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'There is some good in this world, And it's worth fighting for.'
[J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers]
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Her eyelids were heavy as they opened, weighed down by a seemingly endless, almost drunken fatigue. Addie's thoughts felt painful, as though she'd been dreaming for days and was only just starting to recognise the reality suddenly around her.
A month had passed since she'd first been taken to the Manor, but she'd been in wavering consciousness the whole time; falling into dreamless sleeps for days on end as the summer month of July progressed. It was an effect of her sickness mixing with the antidote potion; a brew of which had only just pulled her from death's hands.
She only had very faint, blurry memories of the potion in question—which tasted sour and foul all at once—that had been given to her daily in specific amounts. Addie thought she could remember Snape's familiar drawl of a voice whenever one of the Death Eater's was forcing the antidote down her throat.
It took a moment for her to register the cold metal of tight chains around her wrists; binding her to a stone wall with her arms above her head. Faint daylight—or moonlight, maybe; she couldn't tell—seeped in through a single, thin window at the top of the wall opposite her, barely illuminating the small, bare room she was in.
Suddenly, memories came rushing back to her like a tidal wave.
She was trapped in the Malfoy Manor.
Everyone thinks she's dead.
They are going to use her as a weapon for the war.
Her breathing became quick as a buzz of anxiety ricocheted in her stomach. She has to escape before they use her to do anything—to hurt anyone. She has to get out. She has to get out. She has to get out.
Addie tugged her numb hands—but the chains only seemed to painfully tighten. She closed her eyes, trying to concentrate; to force herself out with a spell—but nothing happened. The energy she usually felt when performing her magic wasn't there; it felt sluggish. She tried again, and again, and again, but it didn't work.
The back of her Adeline's head rubbed against the wall as she looked up at the chains—but stopped when she saw it.
The shock Addie felt rendered her frozen for a moment, until a heavy sob wracked her chest at the sight of the Dark Mark etched onto her pale skin.
It felt unreal—but there it was, as black as ink; the mark of a Death Eater, a supporter, of Voldemort, the one who took everything from her, right there on her arm, forever. From the way her skin burned a little beneath it, she assumed it was new.
