Thicker than Water (Marauders Era)

21 April, 1978 - Fear

***

As soon as she was free of Sirius's grip, Lavinia started running. She ran past tapestries and statues and down stairs and through corridors. She ran to the Entrance Hall and unlocked the doors as soon as she finished descending the stairs. And she ran right out the front doors.

It was raining. Because of course it was. But Lavinia didn't mind. She dropped her book bag in the shelter of the awning and tripped her way down the stairs before slowing to a walk as her feet hit the muddy ground. She walked away from the castle and away from her bag and the knife it contained. She walked across the grounds and down to the lake and stood, in the cold and the dark and wished the rain could wash away her sins.

She hadn't meant to snap at Sirius. She hadn't meant to run. But he'd been right there and she'd only just gotten out of the prefects bathroom. She'd only just rinsed her knife and pulled her sleeves back down and her heart had been in her throat from the moment she'd heard his voice.

It had already been a bad night but the sight of him with his innocent concern and soft questions... It had broken something. The only thoughts in her head had been of the fresh blood on her wrists and that he could not know. He must not know. Look how concerned he had been over the simple fact of her missing one of their meetings which, though out of the ordinary, didn't seem to her to be cause for anything resembling panic. If he knew what she'd been doing in there...

But the problem with trying to remember what you don't want a person to know while you're having a conversation with them is that there are no other thoughts in your head. Lavinia hadn't been able to think of a good lie, a good reason why she might reasonably have missed their meeting time. She hadn't been able to explain away her presence in the prefects' bathroom at two in the morning when she had no business being out of bed if she wasn't with them. Her head had been full to bursting with thoughts of what she'd just done, her fear and panic at it too massive to conceal. And she'd known she wouldn't be able to contain it for long.

So she'd done what seemed logical. She had run, not thinking that he of all people would try to stop her because he knew why she ran, knew what sort of things passed through her head when she was alone. And he'd grabbed her. She'd felt his fingers not through her sleeve but on her skin. Skin she knew was covered in her own blood.

Fear had been the first reaction. Fear over his response. Fear that was illogical because he was nothing like her mother. But fear nonetheless. And then she'd felt guilt. Guilt that she'd ever done such a thing when she knew he tried so hard to get her to take care of herself. Guilt that she hadn't done enough to hide it. That much at least, she thought her mother had the right of. She knew it would have been better to stop, better to never do it again and let those scars fade into memory but barring that she should have done a better job of hiding them. They were her problem, her hell. And her hell had no business bleeding over into someone else's life.

Lavinia wrapped her arms around herself, sighing even as she shivered slightly from the chill. She shouldn't have run. But of all nights that he could have found out, why did it have to be this one?

Aside from the normal barbs, today she'd left the library at closing and run right into Mulciber. Now Mulciber, Lavinia knew, had never liked her. He had tolerated her because he was the son of a lesser family and she was the first daughter of a much higher house. But he had never liked her. She had never done anything to make him like her either. She found him easy to tease, in part because he always sat as though on a high horse, utterly convinced he was the best of the best and she had, admittedly, enjoyed reminding him that he was no better than anyone else. That he was less than her. The memory of it made her stomach twist with guilt even now.

So maybe she'd brought it on herself.

Either way the look on his face had spoken of a sense of delighted superiority that had left Lavinia with now doubt that he was going to take advantage of having her alone, with no witnesses and no teachers nearby. Indeed, he'd wasted no time, even as Lavinia stumbled back from him, in starting the string of ridicule.