Raised as an orphan, Nel Saintday, endured years of torture from the Slytherin House. The Dark Lord only allowed her existence for her to serve a very specific vile purpose for him. Her birthright dictates for her to choose a side in the Wizarding W...
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1 9 9 5, September 1st
The train's bathroom compartment shifted as the Hogwarts Express advanced to its final destination.
Elowen gripped the edges of the lavatory's porcelain as she attempted to steady her nausea. Out of all the summers she had spent away from Hogwarts this had certainly been the most interesting one.
She looked at her reflection with a small frown, she didn't even recognize herself anymore. Her pre-mature graying hair now colored most of what used to be dark brown. It reached just below her shoulders with thick white and silvering streaks. Her brand new Slytherin uniform (courtesy of Sirius Black) hadn't been ironed properly by Kreacher. And her face... She couldn't even look at it anymore. She felt ugly knowing the constellation of beauty marks on her face was a brand- an ugly mark she had been branded with as possession of You-Know-Who.
It didn't matter if the others didn't know, she knew, and it would forever be a grim reminder. She wondered if Harry felt this way about his scar- perhaps it was different, his scar was a reminder that he had lived, that he had triumphed over the Dark Lord, hers was of subjugation.
'"Don't you want to know more about them?" Harry had asked over the summer.
"About who?" She retorted mindlessly.
"Your parents?"
"Does it matter?" She finally looked at him. "They were Death Eaters and Voldemort killed them. That's all there is to know."'
She really didn't want to know more about them. Not after what Sirius had said. It did, however, make her feel better knowing she hadn't been abandoned.
Summer had been tedious. Sirius Black had been a welcoming home, however, he wasn't well. Perhaps he had survived 12 years at Azkaban but his sanity certainly hadn't. He hated his home, his family, and their beliefs. Most days he would drink himself to numbness. Nel could hear him from the room she was staying in. She could hear him shouting and arguing with the portrait of Walburga, his hateful dead mother. He would also fight with Kreacher and throw bottles at the walls. Most mornings when Nel was alone with him, she would wake to find Sirius slouched on a sofa, the dining room, or on the stairs. Sometimes he smelled like urine, other times like vomit.
"James!" He would howl remorsefully at night. "James!" His painful screams echoed the empty rooms of the Nobel House of Black as he called for his dead best friend.
Nel constantly avoided him. She would tiptoe down the stairs and around the corners of the house, heart in her throat, praying Sirius wouldn't notice her when he was in his inebriated state.
One night he caught her.
'"It helps with my pain," he said from the kitchen table as he nursed a bottle of fire whiskey on his hand. Who knows how many he'd had tonight...
