TRIGGER WARNING: mentions of suicide & self-harming tendencies, also depression. and memory loss.

"let us know if you remember anything"

—

EDEN spent three weeks in the hospital, regaining her strength and trying not to flinch at loud noises.

She napped often and ate copious amounts of pudding cups — she was so happy Hermione convinced St. Mungo's to add them to the patients' menu — but each time she awoke, she forgot where she was.

Elijah and Niklaus had traded off in sleeping in her room, and there had been a couple nights where they'd both fallen asleep in there.

Harry visited every day, Ginny and George visited four times, and Teddy had come twice a week with Harry.

Malfoy hadn't returned since her first day there, but Hermione came in his place.

Apparently, they were soulmates.

And sort of dating.

It was very confusing, and Eden felt incredibly out of the loop.

Eden was given her phone back, which had fallen from her pocket when Dolohov grabbed her. Elijah explained the majority of conversations that he'd been privy to, but he didn't know all of them.

Inside jokes she didn't understand anymore.

Scrolling through messages on her phone and looking at pictures of witty banter between herself and people she hated...it felt like reading a stranger's personal moments. Precious memories that had slipped away like sands from an hourglass.

Eden supposed her entire life was like that.

Guided by the hands of fate — as both Elijah and Nik's other half — with a prewritten destiny to save the world. She lacked a prophecy like her brother, but she bore the same scars, bled the same color, and lost the same childhood.

And as each day passed, her life became less and less her own. The sand left the device that tracked her life, cutting into her skin and forcing her life into something else entirely.

There were no choices left for Eden to make that were entirely her own.

Eden chose to love Fred, and now she couldn't even remember his death.

Eden chose to move to Mystic Falls, but she didn't remember the war ending.

Eden chose to be friends with Draco Malfoy, but when she thought of him, she only pictured her childhood bully.

She'd nearly broken her phone, thrown it across the room in a furious cry, but Nik caught it before it crashed against the wall. She kicked him from the room for taking the choice from her, for not allowing her to dismiss the girl they all remembered, the person she couldn't be.

But she was grateful he hadn't let it break.

Eden didn't know how to be the girl in the photos with Jeremy and Jenna. Smiling like there wasn't a thing in the world that bothered her. Wearing her scars with pride as if they didn't reveal the most intimate parts of her life.

The sand prickled at her skin, uncomfortable now that she was aware of it.

Eden scratched her arm, adjusting herself in the bed. She was tired of being in the hospital. Eden was tired of people looking after her, running tests on her blood, patching her wounds, giving her sympathetic looks.

Anger was a constant now. It harbored deep in her bones, nestling in the cracks left by those who tormented her body. It nicked at her skin and boiled her blood and threatened those around her with furious stares and cruel remarks.

Harry brushed her anger off. He never let her words affect them, and she plastered on smiles for Teddy.

He was the only thing in the world she didn't want to burn.

The more time passed, the harder loving Elijah became. He looked at her like a wounded animal and offered quiet assurances when she wanted to sit in silence. He loved her so fiercely it made her want to throw up.

How could he love someone that didn't know him outside of the string of magic tying them together?

Elijah kept trying to bounce her back. He imagined her mind like a rubber band, and with enough pull, she'd snap correctly into place.

But the more he pulled and pushed and spoke, the more she knew the rubber band would split in two.

Eden hadn't told any of this to him, but their connection revealed her emotions. The shame, frustration, guilt, anger, suffering, the hatred.

She hated herself.

She hated Dolohov.

She hated being a witch.

She hated Elijah.

She hated everything.

She just wanted everyone to stop talking to her. She wished she had lost her memories entirely, not what appeared to be the most important year of her life.

Eden envied Alice and Frank Longbottom.

Sitting in their own bubble of gentle love, married to each other and the ignorance that blinded them. Their own childlike naivety swore to keep them sheltered from true adversity. They'd suffered and endured to the point of snapping, and she wished so desperately to be through with suffering.

Dolohov may not be casting a curse in her direction, but the pain could still be felt. The scars would always remain and for months they would bleed.

Both her arms were marred by one man's twisted fantasy.

Her life was altered indefinitely by another man's greed.

And now her heart was promised to a man, and her soul to another.

Eden didn't have enough to give either of them.

The anger sat and waited, patient and observant. It waited for the perfect time to strike and sunk its teeth into the victims. And she didn't have enough strength to stop it from lashing out.

Eden reread the text message again, feeling trapped in the box it set out for her. Trapped in a life without the knowledge of what was and had been, forced to play catch up with those who had long since finished the race.

Eden couldn't even remember James' birth.

She'd been shocked when Harry casually mentioned him.

There was a person everyone expected her to return to, but there wasn't enough of her to survive.

Her head was underwater, the weight of everyone's expectations drowning her as they piled on and on and on and on and...

Eden wondered if Jenna would understand. She was terrified to tell her sister of her experiences and come out with her head held high.

One pitying look from the person Eden loved more than anyone and it would do her in.

Eden clicked the phone shut, tossing it into the chair Elijah usually occupied. He was speaking with Harry in the hallway.

They'd been doing that a lot.

Everyone talked about Eden, but never to Eden.

Her wand sat lifelessly on the dresser.

Eden didn't reach for it.

She hadn't picked it up since Harry brought it in, recalling the memory in which she'd got it.

She couldn't remember that.

Eden couldn't even remember the man who snapped the last one. When Harry spoke of a Damon Salvatore, she thought he'd incorrectly said Dolohov's name, but they'd explained her rocky friendship with the man.

Stefan, his brother, was around, she'd heard.

She hadn't met him.

Eden was glad.

She couldn't take another face promising a history with memories that refused to surface.

Eden's gaze found the door as Harry entered.

"Afternoon, bon," he smiled, tossing her a duffel bag, which landed on her lap. "You're out of the loony bin today."

Eden nodded, looking into the bag. Clothing she didn't recognize sat at the surface.

Harry curled his hands against the hospital bed. "You alright?" He asked gently.

"Peachy," Eden responded with an eye roll, standing and changing clothes quickly.

"You sure you don't want to see Draco before you leave?" He asked casually.

Eden's jaw clenched at his words, adjusting the bandage covering her cursed wound. "Malfoy's the last person I need to see right now, Harry."

"Alright," Harry nodded.

He was doing that stupid voice thing again.

That infuriating, forced-casual voice disguising the pity. Barring knowledge of a past she wasn't privy to, unsure of how to bring up the conversation, it rested between them in a horrible aching silence.

Eden clenched her jaw, adjusting her jacket. Harry glanced over at her and pulled a hair-tie from his wrist, offering it to her. She took it gratefully and pulled her hair back, eyes catching on the wand on the other side of the bed.

"I can keep it with me," Harry offered gently. "You're safe now."

Eden scoffed. "I'm never safe," she retorted, leaning over the bed and grabbing the wand, stuffing it into her old boots. "You're just lucky."

Eden passed by him, leaving the hospital room eagerly, only to find Elijah hovering outside the door.

Fuck, he always hovering. Always there. Always in her face. In her business. Asking how she was, encouraging her to get better, promising he'd be there.

She was so tired of having everyone around her.

It was suffocating.

"Ready, Elskan?"

"Sure," Eden nodded, glancing back to Harry who was closing the door behind him. She hesitated, unsure of when she'd see him again. She surprised him with a brief hug, but pulled away before he could even reciprocate it. "See you, bubs."

"Bye, bon," Harry smiled carefully, meeting Elijah's gaze over her head as they exchanged a look.

Great, now her soulmate and brother were having wordless conversations about her well-being. As if the ones aloud weren't bad enough.

"Are we leaving?" Eden asked Elijah, hardly glancing at him.

Elijah nodded, taking the lead down the hospital halls. She passed a few gawking passerby's and ignored them, tucking her hands into the pockets of her jacket. They trembled against the cotton, and she pulled them out, clenching and unclenching them.

Eden's hands hadn't stopped trembling since she woke up in St. Mungo's. Nearly a month had passed and no progress.

Not only was her mind fucked, but her hands were too.

She probably couldn't even cast a spell without accidentally sabotaging it.

And Eden fucking hated that Elijah's trembled too.

That he felt the aftermath of her torture, that he'd endured it as she had.

She hated the idea of him in pain because of her.

Eden hated being his soulmate.

Eden hated that he knew so much about her that she didn't have the ability to know. She hated that he could feel her most traumatic life experiences and he would relieve them as much as she did.

The vulnerability that left her with made her ill. How could she be grateful for a man who looked through her to the ghosts of the house she lived in? A house so used and bruised and beaten down that it was no longer recognizable. And he watched the wallpaper chip and floorboards creek and cobwebs glisten in the light that perched through windows stained by blood.

But he was nothing more than an observer with a greater knowledge of what she endured. He could repaint the walls and pave the hardwood with carpets, but he would always remember the house that stood before it fell.

And he looked at her through the shattered windows, expecting her to look back at him, but how could she?

How could she be expected to love a man who loved the person she could no longer be? She knew they were tied together — because god fucking forbid, she's allowed to make a decision about her own life — but she didn't love him.

Eden couldn't love a man who would surely grow to resent the stone fracturing and breaking down with every glance he stole.

She hated their bond. She hated her pain. She hated Elijah.

Eden hated everything.

Harry hooked up a floo for them to get back to America, where she decided to stay. She didn't want to face Molly Weasley or anywhere in fucking Europe without her memories.

She and Elijah didn't speak as he led her to the parking lot, where Eden spotted Nik and a sleek black land cruiser. A blonde man stood next to him, their conversation halting as Eden approached.

"There she is," Nik smiled at her, dimples daring her to challenge his grin. "Eden, this is Stefan. He's a friend of ours, he's been travelling with us in our search for hybrids. Let us know if you remember anything."

Eden looked to the man in question blankly. Green eyes, dirty blonde hair, a tentative smile.

Stefan looked remarkably average.

And she couldn't remember anything about him.

"No, sorry," Eden shrugged. "Nice to meet you or re-meet you or whatever."

Eden stepped around them, settling into the back seat, allowing for her to have space from Elijah. He glanced back at her — that same familiar, irritating, fucking annoying longing in his gaze — and sat himself in the passenger seat.

"Perfect," Nik nodded. Stefan climbed in next to her, and Nik took the driver's seat. "Want to pick the music, love?"

"I don't care. Play whatever you want."

There was silence after her statement, and she had a feeling it was the wrong thing to say, which bothered her. Because of course it was wrong. Everything about her was wrong now.

Nik turned on the radio and pulled out.

Stefan glanced to her. "I, uh, I don't know if you'll want this," he pulled a pouch from under the seat. "It's a fanny pack," he offered a kind smile. "You don't have to keep it, but you were really into it, before the attack. It's got that extendable charm or whatever on it, so you might have some stuff in there to help you."

Eden watched him for a moment, eyes glancing to the fanny pack and then him, before she took it gently. "Thanks," she replied softly. Then, she offered something she'd read in text messages with Jenna. "You're Elena's boyfriend."

Hesitation, a flickered glance to Nik in the driver's seat, who glanced back at the pair through the rearview. "It's complicated," Stefan responded.

"Tell me about it," Eden muttered, looking down at the fanny pack in her hands.

What a lame fucking thing to have.

She couldn't fight the small smile that tugged at her lips as the light from the window caught the incandescent shimmer of the pouch. It was kind of pretty. And stupid.

Eden unzipped it an took a peak in. She could see food and board games and coloring book. Some potions.

She'd need to find somewhere to get wolfsbane potions.

Eden's smile fell and she zipped up the fanny pack, letting it rest on the seat between she and Stefan. She leaned her head against the window and sighed.

Now Eden hated the fanny pack, too.

—

Sleep didn't find Eden that night.

She knew Dolohov would meet her in her dreams and she was trying to avoid dreamless sleep potions.

According to the messages on her phone, Malfoy was a Healer and he made potions to help her and someone in Mystic Falls named Rose.

She didn't want to reach out to him for help.

The last memory she had with Malfoy was seeing him rush after Bellatrix Lestrange across the Hogwarts ground after Dumbledore's death.

He was a Death Eater and a murderer and it didn't matter how much he'd changed or who his soulmate was — he'd always be that.

The anger felt nice to sit in for awhile.

She didn't sit on the bed.

It was too soft, too comfortable. She'd been bedridden for three weeks and she could only remember cold floors and metal chains around her wrists and ankles.

The manor was cold and barren and empty.

It was ironic, really.

According to Elijah and Eden's texts, Draco had been at the manor. He'd helped her through it.

But she couldn't remember that. There was only his betrayal and the pain that came with her first and second kidnapping.

He may have fooled everyone else, but he'd never fool her.

Eden sank against the tall window in the hotel room, curled against Fred's sweater.

It didn't smell like him anymore.

How cruel was the world to take her from him and the memories of his departure, too? Thrust into a relationship with someone she hardly knew, promised to another, but her mind swelled with memories of Fred.

All she could remember was Fred.

The window was cold against her forehead.

She didn't know what city they were in; she hadn't paid attention.

The more time passed, the less she paid attention.

Eden toyed with a string at the end of the sleeve, the cotton yarn running between the pads of her fingertips. If she closed her eyes, she could pretend Fred's hand was intertwined with hers, the loose sweater dangling against her skin, her chest against his with the letter of his name etched deep into her heart.

She hadn't spoken since the beginning of the car ride with Stefan, not that anyone spoke to her.

It was uncomfortable between them all. A ghost sitting amongst the living. They could endure and survive and push and thrive, but she was stuck in the past. Forever one step behind, trekking through their footprints and searching for a light to guide the path but coming up surrounded by darkness.

Eden took a breath, but her body hitched trying to inhale. A sob tore through her chest as the air pushed against her lungs, forceful and damaging. She couldn't breathe, couldn't think. Her eyes watered in terror as the fingers around the string trembled.

She pulled at the string on Fred's sweater trying to let go and tears fell to her cheeks as it pulled a hole in the wrist.

Now she'd ruined one of the few things left of him. She couldn't remember what he smelled like. What he smiled like. What he sounded like. And now she'd forget what he felt like.

Pain always tore through happiness and left holes in its wake, and this was no different.

Fred's sweater was no different.

Her memories were no different.

Eden sobbed against the window, pressing her palm against the glass, using the cool feeling to try and center herself back.

Dark laughter.

Itchy skin.

God, everything itched.

Was it the sweater?

She pulled it off furiously, balling it up and tossing it aside, wrapping her trembling hands around her legs. The air-conditioned room nipped at her skin and blew at the sands trailing up and down her arms.

She itched and itched until her skin was red.

It wasn't enough.

Eden screamed out in frustration, sobbing in anger and pain, just wanting it to go away.

She just wanted everything to go away.

She wanted it all to stop.

She looked down at the bandage wrapped around her forearm and tore it off furiously, scratching at the wound. Opening the cuts, the word screaming at her and mocking her pain.

She was a traitor.

A traitor to Elijah and Nik, who loved someone she would never be.

To Harry, who only wanted to help her, but all she did was push him away.

To Fred, who's memory she disgraced by breathing instead of him.

To herself.

A victim of someone who'd won in the end, who'd broken her entirely.

She scratched until the blood coated her fingertips, and moved the bloody arm to her first wound, the one she remembered getting like yesterday.

Her body betrayed her; the wound had healed into an ugly scar, but she could no longer open the wound.

Her body showed the time passed, even if her mind couldn't.

"What are you doing?"

Furiously, Eden looked up, one hand covered blood, the glare on her face as thick as the red coating her skin. Niklaus stood at the door, arms crossed, an unamused look on his face.

"Oh, great, you're here to save the day," Eden replied bitterly. "Come to patch me up and kiss it better?"

Niklaus sped in front of her and took a seat, one knee up, hand resting on it as he leaned against the window.

"You're bleeding."

"No shit," she retorted, rolling her eyes.

Eden wanted him to leave. She wanted to suffer alone. She was so tired of people suffering with her.

Anger surged through her at the realization that Elijah probably felt all of this pain. And then guilt replaced the anger, and then anger replaced the guilt.

"Fuck!" Eden shouted, kicking her foot angrily.

Niklaus watched her impassively. She clenched her jaw. "If you don't have anything productive to do in here, then—"

"—You want me to help you," Nik caught her off. "You want attention for this. You want someone to come in and cradle you so you can lash out. You've been doing it with Elijah the past three weeks and I'm sick of it."

Eden rolled her eyes. "Fuck off."

"I'm not a hero, Eden," Nik started, observing her carefully. "I won't patch up your wounds and tell you the world will fix itself. It won't."

Eden frowned. "Then why are you here?"

"Because Elijah is downstairs pacing in his bedroom smelling your blood, concerned you're going to try and kill yourself."

Guilt filled Eden and she looked down. "I wish I wasn't his soulmate," she admitted. "It's frustrating."

"Well, you are," Nik stated. "And he loves you."

"He doesn't know me!" Eden shouted. "He just...looks at me like he can fix me. I'm someone he knew, but that's not me. Those memories he has with me...I don't have them. He's a stranger to me. I know I love him, I...feel it. But I don't love him."

Nik paused. "That doesn't make any sense."

"Well, it's how I feel," Eden rolled her eyes. A beat. "My arm hurts."

Nik's lips quirked up. "Well, you probably shouldn't open wounds."

"You open wounds just by sitting here."

"Oh, is my presence that damning?"

"Yes," Eden snarked. She met his gaze, sighing. "I'm so angry," she confessed. "About everything."

"I know," Nik replied, voice a fraction softer. "That's okay."

Eden didn't want to talk to him. She wanted him to leave. She hated having to talk about this, to tell him about things that she harbored close to her chest.

Elijah already felt her pain; she didn't want Nik to hear it, too.

But her mouth moved before her mind could stop it.

"I wish I were dead," she admitted. "It would be easier that way. I wouldn't feel this much. I wouldn't let everyone down. They're just...I'll only disappoint them. I'll never be the person they think I can be."

Nik didn't speak for a long time. He stood, walked to the bathroom and flicked on a light, rummaging around, the sink turning on, before he exited. He held gauze, bandages, and medical tape in one hand, a cup of water in the other.

He placed the water down and knelt in front of her.

"Do you want to do this yourself?" He asked, offering the gauze to her.

Eden hesitated. She wanted to prove she could. She wanted to heal herself. She didn't want to prove his point and seek his assistance. She was so tired of everyone doing everything for her.

He sped around for a moment and came back with a damp towel.

"You do this," he offered. "Clean it. I'll wrap it up. It'll be easier for me to reach it than if you tried it."

Eden met his gaze and tentatively nodded, taking the towel.

She didn't thank him.

She didn't want to.

She didn't want his help.

"Elijah and I have been tortured," Nik spoke up, folding the gauze and bandages in his hands to the correct size. "In different ways. Mine were more physical, Elijah's were always mental."

Eden glanced at him, searching his face for a lie but she detected none. She looked back to her arm.

"It wasn't like yours," he admitted. "But it existed. Our father is...a particularly cruel man," his face darkened. "And the pain he inflicted brought pleasure to himself. I learned to live with the torment. And then he followed me into death and spent every year for a millennium ensuring I'd never find happiness."

Eden's movements stilled, but his didn't.

"You should ask Elijah about his," he continued, "different than mine, but still there. My point is," he grabbed her wrist gently and outstretched her arm towards him, carefully placing the gauze down. "You're allowed to be angry. I will bring people for you to slaughter," he met her gaze, and she saw truth there. No judgement. "I'm a monster, Eden," he whispered. "I've done horrible, atrocious things. But I would do them all again to find you."

Eden looked down, focusing on his hands. On the rings he wore. Cold and coarse against her skin, but when his fingers touched her as he wrapped her wound, he was soft and gentle.

"And my brother is the same." He pressed tape down around the wound. "Burn the world down, love," he reached out and tilted her head up with his finger to meet his gaze.

"But don't burn the people who want to burn it down with you."

—

i told you the torture is done buuuuuuuuuut eden has to heal and it'll be awhile. i hope her pushing away elijah and harry (and poor draco boooooo) makes sense. it's easier for her to talk to nik because he's fully like lol do what you want but don't hurt my brother. he loves her and wants the best for her but he won't coddle her. elijah coddles her because he wants to protect her but nik just wants her to protect herself. she needs both but right now, she's relying more on nik because she feels truly suffocated and lost.
i mean imagine losing all your memories??? what the fuck?? i'm such a mean person lollll sorry eden.
also hope this made sense, but just to clarify:
she knows she loves elijah, but she can't remember why she loves him, just that he's her soulmate. she still remembers fred.
alllllll the healing she did is gone. she remembers none of it. she remembers the manor, but she doesn't remember draco in the manor with her.
her memories are skewed and messy and confusing to navigate so she's not only forgotten the important ones, but she remembers moments that would be easier to forget.
it's truly terrible smh.
anyways!! thanks gang<3