Black Blood

016 - Silent Night

"Draco?" she whispered, wondering if her cousin still held awareness within his resting form.

"Hm?" he hummed, letting her know he was, in fact, still awake.

"Why...do you think he did it?" she quietly asked, unable to take her mind off the subject, which drained her of the fatigue she knew she should've been feeling.

"He was after Potter, is the word," he whispered in reply.

"No, Draco, I mean...why do you suppose he...killed those muggles?" she quietly clarified.

"I don't know, Cass," he quietly admitted, sounding a tad eager to know the truth as much as she, thanks to the appearance of Sirius Black within the very halls of Hogwarts, something that should've been quite the impossibility. "My father...he told me he fought for Dumbledore during the war. He told me your uncle wasn't a follower of the Dark Lord, and that he held great affection for muggleborns and muggles alike."

"He isn't my uncie, Draco," she quietly corrected without a thought. "Do you think...maybe, perhaps, he broke and went mad?"

"I don't know, Cass," he quietly repeated, his tone entirely unsure. "He was placed in Gryffindor, and he hated his family...your family...our family, Cass. Maybe he did go mad, and maybe it started when he was a child."

She remained silent for a long while as she digested his words, finding solace in the fact that he and she seemed so different even from a very young age.

"Draco," she whispered, her voice quivering with uncertainty.

"Hm?" he hummed once more, his voice distant, indicating how close he'd come to sleep before she'd spoken yet again.

"Do you...think it's awful?" she quietly queried, unsure if she wanted to truly hear his answer.

"What's that?" he whispered in reply, and she could hear a clear yawn within his words.

"Him...Sirius Black, do you think...he's awful for murdering those muggles?" she asked, her query almost too faint for even her own well-shaped ears to hear.

He remained silent for such a long while that she felt certain he hadn't heard her question, and she prepared herself to repeat it a tad louder, only to be stopped short.

"I don't want to think about it, Cass," he suddenly whispered, and there was something within his tone that caused her to feel the barest hint of relief.

"Because...it's too awful?" she quietly pressed, needing to know his answer.

"Because, Cass, I don't want to think about it," he replied, not quite quietly, and she knew, from his elevated tone, that he would not give her what she so desired, so, instead, she took a calculated risk.

"You know I loathe the thought of needless harm and death, Draco, so will you think less of me should I tell you what he did bothers me quite profoundly?" she quietly asked, holding her breath as he remained silent afterwards to decide his answer.

"It bothers me," he finally, quietly murmured, and she felt her heart pick up its pace, as she'd never expected him to admit such, and it made her feel rather proud for her dear cousin. "It's not...that it bothers me that he murdered muggles, though."

And just as quickly, her heart froze, and she conceded that she'd known, deep down, all along, that it was too good to be true; that he would never share her empathy for such needless atrocity.

"It's just...it's just that it was so random and out of the blue, you know?" he quietly asked, and whilst it wasn't the answer she'd sought, it was a very good one nonetheless, as she shared his disturbed view concerning the random act of violence. "It bothers me that...someone so good...someone of the light just...snapped like that."

"Someone...of pure blood?" she quietly queried, feeling much the same. "It seems so entirely random for someone of such high birth, especially a Black, does it not?"

"Well..." he quietly began, a hint of mirth bleeding into his tone. "That's not really what I meant, Cass, but I suppose that adds to the strangeness. It really makes one wonder if it could happen to anyone."

She didn't open her mouth to reply, yet she felt, well and truly, disturbed by such a thought. If it could happen to a Black, it could happen to anyone. At any moment, Cassiopeia felt she could snap and go mad, murdering everyone and everything within her vicinity. If it could happen to her once-uncle, it could certainly happen to her.

"Why, precisely, do you suppose he was after Potter?" she quietly asked, wanting to remove her mind from the awful apprehension she felt.

Her cousin remained quiet this time, apparently having fallen asleep during the lapse of conversation, and so she closed her eyes and listened to the soft footfalls of patrolling staff, wondering to herself what had driven Sirius Black to insanity, and why he'd fixated upon Potter of all people, especially considering what her cousin had told her.

'It doesn't make sense,' she silently mused, beginning to drift into the darkness behind her shut eyelids. 'And, I suppose, that's what makes it so...frightening.'