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LUCINDA Elias Avery was not focusing on the dinner in front of her– rather on who was sitting in the seat her father used to sit in before that one night last summer, before her fourth year started.

Avery Manor felt emptier than usual, with Lucinda and Edmund's father not being present like he had been for the past two decades, doting on his children and his wife.

Lucinda had been only fourteen when it happened– well, she was still fourteen, but she felt like she had aged years in the past few months.

She could see that her mother felt the same, could see that her older brother carried the weight of the household name now on his shoulders.

And yet, Lucinda couldn't help but clench her jaw, anger bubbling up in her over the fact that her father's seat was so quickly taken– almost as if they wanted to erase the event that happened and the grief they were stuck with.

"That's father's place," said Lucinda, finally talking for the first time since she had arrived back at the manor for Yule with her brother.

She glared at Edmund– who had taken the seat of the head chair in their dining table, not caring for the guilt that was in his eyes over the fact that he had taken the seat but had to for the sake of their mother.

So that their mother could deal with her grief and not have to worry about the Avery name– the name that Edmund was the heir to.

The name that Edmund now owned and held control, power, and wealth over. It was now all his– but the crinkle of stress around his eyes seemed to show the fact that he felt guilty over it rather than happy.

And yet, Lucinda couldn't help but feel rage. Not over the fact that he now owned the Avery household and wealth, no. But over the fact that their father was gone.

He had passed away that summer due to chickenpox.

Edmund glanced at her, casually drinking the glass of water in front of him before replying, "It's now mine, Luci."

Luci.

The nickname her father had given her when she was only a kid.

The nickname her family called her after it stuck.

Lucinda could feel the tears welling up in her eyes, but continued to glare at her older brother. How dare he rush to take their father's place? How dare he and their mother have the dining table have three seats, instead of the usual four already?

They were so quick to try to forget him– so quick to try to get everything in order. So quick to act fine in front of the other Purebloods, almost as if they weren't allowed to feel grief because of the status that ran through their veins.

But Lucinda was not like that. She felt the grief with every step she took, with every breath she took, and with every tear she wiped away. She could feel the grief with every laugh that she let out with her friends– trying to act like her world hadn't fallen apart months prior.

But she saw Athena's concerned glances when she thought Lucinda wasn't looking.

She saw her brother's concerned frown whenever she was in the same room as him. She saw their mother's constant worry whenever she was in her presence.

It suffocated her.

They all lost him, she knew that. But it felt like she was the one carrying their grief– she felt like she felt grief the amount three people would.

She needed her father. She needed his warm hugs, his huge smile, his warm laughter that filled up the house with joy.

Purebloods rarely had good parents. But Lucinda was lucky enough to have that– and yet she lost it, almost as if it was a curse for Purebloods to have a good home life.

She lost her father that summer, and after that, she realized she lost her mother, too. With her constant daze, her constant worry and stress, and her constant sobbing sessions during the nights that Lucinda would hear through the walls.

Lucinda would never admit she lost herself, too.

She would never admit that she lost herself in the company she surrounded herself with, in the bottles of firewhiskey she snuck in her dorm, in the cigarettes she would hide to smoke.

But she knew it deep down.

She stood up, rage in her face as she slapped the table with both her hands, which made her mother jump. She would've felt bad, if not for the fact that she was allowing Edmund to sit in their father's place. "You are not him," whispered Lucinda, her voice breaking and her eyes tearing up.

Edmund ignored the lump that formed in his throat and gave her a stern look, knowing that the only father figure Lucinda could ever have now was him. "Sit down, Lucinda. Finish your dinner," he softly said, looking down at his own untouched plate of food.

He was tired. He had gone to Gringotts that morning, made sure their bank accounts and everything that came with the Avery name was in order. Then, it was time to make sure everything at home was in order– which he doubted would ever happen.

She scoffed, tears falling down her cheeks as she let herself finally feel it for the first time. She had been in shock– in shock over the fact that the man that raised her to be who she was, was now gone due to a stupid disease called chickenpox.

Lucinda shook her head, watching as Edmund stood up and opened his mouth– concern on his face. ALl she did in return was push her chair back harshly and leave the dining room, rushing to her safe space: her father's study.

When she was in that room a moment later, she closed the door behind her, the musky smell of the room hitting her nostrils. She closed her eyes and could imagine her father rushing over to her, wrapping his arms around her as he did every Yule. She could almost feel it. She smelled it, in the familiar cologne he used to wear that still lingered even months after his death.

But when she opened her eyes, it was empty.

The room felt lifeless, its bookshelves now collecting dust and not holding the life they used to. The paperworks her father was in the middle of before the disease had hit him– were still there on his desk, where she used to chat with him with cups of tea in their hands and talked all about Hogwarts and the friends she had made, to which he would always listen and remind her how proud he was of her to live up to the Avery name.

Even though she wasn't his heir. Even though she had nothing to give him.

But she was his little girl, and that was all that mattered to her father.

Lucinda finally felt all the grief she had tried so hard to push away. She felt it as she fell to her knees, her eyes on the cold floor that she now laid on, tears slowly falling from her eyes as her thoughts raced in her mind. Thoughts of how she changed so much in just a few months– thoughts of how she went from being a confident, well spoken and mannered, pureblood young lady to a young teenager that dealt with grief in the worst ways possible– leading her to not only grieve for her father, but also for her old self.

She did not notice when the door opened. She did not notice when Edmund sat down behind her and brushed the brown hair out of her eyes– the hair she had gotten from her father. The hair she had tried to cut off, but stopped herself from it, due to it being one of the only things her father lived in her.

"We're all going through this, Luci." Edmund's soft whisper broke her out of her thoughts as he took her head and put it on his lap, stroking her hair softly. She refused to look at him, and that broke his heart even more.

But she only refused to look at him because he looked so much more like their father than she did.

Lucinda couldn't even look in the mirror because of the similarity of her hair color and her father's, and yet Edmund was an exact copy of the man.

She knew Edmund was dealing with it the way her father wanted him to: careful, authoritative, but also understanding. It was his responsibility now. The family and their last name.

"We're all in this together." Edmund continued, his eyes on his younger sister's pale face. She seemed to have lost weight, and her eyebags showed the little amount of sleep she barely got.

"Then why do I feel so alone?"

He felt his heart cracking at her helpless voice. The last time she sounded like that was when she was seven and he was only eight. They were at the playground their parents had put up in their backyard, and she had fallen over from the slide, her knee gashing open.

And now, years later, she was fourteen and he was fifteen– and he was holding her the way he did when her knee gashed open. But now, it was her heart that was gashed open.

"I'm sorry," his voice cracked, showing the emotion he tried so hard to hide around his sister and mother. "I don't mean to replace him, Luci, but if I don't, then we will never heal."

"But I don't want to heal!" exclaimed Lucinda, tears falling down her cheeks and onto his pants. She swallowed the sob that she almost let out and shook her head rapidly, almost as if healing from his death meant forgetting him.

But to her, it was exactly like that.

She continued, her voice almost in an inaudible whisper, "I don't want him to be replaced. He doesn't deserve that."

Edmund looked away from her, his head raised and eyes on the roof. He closed his eyes, almost as if he was praying to whatever was up there for help. But he knew he was left unanswered, because in a way, he was dealing with generations of karma that the Avery name had to pay off.

Because no Pureblood family was innocent.

And all their sins were going to be paid off by their children.