ACT: ONE
CHAPTER iii: ' to be so lonely! '

           Sirius was sick and no one knew but him.

Wizard doctors and nurses couldn't help him. Healing spells could only mend what was physically impaired and even then, every spell had it's limitations. He knew what the muggle doctors would diagnose him with though. James' father had confided his own diagnosis with Sirius back when he was still young and rebelling against his parents; back when he was free and happy. Fleamont Potter may have very well been a cheerful and jokester of a man but that was only what met the surface. Unbeknownst to James, the man suffered with depression. "It's a chemical imbalance in the mind," he had told Sirius after one sleepover had led a young Sirius to inquire what the bathroom cabinet of medicine was for.

Young Sirius was naive. He thought it was more fun potion sweets that Fleamont had conjured up, the next product after his famous Sleekeazy's Hair Potion. He thought they would be fun but Fleamont assured him the pills were no joke. The man had explained carefully what they were since Sirius had no clue in his pureblood mind what depression even was. Mental illness wasn't spoke of in the Wizarding World, they had too much to worry about with the blood purity debate. Besides, what wizard would want to admit there was more illnesses they couldn't fix with a simple potion or spell?

Sirius had kept it a secret from his best friend upon special request from Mr. Potter. Fleamont didn't want his son to fret over it and Sirius was determined to honour the pinky swear he'd gave the man that could have easily been a second father to him. Sirius was also thankful for the explanation of the mental illness for it was his description that led to Sirius giving himself a self-diagnosis.

Sirius knew that he was depressed. He had come to realise he had always been a little depressed. His childhood youth had been full of depression; an always working father and an abusive drunk of a mother had done that for him. Not to mention, the constant feeling that he did not belong in his family. The constant differences between his family's values and his own had kept him up one too many nights to count. His teenage years were no better but they were slightly more bearable. He'd been the family disappointment when he'd been sorted at that red and gold table full of lions ready to snap their teeth at some snake that wondered too close. But then James had sat down beside him and clapped him on the back and introduced him to a Remus Lupin and a Peter Pettigrew — and suddenly the depression faded with every laugh and smile and joke that he made with them.

However, depression was not a curable disease. Sirius still had his down days; the days where he couldn't get out of bed; where a single glance at Regulus in the hallways was a glance too long; where failing grades had left him despondent until Remus managed to convince him it was stupid to listen to Walburga's howlers because a pass grade was still a pass — regardless if he did not meet his mother's ridiculously high standards. Then came the darker days, the days after Sirius retreated back to his family and abandoned his friends. These were his darkest times. He was still in them.

Marriage was never a choice for someone like Sirius, a eligible lord from a noble house. It had only been a matter of time before his family torn the last shreds of freedom from his grasps and chose who he would spend the rest of his life with; who he would have to call wife and the mother of more heirs who would follow in his footsteps. Sirius couldn't think of anything worse. He didn't want an arranged marriage; he didn't want children that would turn out exact replicas of his ancestors — Godric knew the world didn't need any more prestigious pureblooded facists anytime soon.

His chest heaved, his chest curled inward as he sat on the side of his bed. The sheets were pulled off him, already soaked in sweat that he would have to charm away later. Curls once adored and bouncy were flat and dull, handing around his eyes while he hid his face in his hands. Somehow, he very much doubted that he resembled anything of how a normal groom on his wedding day would wake from his slumber. He had strong suspicions he looked more than a prisoner on execution day.

He wondered if his fiancée felt any better. His first thought was probably not. She was probably been soaked in lush oils and fragrances, dressed in soft fabrics and veils, and feeling like she was on top of the world with all the people fawning over her. But after the small surprise she'd gave him at their engagement dinner party, he wouldn't be confident enough to say she was entirely what he assumed she would be. For all he knew, she could be having as bad a start of the day as he was.

"Y'know it wouldn't kill you to look happy," a voice called from the door. Sirius whipped his head up and round to see his little brother dressed to the nines in brand new robes their mother had forced him into for the wedding.

"It might," Sirius argued with a roll of his eyes. It was only then he saw the bozarre looking thing was sat atop of Regulus' dark head of hair. "What's with the hat?"

Regulus' face fell from it's natural expression into a heavy frown. He reached up and tore the hat from his head and tossed it on the bed where Sirius' sheets lay in a tangled mess. "Mother found it when she was looking for dad's tie. Said it was his back in the 40's or something. If she asks, I took it off to use the loo and forgot to put it back on."

Sirius smirked slightly, running a hand over the light scruff on his jaw. "Ah, don't worry, brother. I'll remind you to put it back on before we leave."

"You wouldn't dare." Reggie's eyes scrunched up into a mighty glare.

"I'm actually a little surprised you don't wanna wear it, Reg. Aren't you supposed to be a mama's boy?" Sirius mocked playfully. It was moments with Regulus that he almost forgot about his impending doom. He only wished the moments would last a while longer. "What did you actually come up here for?" His tone had turned somber and the traces of playfulness had all but dispersed into tiny shards of dust.

Suddenly, Regulus looked rather emotionless again. He was always practicing that barren expression in front of the mirror when they were kids, preparing for the days he'd need to conceal all his inner thoughts from the world. Sirius wondered when he'd decided that included him. "She doesn't trust you won't apparate out of here the second you get cold feet."

Bitterness washed over Sirius like a bucket of ice water. His temper had a habit of feeling like a deathly cold rather than flaring hot and the room had just gone below freezing. "She sent you to babysit me." Regulus didn't offer a confirmation but then again, he didn't need to. Sirius already knew he was right.

The younger watched his brother spring to his feet and lock himself in the bathroom, knocking shoulders with Reggie in the process. Regulus didn't take it personally though, Sirius didn't mean it — he never did. It was just his quick temper. Just like their mother's.

Once on the other side of the door, Sirius leaned both his forearms against the door and took a few deep breaths to calm down before he broke something out of anger. Merlin knew he didn't see to replace his bathroom mirror again. It was still slightly cracked from the last thing he'd thrown at it in haste.

Inhale. Exhale...

The anger faded and the depression returned. But he found he preferred the latter. He knew how to suppress his sadness, it was easy work compared to trying to tame the sharp icicles that sprung forward like bullets and he was the loaded gun. With his mother forced out of his mind and the sense of dread returning, Sirius was able to get ready for his wedding in peace — or well, as close as a man like Sirius would ever get to peace.

The ceremony would be held in the Scottish highlands' of Gordan's private lands. An outdoor event with a rose petal aisle charmed into the grass and chairs made of the roots of the earth sprung up with a little good use of Herbology to seat the many elite's offered invitations to the wedding. The skies weren't clear but the sun was beginning to set, leaving a warm glow of soft pinks, purples and oranges to dance across the clouds. The trees watch on from the distance, tall and wise, groaning in the harsh winds.

It was all rather grandeur and unnecessary. Sirius didn't want any of it, not the elaborate decorations nor the pompous guests in the aisles. He didn't want the wedding but there was no sign of a crossroads any time soon and Sirius was on a pre-laid out path to his own inevitable end: a path laid out by none other than his dreadful mother.

"Do, at least, try to smile," his father mumbled in his ear as the two walked up the main aisle to the front of the ceremony. "For me, if not your mother."

Sirius' scowl was hard to remove from his face after it had stubbornly planted itself there since his earlier conversation with his brother. With much effort, he was able to relax his facial muscles to a neutral point. He didn't care enough to bring the sides of his lips up though. No amount of Orion's convincing could do that.

"Do me a favour as your wedding gift to me?" Sirius asked as they stopped at the front, keeping his voice low to avoid the nosy onlookers from overhearing.

"Anything, son." Sirius knew Orion was going to regret such words.

"Keep her away from me as much as possible today."

Sirius wasn't looking at his father as he spoke. His gaze had fixated on his mother laughing falsely with Phaedra Murphy and Abraxas Malfoy in the pews. But it wasn't a mother on her son's wedding day he saw. It was a queen chess piece rejoicing in the allies she'd made by trading in her best player. She didn't care for how Sirius felt, what Sirius wanted — Walburga Black was a woman that cared for nothing else only fame, money and power; and Sirius had never felt sicker. How a woman could look so perfectly normal on the outside and be so viciously cruel underneath never ceased to amaze him.

A dark look swarmed over Sirius' face, barely managing to suppress the rage simmering under his skin. "I don't have the energy to refrain from knocking her off that pedestal she's out herself on."

"Sirius," Orion began, obviously shocked by Sirius' abrupt and unexpected request. "She's only-"

"Just," Sirius interjected. He was in no mood to hear another one of his father's poor excuses for the woman. He just wanted to get through today with as little mental damage as possible. "Do me this one favour. It's all I ask."

Orion didn't have the time to object as the arrival of the bride and her father forced him to concede with a subtle nod. He quickly moved away towards his seat where his wife was waiting for him and Regulus quickly took his place at his brother's side. "Who'd have thought I'd be the best man at your wedding? In school, I'd always assumed you would have blown me out for Potter."

Regulus was only jeering fun as two brothers should have been able to at a family event. But by Godric did that little jab puncture a wound in Sirius' chest. A dull pain but a deep and intense one spread across his ribcage, enough to leave Sirius breathing unevenly. He figured it hurt so much because the wound from breaking James' heart had never fully recovered. He didn't think it ever would. How could he recover from something like that?

The inner turmoil Sirius was undergoing had meant he forgot to pay attention to his bride walking down the aisle towards him. He only seemed to pull out pf his head when Asteria had stood right before him and was looking up at him cautiously. Her gown was off white, hints of iridescent colours shifting with her every movement. Her hair was curled in waves, looking too perfect to be natural but too natural to be perfect. It suited her, he realised but the thought weighed nothing compared to the lingering pain of not having his best friends, his real ones, had his wedding day.

They say the eyes were the windows to the soul. If that were true then Asteria worried her future husband might not have one. The grey orbs of Sirius Black were dead, sharp and watchful but never offering a sign of life. They looked despondent as did the rest of his face and Asteria could only assume hers was some of the same.

How does one look upon the person they're destined to spend the rest of their life with? How does one feel exchanging sacred vows to a stranger? They were a sight that would have the ever-smiling Aphrodite in a fountain of tears, dams breaking and the tides set loose upon the valleys below. Asteria and Sirius were not in love. They were not soulmates. Their hearts did not bleed with joy as they stood underneath that alter in front of their families and friends. Even Cupid could not shoot his arrows fast enough to spare them the misery of their wedding.

Asteria barely recalled saying her vows, or hearing Sirius speak his. She had been in auto-pilot since she awoke in a cold sweat that morning. She found it was easier that way — less emotions; less panic. It was as if she were a doll held on a string, her movements were rehearsed, following a routine her mind knew by instinct alone. But when the words, "You may now share your first kiss," came, the strings broke and the glass shattered. Autopilot had collapsed and she was handed back the handle of a falling aircraft with no prior experience to flying. The chambers of her lungs wrung out the air from her chest and left a hallow pain from lack of oxygen.

Reality was setting it quick and violently. There was no decisions for her to make; they'd all been stolen by her family, by the man before her, by the world. Freedom didn't live within these prettied fields, it didn't flow through her veins. For the last time, hope had kissed her goodbye before her husband could. These violent tremors had no delights.

It appeared Sirius was willing to make up for her lack of enthusiasm to initiate first contact. His eyes blinked once, twice, then lowered to just almost closed. Asteria froze like a constellation refusing to blink as his lips softly placed a kiss on the corner of her mouth rather than the centre. It was a small comfort to the chaos inside her mind. Her lack of a response was not as awkward, the contact withdrawing quicker than it had began.

A shudder ran down Asteria's spine as the crowd clapped and she was coerced to turn back to where an audience applauded their performance. That's all it was to them. A performance. To families like the Black's and the Murphy's and the Malfoy's, love was not an impromptu dance of two lovers, it was a strict routine of two partners.

Leto was the first face Asteria looked for among the crowd. She found her amoung the second row, hidden behind her uncle, Abraxas. Asteria had half the mind to scold her later for upstaging her on her own wedding day. Though, Asteria was the favoured, Leto was the more beautiful. Golden threads feel from her up-do and framed her sharp face.

Hollow blue eyes that held more stars than Asteria's ever could stared back at her solemnly. For all the lack of emotions on her face, her eyes betrayed them all. Fury sang the loudest; Asteria wondered if even the great Gordon Murphy could withstand the wrath of Leto for selling her sister into a loveless marriage. Sadness swam in them too; a pool of misery that reminded her that she had no power to protect her sister. Lastly, cunningness. Asteria was obliviously to this one but a promise lurked deep within the waters of Leto's eyes. A promise to right the wrong their father made; a promise to free her sister from the bounds that those loveless vows had created; a promise to erase the man that saw her little sister as nothing more than a pretty accessory at his side.

Asteria's gaze shifted to her mother who sat uncomfortably straight with a painted smile on her plum coloured lips, looking rather similar to Walburga Black on the other side of the pews. Gordan was stoic as ever; looking as if he'd just struck a business ordeal in the office. At least, Orion Black had the decency to look genuinely happy about their completion of the ceremony. Although, she supposed Regulas looked happy too but it was hard to tell from the tiny smile peaking out from under his forced empty expression.

The last face she glanced at was her cousin's. Lucius winked boisterously which only made Asteria turn away and accidentally realise she'd returned her face in Sirius' direction. He didn't look pleased but then again, had he looked all that happy during the ceremony either?

Asteria felt small under his confident stare. But it was not the same as how belittling her father's made her feel. It was unnerving like anticipation instead of fear. It took her a while to figure out why he was looking at her so expectantly and a very soft "fuck!" fled her lips when she realised why he was staring down at her. The port-key lay in his open palm, waiting for her to take it for them to depart the wedding for the after party.

With a lightly racing heart, she took his hand and they vanished as man and wife...