Stellarlune

I tailed Malfoy through breakfast, from the way he had his tea sugar-less to the massive sweet-tooth he nursed. I tailed him through class, through the hallways, through the swish of his robes on the field, even when he was just a speck on the horizon astride his broom.

Through the parts of the day when he just simply stopped to let the sunlight bathe him in its gentle glow or the rain to nestle in his hair, glistening like shining diamonds among the white.

I tailed him through things I never knew someone like him could do, like offer slight encouraging smiles to a crying Slytherin first year who had been bullied, or stop in the hallway to help Slytherin third year with his books, albeit snarling scornfully.

The worst part?

He was alone all the time.

And not once did he even show an inkling of the magic that I had seen he could do.

He never talked, never laughed, never smiled. Always the epitome of broody. He gazed at passers-by with stone-cut eyes and a shuttered expression to match, burning holes into those watching him.

So, I supposed, it was inevitable that one day those eyes would burn holes in mine, too.

My nose was buried Joseph Slinkhart’s book. Again.

But I couldn’t help it. It was fascinating, the material.

I had found it by accident, and not even in the Restricted section of the Library, while perusing the bookshelves in search of an Arithmancy book. 

The library had been in such a haphazard state that I had wandered over the sections for at least an hour before I found it.

Several rows and aisles detailing the history of magic in Britain and the traces left by it across the country had been blown to smithereens, and my hands had brushed imaginary spines as I stepped over the empty space where they used to be.  

Across the Restricted Section, tucked into a little dusty alcove, had been a niche about a few feet deep containing the last few shelves of the library.

I, being the curious little busybody that I was, had wandered over.

......

Mindlessly trailing my hands across the last remaining bookshelf, fingertips sliding over dusty old tomes and rough paperbacks yellowed with age, I had walked over to the last row of books on the right.

Behind it, my nails had dragged across ridged rock.

The back of the library. 

My fingertips abruptly snagged on a fractured, freezing cold surface. My hand paused, and I had doubled back to catch a glimpse.

I pulled it out, realized it had been ice cold; frigid to the touch, the cover dusted with crystals of frozen water droplets that nipped at my hands like the most vicious frostbite.

The title was written in a narrow, looping script that had been extremely hard to decipher.

Artes Bestiae Latores: A Theory by Joseph Slinkhart

Or, transcribed from Latin, The Arts of the Beast Bearers.

On the first page was scrawled, 'To the wielder of hope -dear Firenze, as the gift that keeps on giving -endless knowledge.'

By the 2010s, during the Calamity, volunteer members of the Statute of Secrecy Task Force had returned a copy of Bestiarium Magicum to Firenze. I vaguely remembered him gifting a whole stack of books to the Hogwarts library as a gesture of goodwill when he was nominated professor in sixth year.

This one must've been among them.

......

One year ago, it would have meant nothing to me. But now… it contained rituals, ancient spells whispering of immortality, of Fae magicks that could save a dying soul. It spoke to me of people turned beasts, lured over by their animal forms.

The script was ancient English, the early 1600’s maybe. It spoke of a lure, that once tasted, could not be resisted. 

Roaeun, it is called. The switch between the two conscious’ of the wizard and the animal. It is a delicate thread, barely connected by sheer grit and magical linkage. Just as easily broken.
Many animagi, while training to shift, do not learn how to keep this thread connected. They lose themselves to their animal forms when using it for prolonged periods of time, returning to their baser instincts of survival.
They forget who they are. Wizards.

Naenuii is the ritual to immortalize it. To forever prevent it from breaking. It requires the blood of another, of the same species, of magical origin beneath the tide shifter and north of the constellations of the spirit goddess.

The tide shifter…the moon?

And that was just one ritual. What of daduwe, which drew the power of the very earth itself? All of them were blood sacrifices, using forbidden tongues and illegal ingredients.  

It frequently mentioned man-turned-beaste, the supposed old word for an Animagus?

Who was he?
How had he even known all this?

And as much as I was loathe to admit it, the Dark Magic in that book attracted me somewhat.

It was all about the cycle of give and take. Yin and Yang. How sources of magic were used and stolen to wield as weapons and how coaxing nature to provide easy harvest of magical sources would rebound in the form of the give factor. 

It detailed ancient spells and magicks that could only be performed by those bitter of heart or heavy of mind. Only by those who have experienced pain, death, sorrow, emotions as dark as the spells that were born from them could the practices be continued. Oh, and I was. 

Running so far, for so long, so scared…it had done something to me. Voldemort might be long gone, but his looming presence was a constant in my mind.

I'd had this void inside me for so long, I had forgotten it was there.

And now, I would do anything to fill it. Even stoop so low as to actually consider this book.

Maybe, just maybe, it had something that could help me.

I shuddered, snapping the book closed once I realized I couldn't feel my fingers anymore. 

With a jolt, I considered the fact that I didn't know just exactly how far I was willing to go for this little study of mine. Was I willing to kill for it? Was I?

After all, I had done it before, hadn’t I? Countless Death Eaters, snatchers… and so many more.

It was late night, maybe past the witching hour. Admittedly, defying school rules wasn’t something I particularly tended to do, but…I couldn’t sleep.

There was this restlessness inside of me that churned a well of turmoil and anticipation in my gut. A restlessness that kept me up at night, despite my tiredness. Something big was coming, I knew it.

I just didn’t know what.

Or how.

Or when.

Or where.

Or anything, really.

And so I found myself curled up in a mirrored alcove that overlooked the grounds, streaks of moonlights dotted across the stone ledge. Moss crept up at the edges, spreading their leaves like those of snowflakes across the panes of the glass, towering high above from where I dangled to join in a triangular flurry.

What was the harm? 
I muttered a quick warming charm on my fingers and opened it again, counting the pages one by one.

My eyes skimmed the pages, twisting and turning the book this way and that to point the moonlight towards the cramped writing.
I bent my head further, curls escaping my wild bun like runaway refugees would a prison.
Maybe it had something about my Animagi form.

Wolves.

Lycanthrope shapeshifters might just be one of…

“MMphh!”

Two agonizingly bright silver eyes stared at me in silent reprimand. I grabbed the hand covering my mouth and ripped it away, indignation heavy on my face.
Who fucking dared…

Malfoy.
The git.

I opened my mouth, ready to curse him to the ends of this fucking castle.

Sensing my agitation, he promptly covered my mouth again, except using both his hands this time. My muffled squeak did not go unnoticed, as the book fell off my lap and fell with a distinct thud on the floor.
I was too busy glaring into his stupid fucking eyes to see where it landed, the asshole.

“Shut up, Granger, you’ll damn us both.” He whispered hoarsely, like his throat had stopped working for a bit before he decided to employ its services again; his hair looked eerie, almost glowing in the dim moonlight. 

That is, until I caught I familiar, spicy whiff of warmth I knew all too well.

I sniffed, nose wrinkling in distaste. “Have you been drinking?”

He rolled his eyes, like it was typical of me to focus on his being drunk rather than being in the alcove.

It was not. 

I was perfectly aware, thank you.

“Why have you been following me?”

I sniffed again, haughtier. 

“Who says I’ve been following you?”

He hissed through his teeth, tongue flicking out to trace a cut on his lower lip. “Don’t play dumb, Granger. We both know who’s been following who, and I am not fucking interested in playing this fucking game of yours.”

“What game, Malfoy? The game that requires you to drown in your shallow assumptions that everything is about you or the game that requires you to seek me out long after everyone is asleep?”

Grey eyes turn molten at my accusations, and my eyes flick down to see his jaw tightly clenched.

“Stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Whatever the fuck it is you’re doing. I can’t figure you out, you know that? Its fucking annoying.”

He huffs, like he can’t believe the words that are coming out of his mouth.
His expression was partly petulant, partly incensed. And I was amazed at how clearly his emotions showed on his face. He couldn’t occlude when he was drunk.

I hated this look on him, I thought viciously.

When he was drunk.

It almost made him seem human.

Capable of emotion.

It made me want to smack him. Hard.

“I want you to ignore me like everyone else does. Go fucking away.”

Despite being drunk, his stare was anything but. I fidgeted skittishly; my eyes drawn to his again. They stared straight at me, unwaveringly, unflinchingly.

I raised my chin, closer towards his, and did the same. I would not back down to this, whatever it is that we were doing.

And unbidden, the words flowed out of my mouth.

“Tell me how you did that. The magic.”

He scoffed, rolling his shoulders, and turning away. Only to flop himself down beside me, leaning back against the window and closing his eyes abruptly.

My eyebrows shot up to my forehead, even as I bent to retrieve my book. Draco Malfoy, willingly sitting, no, lounging with a Mudblood?

His casual posture did nothing to lessen the snark in his reply.

“I waved my wand, you daft bint.” 

Apparently being drunk made Malfoy more ……Malfoy…ish.

And although the insult carried no weight, the laced venom in his tone irked me, sparking a white hot flame of indignance and rage in my gut. 

I snarled, swatting him on the arm with my book. Hard.

“Ow.” He narrowed his eyes at me in derision, and his gaze fell on the book.

I don’t think I was able to decipher his emotions well, for all I saw was a touch of shock before it was quelled. 

“Where did you get that from?”

“Why? Is it important?” I clutched it closer to my chest and raised my head in defiance. 

He sneered, eyes flickering from my hands to my face. At my possessiveness of the book. 

“That piece of garbage? It doesn’t know shit about magical creatures, let alone Animagi.”

My brain almost short-circuited. I gaped at him in astonishment. 

“You’ve read it?”

He got up to leave, apparently done with the conversation.

“Wait!”

I decided I wouldn’t let him see how desperately curious I was. 

“I’ll make a bargain with you. A trade.”

And all of a sudden, his back wasn’t facing me anymore. Pale grey eyes tilted slightly, rippling with ire and a bitter resentment. Somehow, I don’t think it was directed at me.  

“Of what?”

My mouth answered before my brain did. “Of secrets. One for another.”

“And if I don’t accept?”

“I’ll make you, somehow.”

He stepped back, far, far back, eyes widening slightly, and the sneer set back on his face. Disbelief. Astonishment.

“Let’s see you make me, then.”, he mocked, the final echoes of his whispers dissipating in the crevices of the rough stone he had stood on. 

My mind was a tumult of thoughts, and my gut roiled with an emotion I couldn’t place. 

She had the book.

She had the fucking book.

How could she of all fucking people find that fucking book?

It had damned me, and now it was back, haunting my footsteps.

And her.

What kind of blasted secrets was she willing to trade in exchange for my magic? 

I, like the many other times in my life, found myself at a crossroads of sort. I scowled at myself, blaming my thoughts for spinning into a psychoanalytical spiral, my strides turning purposeful as I exited the castle and neared the fringes of the Forbidden Forest. 

Forbidden, my fucking left foot.

There were at least ten students here doing Merlin knows what, not counting eighth years, and that was just the start. 

Couples, mostly.  

My eyes caught a glimpse of a silhouette in the dark, moving furiously, and I silently moved behind a large pine for cover. Better I remain unseen.

Or rather, two silhouettes, entwined as one. Wild hair stuck out in all directions, a small, delicate hand fisting in the boy’s ruffled crew cut. Muffled moans cut through the air, silenced by the boy, his hand forcefully clutching her mouth almost to and maybe even past the point of pain. 

It reminded me of a time during the war, way back when. 

He twisted her nipple viciously, a feral grin rippling over his features at her shriek. 

He thought she was enjoying this. He wasn't going to stop.

I flinched at the realization, unable to block the memories rushing through my mind like a bloody fucking tidal wave, washing away who I was and reminding me of what I had seen and done. 

Flashes of a battlefield swam in front of my eyes, my teeth stained a dark red with the blood pooling in my mouth, watching as blow after blow, strike after strike, sparks of life were snuffed out like feeble candle wicks. 

A wand.... my wand.....casting the Cruciatus. Sneering with a cold sense of indifference as a fourth year shattered before me. His tortured screams rebounded off the stone walls, echoing down the hall until his voice and his throat shredded into ribbons before finally fading into silence.

Being, all the while under the unrelenting scrutiny of Lucius fucking Malfoy, an almost proud twist to his lips.

My shaking hand.....tightly clutching a dagger, carving filthy words into filthy skin and filthy blood......... all the while wondering why the look on her face was anything but, eyes open in silent plea, lips parted in a silent cry. 

Bellatrix….. cooing over the Dark Lord while the snake twisted even tighter around a white-faced Luna in front of the hastily assembled court as an example to be made of, making her whimper in pain……glimpses of my mother in the bedroom with the asshole that was my father, , his hand wrapping around her mouth like a vice, making her take everything he forced without complaint, without noise………dead eyes staring at my blank face as I windlessly cleaned up the fallen bodies after his rampage, learning their weight and the smell of their blood as I dragged them to the slowly growing to-be-incinerated pile. 

Bile rose in my mouth, rubbery and acrid. I retched into the bushes, my empty stomach offering up nothing that wasn’t already there to give. I hiccupped, feeling more vulnerable than ever in the naked silence of the night, feeling tears track down my face. 

The moonlight left reflections in their gleaming wake. 

I ran a deciding hand through my hair in frustration, whispering a silencing charm.  

That night, I screamed. I roared my rage, my sorrow, my despair, my helplessness at the sky. I screamed for all I was worth, screamed until my throat was raw and cracked and my voice was shredded past the point of recognizable. 

Fuck this. Fuck reconciliation. 

I sat broken on the ground, my hands and legs morphing into sleek, muscled forepaws and hind paws of power, claws viciously striking the ground. My teeth lengthened, my white hair darkening to an onyx black.

I raised my hackles, my fur standing up on end. 

My voice was gone.

No more.

I whimpered brokenly at the moon. 

This was no majestic wolf. This was a rogue, this was a wolf cast out of the pack. This was ………me.

I prowled forward, an eerie calm taking over my frantic thoughts, giving way to cold blooded instinct.

As the moon gave way to gentle beams of gold-tinged light, as the Forest awoke with the rise of the day, foreign growls echoing throughout its endless depths, a wolf emerged from the disappearing shadows. 

 It was the color of midnight, the very embodiment of power. Its pale grey eyes gleamed with triumph, claws broken in half. 

Dark red blood dripped from its jaws, staining the gentle browns of the soil and returning to the womb of the land the sacred life-giver of all, a finality in every splash and splatter of drop.