MARA WILLIAMS

I sat before the desk, quill in hand, watching as the sun set over the horizon, disrupting the sky in a thousand shades of fire and signalling the final cadence that marked the end of Christmas Day.

The page before me remained just as blank as it had half an hour before, part of me thought of not bothering to write back to my great aunt, maybe if she stopped hearing back from me she'd stop sending the letters in the first place.

With a sigh I set the quill down, the one my mother had given me, staring at the shifting navy and emerald flecks in the feather as I did so, the edges of it charred black after it had barely escaped the flames. A deep ache settled in the hollows of my bones, like a weight I couldn't shift no matter how I tried.
I still missed her. I missed her every second of every day. They say time healed all wounds, but they lied. Mine were still as bloodied and raw as the day she had died, the day he had killed her.

She'd looked so peaceful in death, almost as if sleeping, if it weren't for the crimson tears and the bitter kiss of blackened bruises. Yet beneath it all she was still just as beautiful as she had ever been.

I had been the one to find her. And I alone had been the one to grieve her. No one else cared, and the few that did were to fearful to mourn her publicly for fear that the same would happen to them.

He was a coward, killing her with a single spell and then delegating the house to nothing more than ashes and flames, hoping to destroy every last sentiment of her.
-But the memories of my mother would never die.

He thought that killing her would break me. He thought that destroying everything I had ever known would cull my spirit. Because of him, I had been born in blood and raised in ashes, it would take more than a little fire to ruin me. I would survive, no matter what, I always did, I would rise from the ashes.

The blank page stared back at me, and in that moment I didn't think I'd be able to write even if I had wanted to. The out I was looking for arrived, as all of a sudden there was a thud from somewhere downstairs, and moments later a shout followed.

Something akin to a cackling shriek, it was a foreign sound, a woman's voice, and I felt sick when the horrid realisation hit me... There were no portraits downstairs.

Someone was in the house, and Draco was nowhere to be seen. I felt a creeping cold crawl down my spine, making the fine hairs on the back of my neck stand on end as I stood up and began to cautiously make my way down stairs.
As I reached the bottom of the stairs there was a slamming of a door down the hall, and I quickly followed suit.

I stood before the grand double doors that guarded the dining hall, I'd only been in there once before as Draco and I usually just ate at the kitchen island but it was a huge room with a long, thin table that seated up to thirty people. Draco had said his parents often used it for important meetings and such, but it certainly didn't sound like it was Draco in there now as I pressed my ear to the door. A gruff male voice spoke from somewhere inside...

"My Lord, there is news on the whereabouts of Dawlish, our sources have located him near-"

I jumped back, stifling a shout as something brushed against my ankle, and looked down to see a snake, easily twelve feet long and as thick as a grown man's thigh, slithering past without so much as sparing me a glance before pushing the door open with its snout and disappearing into the hall.

My heart thundered out of my chest, ricocheting off it's cage if bone and yet somehow I remained frozen in place, watching in horror as the last of the emerald tail vanished behind the door.

-Holy fucking shit.

Swallowing the lump in my throat I worked up the courage to press my ear to the door once more, only this time I was met with silence. The only sound that could be heard on the other side was the flickering of the snake's forked tongue, serpentine words that only a Parseltongue could decipher.

And then a new voice spoke, a strangely frightening hiss, that made my legs feel as though they may buckle beneath me at any moment, and caused my blood to run cold through my veins. "...Is that so Nagini?"

My lungs froze over and my breath hitched in my throat, and yet I couldn't tear myself away. I should've ran then, whilst I still had the chance, but I couldn't bring myself to, as I hung off his every word and by that point it was already too late. I was already a dead man walking. "-Worm tail, I hear we have a visitor, why don't you be so kind as to invite them inside..."

And with that the great doors swung open and my heart ceased to beat as I stood barren before the crowd.

"-Well come on, don't be shy. We've saved you a seat." Beckoned the inhuman voice, and I found myself following the order before I could even comprehend what I was doing. My legs carried me of their own accord to the only empty seat at the long table.

My skin crawled and I could feel every pair of eyes in the room firmly focused on me as I tentatively took my seat. That was when a voice whispered to me across the table, a voice I knew all too well...

"Mara?" The sound of him alone was enough to set my heart racing and I clenched my fists beneath the table to stop them from shaking. "-What are you doing here?"

He sat directly opposite me, the man that had plagued my nightmares for so many years. The man that had singlehandedly ruined everything that was good and pure in my life, and here he was.

I tore my eyes from my balled fists, slowly dragging them up to meet his, soulless and black as a winter night. My skin seared, and my lungs constricted with the absence of air, what had he done to himself...
-Now he looked every bit the monster he'd always been, no man remained in the beast before me.

I'd heard tales travelled across oceans about this monsterours man, and the things he'd done to himself to prove himself to his one true master, the one he'd destroyed his family to serve.

Arguably the most powerful and undeniably the most evil wizard to have ever lived.
-The one who spoke to me now and even so, I couldn't tear my eyes from what had once been my father. "You must be Mara Williams..." He trailed with a flickering hiss, "Yes... Your father has told me a great deal about you."

My father, a Death Eater...
-My father, Fenrir Greyback.

I thought in hate what on earth could he have possibly told The Dark Lord, other than my name, for the man before me knew nothing more about me than a stranger.

"What a lovely little family reunion." The high screeching cackle of the woman with feral, raven hair three seats down pierced the thick atmosphere.

In the moment I dared break a glance further down the table my eyes instantly caught on the boy with the white hair, the boy I thought I'd known, the boy with the dark mark hidden under his sleeve, the one who had lied to me all along, the boy who now refused to so much as even look at me.
I'd never felt so betrayed, and despite the room of traitors and murderers that surrounded me, the only thing I felt then was hate.

I felt so ashamed that even for a second I'd believed that Draco had ever felt something genuine for me, that he was even capable of such a thing. I had cared for him, I had loved him, and this is where it had gotten me.

The Dark Lord turned to me, but still I couldn't look away from Draco, a sneering glee dripping from every wicked syllable he spoke. "I trust you'll be joining us, tell me..." Out of the corner of my eye I saw the snake coil, as if ready to pounce at the moment her master gave the command, "...Do you possess the mark?"

"No." The word was hollow, empty, meaningless.

I felt nothing at all, not even fear as the man, or creature, who's name many dared not even speak for fear of death condemned me to die. "That is great shame, and something we must see to..." He gave a wave of his ghostly white hand, fingers so slender they seemed almost skeletal in the harsh candle light. "...Bellatrix."

The feral woman stood at once, flying to her feet as if she'd been waiting for the moment. She moved quickly to stand behind me, bending down so that she spoke into my hair, scarcely more than a whisper as her wand found my throat, tilting my chin upwards to expose my neck. "-A pretty little thing isn't she, such a shame to go to waste..."

"She's not a part of this!" Finally he spoke, his shout breaking free of its own accord and echoing around the dining hall.

"-Silence Draco." Snapped a man with long white hair and the same cruel countenance as the boy himself. But there was a fear in his eyes, a fear for his son, a terror shared in the face of the woman beside him, who's fists clenched around the edge of the table, nails piercing the hardwood.

"You made her part of this!" Hissed Bellatrix, pressing the point of her wand deeper into my throat, and I held back a cry as I closed my eyes and braced for death.

Nobody ever made it out of here alive, The Dark Lord had never been known for mercy. He was a souless creature, heartless beyond belief and cruel beyond counting, and yet for some strange unknown to us all, he decided to let me live.

"Leave us."

That was all he had to say, two words, seven letters, that was all it took to spare my life. Not soul dared to question him, for fear of their own life replacing mine, even the wild woman released me as I stood from my seat, the chair screeching in the silence and I left as quickly as I could before he could change his mind.

***
QOTD-What do you think will happen next?
-TFOA