good things fall apart • sirius black

Crashing down

She was shaking violently, but otherwise, not moving.

A cold passed through her like a gust of wind, but instead of only hanging in the air for a fleeting moment or two, it never left. Frost started to form a freezing layer around her lungs and glaciers froze over in her heart. Like an ice sculpture, cold and unmoving - the only sign she had of life were her breaths. And even they began to go shallow. The frosty layer around her lungs chilling every intake of air until she couldn't breathe anymore. It was as if she were stuck in the middle of the arctic, and then it had begun to snow... Actually snow. Flurries of the flakes falling everywhere the way she used to create weather indoors when she was young and couldn't control her magic.

Materialising the coldness within.

Her brain was fuzzy, and nothing was computing, the image of someone waving their hand in front of her face and clutching her shoulders, just distant figments of her imagination. All that could be seen was black.

Black like the arguing brothers. Black like the handsome boy who was so angry. Black like the Slytherin who'd only made a mistake.

There was too much going on to compute anything, her mind was just a mass of everything all swirling together. Black and that fateful flash of green. She hadn't even seen it happen, but she knew there would've been that flash of green.

Green like the tiny walled garden. Green like the Forbidden Forest. Green like the Hogwarts grounds in the middle of summer.

A flash of green and then her world came crumbling down.

Her world that was her full of happiness and love. Her world that was over-flowing with family. Her world that no longer had her mother in it...

Suddenly, she was a heap on the floor. Collapsing like a marionette doll cut from her strings, as every part of her soul was torn from her body - ripped right from her chest and taking her heart with it. She might as well have been sliced open and had her organs rearranged, for everything just felt wrong. It was almost like her insides were itchy and all she wanted to do was claw at her skin until everything felt right again. Snow still settling around her in a thick layer of even more coldness.

Snow like chasing the messy haired boy around the garden. Snow like searching for mistletoe. Snow like Christmases as a family...

A family that was no more.

Then the crying came. Tears from the beautiful girl who never cried, but like a tsunami hitting the land without warning and washing away everything in its path. Streaming down her face like waterfalls, emotions overflowing dangerously as her hands clawed the ice around her. Slicing through the air, shrieks of physical pain sucked every piece of lingering warmth from the atmosphere. All that was left was the cold, and her wailing cries of grief and sorrow. Thoughts and feelings mangling together into a senseless rage of all things dark and angry.

It wasn't just sadness that seeped into her pores, it was fury and madness. Her eyes would've been wild if they weren't shut tight, her sobs only becoming more guttural and more intensely shattering.

Someone moved her from the living room of her home, but she wasn't processing the world around her to be able to recognise who it was. A woman maybe, perhaps Euphemia. It wasn't until they were heading towards the front door that she heard the someone else's sobs, someone else's cries of grief - dad. Cyrus Gryffin somewhere in the house, being heard but not seen, and Euphemia rushed Ellie outside as fast as possible.

There were other people around, unfamiliar people who had unknown faces and strange uniforms, probably the Ministry. None of them spoke, they just marched around the house, sweeping up broken glass and shattered pottery, setting picture frames straight and closing doors.

It was a chaos that Ellie didn't like - the only kind. This was uncomfortable chaos, confusing chaos, suffocating chaos. The snow had stopped, ceasing to fall when her tears dried up, but there were still remnants of it on the living room floor. Only when Euphemia had gotten her outside, was there any sense of calm.

But even then, her mind wasn't still.

Ellie couldn't even see straight, there were no pictures in front of her eyes, no shapes or figures, as if someone had blurred everything she was seeing. Yet it was all still so bright - so bright and so overwhelming. The vibrant flowers lining the gravel paths Euphemia was leading her down, acting like a disorientating kaleidoscope, and all Ellie wanted to do shut her eyes and block it all out. But her feet kept stumbling along as she was guided as far from the house as possible.

They came to the tiny walled garden, but its beauty wasn't able to be appreciated for the first time in years, and Euphemia just wanted Ellie away from everything going on. Whilst bringing her home was important, and being surrounded by her family was important, the loving woman also didn't want her to see any of it. She didn't want her to see where it had happened, the mess left in its wake, or her father breaking down in the Library. They would be things she would never be able to forget if she saw them, and so Euphemia brought her to the only place that she knew that Ellie would be shielded from it all. Transported into a different world where everything hadn't gone so wrong, where everything was still perfect.

    "Tell me how you're feeling, honey."

A simple request, but one with a very heavy reply. Bringing her hands to Ellie's cheeks, Euphemia searched her face for any indication as to how she was taking it. Yes, she'd been screaming and crying not long ago, but now there was nothing. No noises, no tears - nothing. There was an emptiness behind her eyes, features void of all expression, and that was worse than her hollow sobs.

    "Tired." Ellie couldn't entirely compute the question, nor could she put together all the swirling things in her head to create a response.

But that one word seemed to say it all.

Generally fatigued from the long day; mentally strained from all the new information; and emotionally exhausted from the intense highs and lows that the last twenty-four hours had brought. The laughing, the arguing, the crying. Everything was so tiring.

That was enough for Euphemia to guide Ellie further down the garden, towards the old Orangery along the far wall. Not until recently had it been made fit for use again, fit for Ellie's use. No longer housing neglected gardening clutter, it had been converted into a makeshift summer house, accommodating everything Ellie would need to spend even more time in the tiny walled garden - including a double mattress on the floor. No words were spoken as she climbed onto the bed, not taking in the new space, and only focussed on curling up and shutting the brightness out. It didn't even matter that it wasn't her bed, or her sheets, or even her room. In fact, the new environment acted as a blank canvas and didn't hold any memories that were starting to cloud her mind - it was quiet, and it was safe.

Introducing Ellie to the Orangery in this way, was not what the Gryffins wanted, nor did Euphemia feel it was her place to show her either, for it was supposed to be a belated Christmas present at some point. It was supposed to be a happy place, a place that would nurture her creative flare. Not a refuge.

But in that moment, it was what was needed, and the loving woman never left Ellie's side as she slept.

She wished for the beautiful girl to have a dreamless slumber, for she was too pure to be shrouded in the darkness that had cast itself over the Gryffin's home. Yet, evil like that had a way of clawing at everyone eventually, and not even the purest of souls were safe.

Death had a way of claiming everyone in the end. And now,

Adelaide was gone.