kind enough to open any of them."

Before Alastiare could say any more, she turned on her heel and started back to the door she came through. She ignored the books pulled out haphazardly in stacks on the ground as she went. He had always been too invested in literature. Just as her fingers started to grip the handle of the door knob, she stopped. With her back still turned to him, paying close attention to the cracks in the wood of their ancient manor, she kept in what was left of her tears.

"I choose to believe there are variations of our love that received happy endings. If only we had picked one of those, my love. I'm afraid we chose the wrong one."

―――――――――― 

March 24, 1997

"I'm not going."

"Theodore."

"Andromeda. I'm not just going to leave you here alone to deal with this news―" Theo was interrupted by the sound of a throat clearing exaggeratedly, and his blue eyes steeled to glare over Mia's head at the person "―my apologies, where are my manners? I forgot you were in the room, you've been so unusually silent...not leaving you with only Malfoy as company. Mia, if that letter is truly from Uncle..."

"It is," she muttered, glancing down at the letter she had yet to open. Her first name screamed at her like a Howler in her own demented mind. "I've already run a few different charms on it to make sure it was not some cruel joke a Gryffindor decided to play...it's authentic in every nature but the fact that its author is very much dead."

In the short amount of time between Mia and Draco discovering the letter, she had run circles around a series of emotions. The first was disbelief, and that led to her and Draco running every possible authentication spell they had in their arsenal of mind (which, it must be said that they knew an extensive amount collectively). The second was anger, and Draco had to rip the letter out of her hands before she could get the word 'Incendio' through her brain. And when she finally got around to utter numbness, Draco finally decided it was best to go find her cousin.

"How..." Theo paused at the letter in his hands and swallowing hard "...how did it even get in your schoolbag? How long has it been in there?"

Mia flinched at that question. "I think it was sent to me on my birthday. I found a few more letters from Grandmother and Grandfather when I checked my bag again. I never got around to look at them...if this is another one of Mother's ploys to get me to 'learn from the past'―"

"She wouldn't have just sent them without explanation, Mia."

"She wouldn't?" Mia challenged, raising her brows at her cousin. "She was the one constantly cautioning me about Father's history with Sirius, sending me pictures of him holding me when I was a baby, and you honestly mean to tell me that she would not deliver something like this with the motive to deter me from this?" she gestured around her at the Room of Requirements. "She despises my involvement in this. I can very well see her manipulating Father's letters, be as it may if he actually wrote them, just to sway me."

Theodore looked at her expectantly, his shoulders sinking deeper and making him appear shorter with every second. "Can you truly blame her for wanting to keep you safe? I understand why you are doing this, Mia, but Merlin forbid you take into consideration the way it feels for us to have no other option but to watch as it happens―"

"And would you rather not be able to watch anything at all? I'm trying to keep you alive, Theodore," she interrupted, "and you forget that this isn't the first time either of us has had to witness the loss of someone in our family to this life―"

"Yes, but the difference is that it's you―"

"Romy."

The cousins, facing one another as they battled the never-ending conversation on her health and involvement, both turned around to the sound of the nickname. Mia's eyes softened of their anger when she saw the look branding Draco's face. She could see that he was biting his tongue, trying not to input the opinion that she knew would lean more towards Theodore's side than her own in this situation. His hands had sunken deep into his pockets, and she had to appreciate his attempt to make himself unintrusive as she spoke with Theodore.

He hesitated, peering at the letter Theo was still holding before his eyes fell on her. "Won't you read the letter? I'm sure it has some of the answers you are wanting to know."

"It can wait a few more hours to be read. It has been a year since his death. He can wait longer to have my attention," she immediately dismissed, her face hardening impassively. She turned half of her body back in the direction of Theo. "You need to be leaving. The train departs soon, and if neither of us are there for the Easter holiday, it's likely to be a catastrophe."

After that, she went back in the direction of the book she abandoned when her argument with Draco first began. Both Theodore and Draco stayed standing, watching as Mia collected the book in her hands and went to go sit down on the chair without another present concern. Theodore's lip curled, the urge to say something about how she was acting reaching in the back of his throat, but then he caught Draco's expression out of the corner of his eye. Draco shook his head. Both of them knew Andromeda. They knew how she handled pain, and her instinct to shut down the moment it appeared.

More importantly, they knew how to handle it. Theo's jaw tightened, muscles constraining as he bit back his words and the urge to protest leaving Mia alone. Every gut instinct was telling him to stay, but he knew that she was left in the hands of no one better than Draco. So, reluctantly, he silently agreed to leave and deal with the other half of the current situation―his aunt.

He gave a slow, hesitant nod to Draco. Then, he walked over to where his little cousin was sitting and avoiding her pain to lean down and press a kiss to the top of her head. He let the letter in his hands fall in between the pages she was reading. "If you need me, I'm only a second away. I'm getting quite good at Apparition, you know."

"As if you would break the law just to wipe away my tears, cousin," she scoffed. "I'll be fine. Enjoy the Easter holiday with Grandmother. Let Andrew murder her for me, would you? It'll be a nice present to hear about when you return."

"He'd do it if she dared talk bad about you over dinner. I've already warned him of her," he said softly, and then he paused. "And you know I would, Andromeda."

Mia knew he wasn't talking about murdering their Grandmother (although she reckoned he would be open that idea, as well). She could hear the sincerity in his tone when he challenged her joke that he would never break the law for her. Her brown eyes flickered away from the book and to him, a nerve of pain spiking down to her heart that she couldn't shut out in the midst of the rest. She was not sure whether to be entirely grateful or utterly hopeless that he would do such a reckless thing for her.

"I know. Be careful, Theo."

"You'll be wise to do the same here."

She glanced momentarily at the Cabinet in front of her. "Always the plan."

"In more than just physical health, Mia," he said pointedly. "Whatever that letter reveals to you, when you finally decide you want to read it, remember where you are now―who you are now. The contents of it do nothing to change the person you are in the present―"

"―a Death Eater?" she scoffed. "He will write the opposite hope for me, I'm sure. I'll be glad to disappoint him again as he rolls in his grave. I'm nothing if not the daughter of death. Although I'd reckon Uncle Eldrice would welcome me―" she stopped talking when Theodore flinched and straightened up at the mention of his father. Her face fell in guilt. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean..."

"It's all right. I know what you meant to say. I'm sure it's the truth...just remember that it isn't who you truly are. Not like your father, and certainly not like mine," he said shortly. Mia's heart sunk further, knowing she had said the wrong thing and upset him. "I need to be going. I'll see you in two weeks."

Before Andromeda could do any more than stand up and try to apologize again, he was already leaving through the aisles. He stopped briefly to mutter something to Draco on his way out that she did not hear, and Draco's face switched momentarily before returning back to its blank state. She watched Theo until he was completely gone from view, and even the faintest sound of the door shutting behind him sent a wince through her. She shouldn't have been so careless as to bring up her uncle. Eldrice Nott was as safe a topic to Theodore as the death of his mother and her aunt―they were unspeakable, and both cousins knew the other's boundaries. Mia had just been too wrapped up in her own suffering to pay attention to something that may trigger his.

She was briefly brought back into reality when a hand softly curled around her arm, reminding her that Draco was still present in the room. The second wave of emotions fell flat on her shoulders. Draco was patient with her, though, and he watched her expressionless face for any hint of a new emotion. When there was none, he took another step forward and gently pulled her by her arm into him.

"Romy," he said softly, trying to call her back to the present. "Tell me what you need me to do."

And it was the last wave of emotions that rounded on her and broke what she had left of her composure. Perhaps it was the letter written by her father. Maybe it was that the letter laid between the pages of a book of spells meant for the Dark Lord's mission, or that she had just upset her cousin and would not see him for another two weeks―but it could be Draco, and the utter hopelessness that she felt in that moment, wanting nothing more than to be with him and knowing that she might never get that chance.

So Draco did what he could, and his hands on her arm eventually wrapped around her waist, holding her tightly when she could not hold herself up―and he did not say anything when she finally broke down crying. Instead, he allowed her to break down and let it all out, and he promised himself he would not let go until then.

―――――――――― 

March 29, 1997

Andromeda had not touched the letter yet. She'd discovered it on the Monday that everyone left for the Easter holiday. It was now Friday, and it still sat neatly tucked in the Reparation book she carried in her hands. She would say that she was handling the situation remarkable well. The letter rarely came up in the back of her mind as she worked on different spells for the Cabinet with Draco throughout the day and conspired on different methods of murdering their Headmaster late at night.

Draco would disagree heavily in how she was handling things. While there had been a noticeable shift in their partner dynamic since they inadvertently revealed to one another that they were both falling down the rabbit hole of feelings, his hovering would contribute more to her actions than their expressed-emotions. He lingered around her more than usual, acutely aware of every changing mood if she experienced one, and he was plenty prepared to step up and take the blunt of any aggression she wanted to release. He, of all people, knew that her phial of emotions need only one final stirring before it exploded.

"Have we tried 'Fige contritos' yet?" she asked, her head stuck in a book as they trekked their way up to the seventh floor.

"A few weeks ago."

"The spell doesn't seem familiar, are you positive?"

Draco glanced over at her, already prepared to shoot her a look at the way she doubted his word, but she was still focusing intently on the book. His eyes softened on her and he sighed. "You and I were not on speaking terms at the point in time when I attempted that one...so, yes, I am positive. I vividly remember cursing you inside my mind when it was unsuccessful."

"You say the sweetest things to me," she muttered sarcastically, her eyes tracing over the different variations of the spell. She missed the twitch of his lip. "I want to try again, if that's all right with you. Everything that has helped us this far has been when we were casting the spells together―"

"Perhaps this entire time we've been focusing on the wrong pieces of this," he interrupted without meaning to, frowning ahead of the long, deserted hallway. They were on their way back to the Room from lunch. Unsurprisingly, the Great Hall was scarce of students on holiday. "We are looking for reparation spells to fix the physical components of the Cabinet. What if it is no longer anything physical that is broken? It may not be reparation spells that we should be focusing on, it may be something to do with the link that binds the two Cabinets to one another―Romy, watch―"

Draco cut himself off, hastily warning Andromeda of the bench that she was readying herself to run into (the same bench that had been there for over hundreds of years, and that she'd walked by thousands of times). His hands were reaching to grab her bicep and pull her against him, causing her to let out a startled yelp and drop the book her face was shoved into. Only when she glanced with spiked adrenaline at the bench she'd nearly toppled over, down to the book on the ground with sadness, and then finally up to Draco―who she suspected was readying himself for a witty remark her way―she stopped.

Because she was put in a situation similar to four days ago when she had to use every ounce of self-control to pull herself away from Draco. He seemed closer to her this time, one hand still gripping tightly onto her bicep and the other balancing her by the waist. The grey in his eyes had turned a musky shade, darkening upon their proximity. Mia's inhale faltered when they traveled down until they landed on the same thing he'd noticed―their lips were millimeters apart, and if she'd just put a bit of pressure on her toes, they would be touching. Why weren't they touching?

She made no move to leave like last time. Draco's gaze went from her lips to her eyes, his pupils blown to a degree that made her stomach churn with butterflies. She watched a nerve in his jaw twitch before he stepped back, dropping his hands off her. Mia ignored the deafening sound of her heart screaming in pain. She watched him, inspecting his every move, when he cleared his throat and glanced down at the ground to recollect himself. Then, he was looking up at her again with a forced smirk on his face and pain twirling around in those eyes of his.

"If I hadn't known any better, I'd say you did that just so I would whisk you off your feet. I never would have imagined your type to be the wizard with good intentions, Romy," he casually commented, although the emotion in his voice was strained more than usual. He grinned when she shot him a look with flustered cheeks as she bent down to pick up her book. "But I suppose they aren't after all, are they? Otherwise you never would have fallen―"

"Don't you dare even think of finishing that sentence, you impotent fool."

"Impotent? Certainly not," he refuted with a scoff, his grin widening. "I was only going to say you wouldn't have fallen over the bench...have bad thoughts poisoned your mind, Mia?"

She scowled at him and lunged the book in his direction, hitting the top of his arm incessantly. He grinned, stepping away from her constant attack with the spellbook. "I loathe you with every fiber of my soul, Draco Malfoy."

"I believe you've mispronounced that word. Here, let me assist: I lov―" he was interrupted again by another whack, this time with her hand upside his blonde head when she stood on her toes to reach him. He grabbed her wrist in midair, giving her a look with an entitled smirk. "Your way of showing that you fancy someone is truly misguided, Romy. Normally this kind of play only comes after we snog. I can happily show you if you'd like."

"Is that so?" she asked bravely, narrowing her eyes at him even with red cheeks. "I would be grateful you are being given any sort of attention from me, literary-abuse or otherwise. The urge to plummet off the Astronomy Tower to my terrible doom has been a growing dream of mine, and if you were alone with yourself over the holiday, you'd go mad of loneliness."

His lip twitched up further. "I'd just speak to myself in the mirror. A man's best friend is himself after all."

"The gallantry you give is truly selfless."

"It is but one of many qualities I possess that make women fall for me."

"Your haughty narcissism?" she threw back, raising her eyebrows. "I'd reckon it has something to do with your entitled sense of self."

Neither could keep the twinkling humor out of their eyes. "Possibly. Perhaps it's the hair."

She glanced up at it, feigning thought before her nose wrinkled. "A bit too pompous if I'm honest. Looks much better when you leave it be."

Before Draco could see the smile creeping up on her face, she turned on her heel and started to walk down the hall. The flush of her cheeks was felt, and if she pressed her hand to her face, she was sure it would be scorching―she hated it. Instantly, she felt the rational part of her brain berating her for being such a careless, emotional child when she certainly had problems extending to further horizons of importance. That journey did not get her very far.

"Andromeda?"

She stopped in her place when she heard Draco call her name, but also because she could not hear his familiar footsteps trailing behind her. Turning, the flush of her cheeks disappeared alongside her smile. Replacing it was a blank stare, noticing the white envelope that Draco was holding up a few feet away. It must have fallen out when she dropped her book. Her fingers tightened on the edge she was now holding of that very book, ignoring when she felt the sharp pain of it digging into her skin.

Draco slowly walked over to her, his eyes watching her and calculating her every move. "You dropped this."

"You should have left it on the floor. Someone else would get more use of it," she said cooly, void of any emotion. "Missus Norris would love to rip it to pieces if given the opportunity."

"Mind telling me why you are so hellbent on pretending the thing doesn't exist?" he asked. When she made the smart decision not to meet his eyes and looked down the hallway instead, he took a step forward and grabbed her elbow to pull her close. "Don't start with me now, Romy. You were the one who made the vow that we tell one another everything. Hypocrisy has never been a strong suit of yours."

Mia tightened her hands further on the book, blinking slowly. She could feel herself losing reach on her emotions―going so far as to say she felt happy with Draco only a minute ago and now there was only numbness at the thought of her father. When she was finally brave enough to meet eyes with Draco, looking up at him with her chin held a bit higher than usual to fake confidence, it all failed. Not because she was not good at it―she could perfect apathy wonderfully―but because he was seeing straight through her the second she tried.

Her eyes flickered down to the envelope in his hands. She took a shuddered deep breath and clutched the book tighter to her chest. "Why should I?"

"I'm sorry?" he asked, confused.

"Why should I open it?" she rephrased, meeting his eyes. "What benefit does it give me to read the letter and open up the past again― the...the pain again..." she grit her teeth together when she felt the spike in her chest and numbed it instantly "...there's nothing in that letter I need badly enough to ever feel that again. No answer or explanation could be good enough. That letter fixes nothing. It does not take away all that has happened since his death...so, tell me, why should I open it?"

Draco gave her a knowing look. "Because you have been mad with your father since his death last June. Because you never found closure, only someone to hate for the life he dealt you. You have been sitting on this fury for months, Romy, letting it fester and build up and it is not good for you. To hell with giving your father any benefit of the doubt or mercy, I have no empathy for him―but I care about you...and you have been destroying yourself, numbing yourself, to the pain of his passing and if this helps ease that in some way..."

"...and what if it only makes it worse? What if I learn something in that letter that changes everything, Draco? I may not enjoy this life I was dealt, but if I were to ever receive even the slightest chance of hope..." she stopped, scoffing lowly and shaking her head. "I know the man that my father was, and I am past the point of seeking out any difference. He was a coward. A man who turned his back on his friends. A man foolish enough to go against his loyalties."

"A man your mother has been advocating for since he passed. What if that letter speaks to his friendship with Black? You could have the answers you wanted, Mia." Another scoff from her, and Draco's face twisted. "This may not be what you want right now, but there will come a time when you are ready to hear what he has to say, and you will want this letter...your mother said it best. You cannot live in the past, his and your own, but perhaps with it, you can learn to be better."

She could help the huff underneath her breath at the word and it's irony. "Better..."

"You have to feel all of this eventually, Mia. You must grieve―"

"I grieved."

The flashes of the night in the manor when she had accidentally hurt Theo burned in the back of her mind. When she stood in front of her father's portrait and decided she would never feel anything for the man ever again. When she renounced his name because it only ever caused great pain and overwhelming darkness.

Draco sent her a look telling a thousand words. "You are numbing yourself. When something terrifies you, you shut down and believe shutting out your emotions solves the problem...Romy, I understand more than anyone in this bloody castle that the image of a father is one skewered, but if you did not love him, you would not be this upset. You would not defend his name to others. You would not despise Potter. You would not care. But you do and there is no denying it. He is your father and you cannot change that."

Mia could feel her soul dividing in two, hating just how correct he was. Her jaw twitched, clenching down tightly. The taste of iron was building in her mouth, but she did not pay any mind to the fact that she had bitten on the inside of her cheek. The pain was unfelt in the physical sense, which was exactly why she was unaware of the small abrasions she was creating on her left palm from the book's edge―forming directly in the center of the scar left by the Dark Lord. Funny, how full the circle came to be.

"No one is forcing you to read this letter, Romy...but I suppose this is the part where Nott would become the philosophical nitwit that he is and tell you that there are times when pain is easier to heal than regret, and never truly knowing may be more difficult than anything..."

His face curled up briefly at the seriousness of the words so uncharacteristically uncommon of him, but he stopped so that he could bring his hand up to her face, curling around the nape of her neck and hair. Mia watched him, swallowing hard as she felt the fight of her emotions and the instability of it all. Draco looked down softly at her, a soft curl coming on his lips at her.

"My feelings for you have already been well expressed in the last few days, Romy...but you should know that, in all of this, you are it―not just in whatever this is, but the partnership we've built together. It matters to me. You matter to me...and I will respect all of your decisions with only mild protest, so when you decide that you are ready to open his letter, I will be there for you."

A break in her cold exterior. She could feel the crack, allowing just a small section of her surface to open itself up to Draco. Slowly, she nodded and curled into the warmth of his hand on her cheek for a few seconds. Then without a warning, he pulled her into his body and clutched her tightly. The book and letter were in between them, an awkward barrier preventing them from truly touching―another bitter irony―but it spread the warmth from her cheeks all the way down her numb body.

"...you've gone soft."

He snorted, although he never released her. "Only for you, it seems."

"Well...it's certainly one of those qualities."

She could feel the tension roll off his back as he recollected the memory of the conversation they had had earlier. He let out a deep sigh, recognizing that she had just inadvertently admitted to falling for him, and broke apart from her with an irreparable force constantly trying to tear them apart. As selfish as Draco was, he could never be selfish with her no matter how much he desperately wanted to. She was broken over the letter her father sent her, and he could not take advantage of those heightened emotions even if some were real.

Just one look at her deep brown eyes, and he could see the spider cracks dividing all of the different sections of her broken heart―and at the very root of it, he believed, lied all of the feelings she'd locked away for her father. His hand burned with the letter laying in it, and Draco Malfoy glanced down with the sickest feeling in his stomach that when Andromeda were to finally read the contents inside, everything would change for them.

――――――――――

My Dearest Andromeda,

This letter, as you may have suspected already, is meant to be delivered on the day that you turn of legal age on the 14th of February in 1997. If I am not there to deliver this to you myself, I can only assume that one of two things have happened―the Dark Lord has finally fulfilled your mother's worst nightmare and had me killed...or your Grandmother has finished the job herself. I sleep better at night hoping for it to be the former and not the latter. She has wanted my head on the tip of her wand from the moment your mother brought home an Erebus―

I suppose this is not the best time for me to include humor. If I was able to hand this to you on the day of your seventeenth year, then I hope you know that it was the proudest moment of my life to do so, to have watched you grow into an adult even in the face of the war that is coming. I do not need the Sight to see that future―

If what I suspect will happen is true, and I am truly dead―no apology in this letter will equate to the sorrow I feel if I must leave you to this world without saying goodbye. There are more than a single letter's worth of apologies I can wear down into this parchment, but I will start with the hardest: I am sorry that you have to read this. I am sorry, my wise and strong daughter, if I became the villain in your story. I am sorry that Celicia and I were not the parents you envy out of your classmates. I am sorry if I ever made you feel unloved ―for missing your fifteenth birthday and being less than a father should be for so long, to force upon you such a harrowing reputation as the daughter of a Death Eater―

But among the hardest, I must apologize for dying.

There is an unkindness, an evil that has imbedded itself into the very roots of what our family tree grows on. My father always believed that we were born from that which gave us our name―darkness, that lives in the shadows, a density that can swallow you whole if you allow it. He let it with his costly allegiance to Grindelwald. His father before him, setting a high price by giving away his soul for more power, and our lineage goes until the beginning of time setting a high price and waging a lost war to Darkness. It is envy, greed, a thirst for power, emptiness ―which allows this darkness to set and give way to the terrible decisions our family has made in this life.

I say this not to make any excuses for the wronging I have done in siding with Voldemort―yes, I speak his name for what it is and not what he should have me call him by anymore. If he is the cause of my death, then he should not be called a Lord of any kind. He has been my undoing from the moment I was sixteen. Your Uncle Eldrice and I became close after he began chasing after your aunt like a madman―so close that he coerced my views of the world, praising a man named Tom Riddle whom he had known for some time, telling me and others in Slytherin like Lucius Malfoy and Regulus Black of the beauty he wanted to create in our corrupt world―

I was naive and listened. I fought alongside him, and I ruthlessly began to see the world as everything I did not before. Celicia could see my changing. I no longer cared for the lives of others, muggles were scum beneath my shoe―mudbloods an even more unkindly creature I had to interact with. And the further I treaded into this darkness, the more I could feel a hollowness decay me from the inside out―

But then I heard news of you.

And you, my littlest star, suddenly became the only light I could see in the midst of infinite darkness. You must know how easily it was to fall in love with the thought of you, long before I even held you for the first time. You were what I needed to find myself again, to find purpose and love and hope. It was you, my sweet girl, that led me to see the wrongs in all of the decisions I was making―

I will not lie. I did not despise the man the power made me―but I only needed to consider how I would feel if I saw you ever once look at me the way others did―with fear. That was all I needed, the only glimpse I need be shown, to allow myself to change into the father I knew I could be for you―

At the news of you, I found myself in contact with an old friend from school. One I regret, writing this only hours after meeting with him on your fifteenth birthday, never having told you about―he wishes you happy birthday, as I'm sure he has for the last seventeen years. His name will not be unfamiliar to you, and I wish that I could have given you a better image to see him by than the man the rest of the world made him to be―

Sirius Black and I met when we were still students at Hogwarts. Professor McGonagall had partnered the pair of us together after a week of us feuding―Potter, the friend he thought so highly of, had never been fond of me and began the exchange of jinxes and hexes until it grew brutal―and it was from then that our friendship became an odd understanding. He understood the parts of myself that questioned my heritage, my family name―I understood the darkness that lived within him, the parts he feared sharing with his Gryffindor friends―we, over the course of the years, became as close as brothers―

And then I chose a path different than he. The question of what may have become of my life, and the lives of your mother and you, is one that plagues me every day―because I suppose I had been given a choice, no matter how desperately I fought to tell myself there was never one for me. Sirius all but spoke it to me, constantly pestering me of this organization called the 'Order of the Phoenix' that was created when the Wizarding War was only just conspiring―he gave me a way out, and I failed to take it―

It would be a continuous fight between us. We fell out more than once in the years that I struggled being a Death Eater, and it grew worse after the death of his brother. The Dark Mark I carried was felt in more places than my arm, but in the sections of my soul it blackened along with it―Sirius saw that as much as Celicia did. For years, the question of why I did not leave was brought up―my answer remained the same: I stayed for you.

If he has not told you already, and this is the first time you are hearing of this, then hit him upside the head, will you? There was an Unbreakable Vow, created days after you were born, between myself and Sirius―that in the event of my death, he would keep you safe―he would allow Celicia and you into protection of the Order of the Phoenix should it ever be needed. It was never meant for me. I knew my fate, from the moment I signed away my life to Voldemort, that there was no form of redemption or hope for me―he would have found me by my Mark, would have taken you and your mother away. Death was my only way out, as it was for my father and his, and all the others before. I stayed, my sweet, sweet girl, because it was the only way to protect you from the very thing I fought against myself―Voldemort―

I write this now in hopes that I have died, so that you will be given the chance to live―that you have been faithfully protected by my closest friend, who never wavered in his loyalty in me until I broke that trust with him―it was my doing. Mine. My fault, and my wrongs, that were the reason you never knew of Sirius Black. I could not bear the pain myself, and I could not accept the agony of giving you a ghost of someone I believed you would never meet―

But he is free now, and I write this letter on your fifteenth birthday, so that you will know that he is always there for you when I cannot be―he is your Godfather, after all, my littlest star. Your name came from the cousin he adored, a Slytherin, who valued the hearts of others more than anything―a witch named Andromeda who reflects everything I see in you. And I trust no one more with my life and with yours than Sirius. Your mother will know the same, and if there are questions left unanswered by me, then she will find a way to answer them. You get your wisdom from her. I hope that you have met him long before you read this letter, and that you see everything within him that I did―

My only hope is that you read this alongside those that will protect you―that Sirius has kept his Vow―and that you have been given the second chance to live a life deserved, away from the harsh shadow I burdened you with. Voldemort cannot touch you with Sirius there to protect you, I promise that to you.

And so I hope that you will understand where my mind ran in the moments I regret. This letter is only the beginning of many that I have started writing for you―you may do with them what you want. Burn them with the brilliance you show in nonverbal magic if that is what makes you happiest, Andromeda. Just know that they are not meant to cause you pain―they are meant to show you my past. I made sacrifices. You were mine.

Learn from who I was―the power, the darkness―all of it, you will come to feel all at once. Know that you have a path, and a choice, and that you are much stronger than any of us who have come before you. You may be an Erebus, but you are so much more than that, my daughter. You take after the name of the constellation in the northern sky. Nothing can dull that brightness which shines in you.

You have gifted me with love and pride, to finally know that feeling within me, of having had the wondrous opportunity to be your father.

I love you more than I ever believed possible for a man like me, Andromeda.

No matter what odds divide us, that will always remain true.

Alastiare.

――――――――――

Author's Note:

I'm just going to leave it at that...because there's so much I could say but I think his letter speaks for itself. I never really feel like I'M the one writing those letters, more just typing out what they are saying and translating it onto paper from their feelings.

Please don't be upset with Mia or think she is acting rashly. You may want her to "just read the letter" or "just be with Draco" but she is an entirely real person in my mind, and it would be a disservice to her character and emotions if I pushed things before she was ready―this is all moving with the line of the story. I can promise you that Mia will read the letter before the end of HBP. Only nine more chapters.

I'm on break, so chapters will be coming a bit more often (hopefully). I just don't want to rush this story because it's truly something I am so proud of.

As always, leave a comment and let me know what you thought. Did you enjoy the glimpses of the past? The dates are getting closer together now. It won't be long before Alastiare's death. What about Mia's reaction to the letter, and Draco's reaction to Mia?

And...the biggest question of all...how do you feel about the letter? Alastiare? How will Mia react when she finally reads it? A huge bomb was dropped in it.

ACHLYS: DIETY, THE CLOUDING OF EYES PRECEDING DEATH