LUNACY ll Mattheo Riddle x Reader

79. ᴛʜᴇ ꜰɪɴᴀʟ ʙᴀᴛᴛʟᴇ

Short chapter BUT it's a double update!!! i just really needed to cut this chapter off where it ends for the dramatic flair and everything, yaknow?

can't believe i never mentioned this before but my biggest flex is that benjamin and i share birthdays which means the universe meant for me and mattheo to be together ha so there <33 

you guyssss i'm gonna miss everyone so much when this book is over, we've literally got so few chapters left

let it be known that i read every single last one of your comments and obsessed over every single one of them ily <333

She was safe.

That was the only thing that mattered anymore.

Mattheo brushed his fingers through her hair, a numbing, monotonous motion borne solely of muscle memory. His mind had been too damaged at this point for him to have mustered it on his own.

Fragments of memories flitted through his head, overlapping with each other until the notion of time was lost on him. Years from his childhood crossed over with the long days on the battlefield. Malfoy- The other Malfoy, Draco- Was sneering at his eleven year-old self for his Muggle origins while shrinking away from what he had now become. Then there was her, in the Slytherin Common Room, laughing with him in their group of lost friends, yet she was also there, sitting across from him at Death Eater meetings as he tried to figure out why on earth anyone would have voluntarily chosen this life.

Where had it all gone wrong?

His eyes flitted down to the witch curled up in his arms. At last, she was sleeping, a rare sight to behold ever since his father had finally given up with him and had Bellatrix discard him back in his room. Y/n had watched over him, clearly needing rest herself, but refusing to trust anyone with the task of making sure he stayed alive.

With the ends of her hair having started to curl, and her once light locks having turned entirely black, she had begun to look more and more like her aunt each day. He wondered if anyone had told her that. He wondered if she would care.

They had all changed so much. The consequences of war; It tore away every shrouding detail until only the rawest, truest form of character remained.

Life was miserable. He wanted to die.

Y/n stirred, as though her stubbornness to refuse to let him die had been roused by his thoughts alone.

"I want to leave," she had whispered to him one night, on one of the very first nights he had been allowed reprieve. "I want to leave everything behind and run away with you. Let Britain suffer the war, let the Order try to salvage what's left. I don't want to do this anymore."

Then leave, he'd wanted to tell her. Leave me behind, leave all of it behind, and just go.

But he'd known it would be futile, that she would refuse salvation if it came at the price of losing him. Unfortunately for her, Mattheo would never in a million years risk running with her and then getting caught. The Dark Lord would know at once that it was the fool's master which others called love that had led to Mattheo's loyalties wavering, and he would make sure Mattheo never dared to love again.

Y/n would suffer if Mattheo allowed himself a chance at happiness. And that, he would not have.

____________________

An opportunity. That's all we would need.

Whether it came in the form of success or disaster to the Death Eaters, it wouldn't matter. The whole country could burn down at this point for all I care, so long as it offered destruction grand enough for Mattheo and I to make our escape.

How I'd love to be able to think that way. To not have a care in the world for anyone other than myself and the man I've eternally given myself to. But were we to leave, all those around me would be punished for it. Starting with my family, and next, my friends. And the Dark Lord's wrath is not something I would wish upon even Lucius and Narcissa.

What I need... What I really need, what I would sell a part of my soul for, is for the Prophecy to come true at last and bring about an end to this war. At least then, whether the fighting ended in favor of the Order or to the Death Eaters, there would be no more death. None so blatant and on such a large scale, at least.

For a moment, I close my eyes with my head resting on Mattheo's shoulders, and dare to dream of a world where the war has ended. If the Dark Lord's forces secured victory at last, then a New Order would be brought into light. Muggleborns would end up either second-class citizens, harshly discriminated upon, or slaves, depending on the Dark Lord's mood. I doubt there would be getting out of my engagement with Enzo, for the union of two pureblood families is considered untouchably holy in our world. Frankly, I'm not sure whether I would want to get out of it, either; What burns between Mattheo and myself is a dangerous thing, and it has ruined his life in ways I will never forgive myself for.

And then, I consider the other possibility. A world where Harry Potter defeats the Dark Lord, and the Light restores the former glory of Magical Britain once more.

It's with this that I realize I never did allow myself to think what might happen if the Order prevailed. Not once, in all the years since the inevitability of a war was born with a man rising from a cauldron so long ago.

If the Order won, we'd be done for. My father would not be able to get himself out of this one, not this time. Draco might be spared; To this day, his only crime remains having provided a way for Death Eaters to enter Hogwarts in our sixth year. To everyone's surprise, he ended up being the smarter of the two of us. He stepped away the moment the chance was offered to him and never looked back.

And me? Well, so long as I don't get a bottle of Veritaserum shoved into my throat, the Order will still be under the impression that I am but a broken husk of a girl whose mind has been completely damaged by the monster that is Mattheo Riddle. I would be spared. Perhaps strung up on display in the St. Mungo's Janus Thickey Ward, to be used as an example to further the notion that the condemned Death Eaters deserve only the worst of ends.

The worst of ends...

Mattheo, at best, will be sentenced to life in Azkaban. And when considering what lies on the other end of that scale, a fate of execution would be preferable. Far more preferable than getting his soul sucked out of his body.

The Order has to lose, I realize numbly. They must.

Fate, I come to find the very next night, has a very twisted sense of humor when it comes to me.

In the light of the crescent moon, a cloaked figure marches across the grounds, his dark robes rippling behind him. He reaches the gates just as the clouds move to shield the dim glow from above. Severus Snape touches his wand to the wards of the Malfoy Estate.

And the fine webs like spider-silk come melting down.

One, two, a dozen, four dozen. Within minutes, every last member of the Order has positioned themselves around the ancient structure that is Malfoy Manor. With walls built upon generations' worth of Blood Magick, there will be no tearing it down. But this will not serve as an obstacle. The destruction that will be taking place tonight will only be serving as a distraction after all, to shroud the true purpose of this mission in a blaze of flames and hellfire.

No more deaths. No more war. Salazar's locket has been destroyed, and very soon, the snake will follow. No matter what happens next... It will all end tonight.

go on straight to the next chapter!! arghh i'm so excited for you guys to read it <333