NOX° SIRIUS BLACK

Chapter Thirty-Four

       The ride back to King's Cross that December went smoothly, but the closer they grew to London the more Calypso's feeling of dread settled into her chest. It was as though every single cell in her body was telling her not to go to her dad's and to stay somewhere safe. She expressed her concerns to the boys, but they told her it was probably nothing and that she was just worrying.

        When the train pulled into the station, Calypso exited her compartment with the boys and caught a glimpse of her boyfriend. Aerin gave her a quick hug and a kiss and she told him she'd try to convince her dad to let her go to his gig.

        "You two make me sick." James said when Aerin walked away from them. She elbowed him in the stomach and watched as Remus waved shyly to Karma from across the platform. Karma smiled at him before her mum grabbed her attention.

        "Bye, boys!" Calypso whirled around to each of the boys and pulled them into hugs. "I'll see you all soon."

        "Stay safe." Sirius said when she got to him. He pulled her close to him and hugged her tightly. After a few long seconds, Calypso pulled away and smiled softly at him.

       She turned to find her father standing tall through the groups of parents and children with his usual impassive look on his face. Calypso felt a certain kind of sadness when she stared at her father, because his eyes were on her mother, who was across the way to pick up Ophelia. He stared at her longingly and, after what Calypso had learned from Professor Arcturus, she didn't understand why her dad wouldn't have fought for Rania if he was still in love with her.

          Icarus's dark eyes shifted to his daughter when she approached him.

        "Ready?" He asked in a gruff voice. Calypso nodded her head and he took her cart from him and pushed it through the crowd. She glanced over her shoulder once more and saw Sirius staring after her while he stood with his family. She waved at him before her and her father left the platform and ventured out to the car.

          The ride was silent, like always, and Calypso resigned herself to staring out the window and watching everything pass them by while they ventured back to Wiltshire.

         She didn't come down from her room at Krane Manor until dinner time came and Minnie, along with the rest of the house-elves, served food to the two Krane's in the dimly lit dining room.

        Calypso sighed and picked at her food, feeling her stomach churning. There was something wrong. She knew it. She could feel it.

        "We will have guests on Christmas. I expect you to be on your best behavior." Icarus said, breaking the silence.

       "Yes, Father." Calypso mumbled, keeping her eyes trained on the tablecloth. Her gaze flickered up for a moment and she saw her father open his mouth like he was going to say something. After a split second's hesitation, he pressed his lips into a line and went back to eating his food.

         Calypso frowned, wondering what he had wanted to say to her.

         She retreated to her bedroom after dinner and the second her head hit her pillow, she was out.

        Calypso was in a dark room that she had never been in before. Her surroundings and everything about the place was completely unfamiliar to her. The sheets on the bed in the corner were freshly made though there were a few toys littered on the ground and a trunk that was thrown open with clothes sticking out of it. Calypso heard a soft cooing sound and turned her head to find a baby girl sitting on the ground. The child couldn't have been more than one years old with wide, electric blue eyes that reminded Calypso of her own and a tuft of raven colored hair sticking out of her head. The baby babbled aimlessly, a trail of drool coming out of the corner of her mouth as she stared up at Calypso, tilting her head to the side as though she could see her which Calypso found odd. She knew that this was a dream and, usually, the people in her dream never reacted or acknowledged her presence. There was something about this child that felt all too familiar to her.

        Calypso heard the door to the room open and when she turned her head she was surprised to see Narcissa Malfoy enter the room. Narcissa looked only slightly older, with her blonde hair fashioned in some sort of elegant do like it normally was. Narcissa's face was grave as she stared at the child on the ground, her face riddled with guilt and tears lining the corner of her eyes.

      "What have we done? Oh, dear Merlin, what have we done?" Narcissa said, her hands violently shaking as she reached down and picked the baby from the ground. Immediately, the child began to wiggle around and squirm, holding her arms out to Calypso. "I am so sorry . . . I am so, so sorry. It'll be over soon. I promise."

       Calypso stepped forward towards Narcissa and the child, wondering what vision she was seeing.

        "Mama," The baby cried out, waving her arms at Calypso again. Calypso froze, narrowing her eyes suspiciously at the child. She moved closer to the wall and watched as the baby's eyes followed her before saying once more, "Mama."

        Calypso sat up in her bed, her chest tightening and her mind spinning. She grabbed a journal from her nightstand and hastily wrote down everything she saw in her dream before she had a chance to forget something. The image of the little girl's face was engraved in her mind and there was only one thing Calypso knew for certain — that girl had been her daughter. 

         She guessed she should've realized from the eyes. Calypso, her mother, sister, and grandmother all had the same striking blue eye color that ran in the family. Her daughter's, however, had been the brightest and most vibrant shade of blue Calypso had ever seen before. But, their eyes were the only real similarity Calypso shared with the girl besides the dark hair and, even then, Calypso's own hair color was a deep, dark brown rather than pitch black like the child's had been. Some of her features looked different, though there was something in the girl's face that looked strikingly familiar which made Calypso wonder who the girl's father was. 

       When Calypso no longer felt like wondering who she would be having a child with, her mind turned to the other person that had been in the dream, Narcissa Malfoy. Narcissa had said, "It's almost over now" but Calypso didn't understand what she was talking about.

        Calypso rarely got dreams foreshadowing the future and none of them had ever been that clear before. 

        She made a mental note to find a book on dreams in the library the next time she was at Hogwarts, but for now, she went down to the kitchens and made herself a mug of hot chocolate to soothe her nerves.

        She prepared the drink with loads of marshmallows and a dash of cinnamon before taking it into the large library where she could sit on the bay window and watch the snow fall outside. The one thing Calypso had learned about Wiltshire after growing up in the town her entire life was that it was beautiful in the winter. When she was a little girl, her dad would light a fire and bring mountains of blankets and mugs of hot chocolate with Minnie's famous ginger snaps into the library where he would read her stories all night long and watch the snow fall with her. Every year she used to look forward to getting to do that with her dad on Christmas.

        But those days were over now and she was alone.

      Calypso heard muffled voices coming from outside of the library. She set her mug down on the windowsill and crept to the door, pressing her ear up against it to get a listen.

      " — This is a bad idea, Icarus. This is a very bad idea." A woman's voice said on the other side. Calypso tried to place the voice, but she couldn't.

      "It has to be done, Nerine. I need you to hold up your end of the deal." Icarus said. Calypso racked through her brain for the name Nerine, but didn't recognize it.

       "You can count on me, Icarus." Nerine said firmly. "But . . . are you sure this is what you want to do? There has to be some other way."

     "There's isn't. I've been preparing myself for this for five years. Follow me, there's one other thing I need to give you." Icarus said. Calypso heard the pair's footsteps retreat from the door and she frowned, wondering who her father was talking to and what he was up to now.