Envy (Sequel to Deceit)

The Memory Potion

The book seemed to almost hover on a cloud of power, closing my eyes I imagined thick black tendrils of smoke oozing from the sides, its spine bursting under the strain of the evil within.

"There should be something in here that might help," Alice murmured, opening the book to the middle and sending a gust of air up from the force of the heavy pages dropping. The sensation sent a shock through me as an image shot through my mind, a mere second snapshot as though someone had turned on a spotlight then immediately dimmed it leaving the room in darkness.

"Gemini" I gasped, rising to my feet.

"Gemini what?" Alice retorted, a wary tone surfacing in her voice.

"It's from a book" I mumbled.

"Uhuh..." Alice murmured, a look of deep thought crossing her face.

"You know which one, don't you?" I grinned excitement coursing through my body, as I read her expression like an open book, "what is it?"

"It's a ritual. An old one... I've been doing a bit of digging; old files and stuff... It's dark, really dark and," Alice paused, taking a deep breath as though the coming words had more power than anything else as though it were prophetical, staring fixedly at the wall she sighed "it's something to do with us... We aren't normal twins... Mia, have you ever wondered why you have no records? Why Dumbledore thought you were a Mudblood? Why you don't even have the trace? None of it makes sense but when we are certain of what the Gemini ritual does, then and only then will the pieces begin to fall into place,"

For a moment I just sat there, immobile, silently absorbing what Alice had said. There was something wrong with us... something dark... something that meant a whole lot more than I knew in that moment. In that moment and indeed for quite a while afterwards, I was blissfully unaware of the true purpose that the Gemini ritual served and how completely its consequences would shatter my life. If I had known its significance back then perhaps things would have been different, perhaps we could have done something before it was far too late.

The world stood still, then a single sentence passed from my lips, so quietly that for a moment I doubted I had even said it aloud.

"Why did you kill her?"

"Who?" Alice sighed, flicking through the pages of the thick volume casually.

"That woman. Diana Elise," I replied, with a far more confident tone than my earlier comment.

"There are many things that you have forgotten, Mia. It is imperative that your memory is restored by tomorrow night, or else I fear to even speculate what should happen..." Staring out of the window and into the darkness she seemed almost lost in her own thoughts, a pensive look on her face.

Reaching over, I grasped the book pulling it towards me "I'll look for something, you talk," I grinned, leaving Alice with no choice but to tell me what I desired to know.

"A long time ago, around the time when our parents were at Hogwarts, there was another family not dissimilar to our own -or rather our mother's- they were noble pure bloods and of course loyal supporters of the Dark Lord. Until something went wrong, you see the family had seven daughters -Diana being the eldest of them- and everything was panning out just nicely for them until the youngest came to Hogwarts. By aunt Cissy's report the girl was odd... The hat sorted her into Gryffindor yet she still had the audacity to think she could have belonged in Slytherin. Soon the girl realised that she could never be one of us and she fell into the wrong circles, associated with our enemies but that was not all the devil child did. Slowly but surely she began to turn her sisters against our beliefs, only a few stayed true. Diana was one of the traitors, she turned on us, resulted in the capture of most of our own, including her father and one of her sisters. She was one of our worst enemies and now she is dead, thanks to me. Of course, her death was part of our instructions anyway but I doubt you remember that," she finished looking at me expectantly.