Antlia nodded, her face molded into a mask of calm. It was a carefully crafted facade, based upon years of her watching other girls be shaped into the "perfect" daughter. She was not the first to bear the title of Slytherin Princess, nor would she be the last. She wished that it would die with her, but generations after her would bear the burden of a metaphorical crown. A crown that greyed hair, bent backs, and grooved lines deep into the faces of young girls. A crown that instead of giving power to the wearer, gave power to the man that she was forced to marry.

She was a doll, ready to be posed. She was at the mercy of her father, the mercy of the Dark Lord in front of her. He could do whatever he wanted with her, make her do whatever he wanted. She couldn't say no, a refusal would result in the end of her life. A flash of green light speeding towards her, and then she would be her mother. Antlia had seen a few images of her mother when she was her age, they were almost identical. At times she wished that it wasn't so, when her father was screaming at her about how she was a constant reminder. A constant reminder of what he considered his failure, his wife being a traitor. A flash of green light and she would be her mother, dead before her time. Dead for believing something other than the pureblood supremacy that Voldemort preached. Dead, dead, dead, her body buried six feet in the ground.

But she wasn't going to let herself be thrown into shark-infested water completely. She walked on the edge of a razor-sharp knife, having to find the perfect balance between traitorous and merely having the Dark Lord's best interests at heart. Her words had to be suggesting but not demanding, commanding but not rude.

"My lord," her voice was calm, meticulous, "I don't think that this is the best idea." Her hands curled into fists, hidden by the folds of her dress. That was what she always did, hid. She hid her feelings, she swallowed her words. She was a girl in hiding while she spun and twirled for the vultures in the open.

Voldemort stopped short, visibly surprised by her objection. He had expected a meek nod, an arm held out, a bent head, a girl defeated. What he got was a girl with defiant eyes and a pursed mouth. What he got was a girl who wouldn't let herself be pulled down. And he didn't like what he got, but the Avery's were influential. He couldn't just kill the daughter of the family for no reason. And Antlia counted on that. She took the risk that he would see that he couldn't outright kill her, that he would have to listen to what she said.

"Why is that?" he asked. His words slipped from his throat like honeyed poison, smooth and deadly. His gaze was sharp, eyes pooling like darkness in their sockets.

Antlia took a deep breath, in and out, in and out, in and out. Several to try and calm her racing heart, to try and steady her breathing. She had to be perfect, her plan would crumble like she wanted to in front of the eyes of Voldemort if she showed any signs of weakness.  She had years of experience. "You need a spy, don't you?" Her heart was beating fast as she said the words at a normal pace. It felt like the whole world could hear her heartbeat, echoing off the bones of her chest.

Voldemort hummed, examining her with hard eyes. A stone-cold expression stared out at Antlia, waxy features pressed into hard lines. "I do."

She took a deep breath, sucking in the courage for what she was about to say. "I am volunteering to be that spy." Try as she did, her voice wavered in the air between them. She cringed at the sound of her own voice, the noise grating on her nerves. Her skin was tearing into a million pieces under Voldemort's gaze.

"Spy you might, why does that not require you to get the Dark Mark? Do you not want to be sworn into my service?" Voldemort watched her carefully.

Her answer to the question asked could damn her, pull her down to hell. She thought that she was already gone, already someone that she didn't like looking at in the mirror. But she also thought that maybe she could change her image. In her father's eyes, she would never be enough. In the eyes of Sirius, she was everything. In her own eyes, she was a ruined girl. When she looked in the mirror, she saw herself rot. When she looked in the mirror, she saw underneath her skin.

"Wouldn't it be so much easier for me to go undercover if I had no mark?" Antlia stepped closer to him, her nails digging deep into her skin. She hated being this close to the Dark Lord, but it had to happen. She blinked up at him through fluttering eyelashes, knowing that flirtation wouldn't work but an innocent mask would. "You've seen how strong my mental walls are, even you can't crack them. With his inferior power, Dumbledore wouldn't be able to get through. I would be the perfect spy." Flattery was a tool, to be used as a weapon. It would be her whisper into the brain of the madman sitting in front of her.

The Dark Lord traced his hands along the snake that Antlia only just noticed was coiled on the arm of the chair. He stroked the snake's neck, the reptile hissing at Antlia. "Yes, yes, Nagini, but she's not food," Voldemort whispered to his snake. It was an attempt to intimidate, Antlia knew it, but that didn't prevent her from feeling scared.

Knowing the purpose of the action was to scare didn't alienate the fear. Fear was deeply rooted in Antlia's very being. She didn't know how to live without the fear, it had been a part of her life for so long. She didn't have a memory that she could look back on where there wasn't the slightest tinge of fear. It was why she couldn't produce a Patronus. Her happy memories weren't strong enough.

Antlia's strongest memories were of fear. The memory of her father killing her mother, blurry but powerful. The memory of Sirius sobbing into her dress, completely soaking it with his tears after a fight with his father. She remembered being scared then, fearing what would happen when he went back to him.

Fear could break open even the strongest walls. It could shatter someone. But what could it do to someone who was already broken? Nothing, was what Antlia decided. It would sit in her mind, coloring her other memories, but it couldn't cut her any deeper than those that she was already bleeding from.

Antlia dragged her eyes away from Nagini back to the Dark Lord. She watched as his eyes flicked back and forth, the only motion

"I suppose that you are right," he said. "You will need some way of being called to me if you don't get the mark." Antlia watched as he produced a gleaming gold coin from a hidden pocket in his never-ending, ever-flowing black robes. It was a Galleon, ridged endings shining.

"My lord, how will a coin call me to you?" Antlia furrowed her eyebrows as she spoke, letting the lines caused by the action show her confusion.

Voldemort tossed the coin to her, flipping through the air. She scrambled to catch it, flustered by the unexpected motion. The coin fell to the floor with a clink that made her cringe. She bent down and picked up the coin, running a finger along the edges.

"Anty, I thought that you were smarter than this," the Dark Lord said. Antlia's grip tightened on the coin at the nickname. "It's charmed. I can send you messages through it. You can send them back." He pulled out a second coin, flipping in through his fingers like the street magician that her father had looked down his nose at the singular time that he had taken her to the Muggle World. "Now leave. I don't want you in my sight anymore. I will communicate with you about my plans. Remember, not a word to anyone." He was relying on her fear to ensure that she would do what he said. She had nothing left to lose.

Antlia curtsied before leaving the room. As soon as she shut the door behind her, her shoulders slumped in relief. She pressed her back against the door, inhaling deeply, her chest heaving up and down, before she was ready to face her father. She called out to him, and he came from where he had been lurking around the corner.

"Antlia," his voice was harsh, "what did the Dark Lord say? Did you get the mark?" One of his gloved hands when to her elbow, the other on her wrist, attempting to push up her sleeve.

Antlia ripped her arm away. "Father, I'm feeling quite tired. I'm going to go wait in the sitting room until the dinner is over." She brushed past her father, brushed past Regulus and Nova, brushed through the doors. She left behind a stunned father, helpless friends, and a calculating madman.

Author's Note

Thank you so much for reading! I know that these past few chapters haven't had much Sirius and Antlia interaction, but I want this book to be Antlia's story. It is not her love story, it is her own story. Sirius will be in it, and a lot more in the next few chapters, don't worry! This stretch of my planning just doesn't have him!

Check out the gorgeous new cover by remuslupout ! She has serious talent!

Thank you for reading!

- Nicole