A Treatise On Greed and Power (Or, What Not To Give A Sociopathic Teenager)
The ritual is the best thing that ever happened to her.
Astarte knows that it was foolish, she knows that completing an unknown, untested sacrificial ritual she didn’t even intend to survive was the height of idiocy - yet, it turned out better than she could ever have imagined.
She is free, now. Free from the chains she had willingly submitted to, free from the useless binds of ‘love’ and ‘care’ that had shackled her for a lifetime and compelled her to a path of self-destruction.
As far as she could remember, Astarte had always sacrificed for love. When their daily morsels of food were delivered by their Aunt Petunia into the cupboard, she gave Harry the lion’s share. When her twin had accidentally broken the vase in Marge Dursley’s guest bedroom, it was she who had taken the blame - and consequently, Petunia’s freshly-manicured nails raking down the side of her cheek. And when they arrived at Hogwarts, and the threats to her brother’s life grew, it was Astarte that charged Quirinus Quirrell with a stolen kitchen knife and Astarte that distracted Umbridge and her blood quills by making a bigger target, a greater nuisance of herself than Harry could ever be.
Even the prophecy, even the burden of “the power the Dark Lord knows not”, was a weight she had taken onto herself instead. It was Astarte, always Astarte.
And where had that gotten her, hmmm? Despised by her fellow Hogwarts students for cursing Justin Finch-Fletchley after he insulted her brother, the target of Dumbledore’s disappointed looks and disapproving eyes as she dared to express her fury. All the while her precious brother, the “Chosen One”, the great savior, was hailed as a hero - never mind that he wouldn’t have survived a year in the Wizarding world without her. Even Hermione Granger, whom she had quietly surpassed in knowledge from her dive into any and all powerful magics, had gained more recognition than Astarte, likely from the girl’s association with her twin.
Well, no longer. Astarte has no room in her heart for anything, really, much less inconvenient twin brothers that have brought her nothing but trouble. Of course, she does hold a residual… fondness, perhaps, but nothing like the love that had merited her former self-sacrificial efforts. Now, the only one she will ever lift a finger for is herself.
No wonder Voldemort had nearly succeeded in taking control of Wizarding Britain the first time. Perhaps the power of love was a real thing - that is to say, the power of the lack of love.
Astarte grinned at the mediwitch signing off on her discharge papers.
Would Riddle be a threat? She didn’t know.
Too bad her ritual would eliminate his advantage, but it would certainly be interesting to see how Riddle would fare without the inability to love.
She groaned, and pressed her face into the pillow. What the ever-loving hell was that?
The banging persisted from downstairs. Shut up, you damn noise. She swore she would Bombarda whatever was disturbing her at this ungodly hour of the morning into millions of tiny pieces!
“Astarte!” More banging, lovely. “Come on, open up!” Did that voice sound familiar? Oh, right, it was the boy who (just had to) live to share her DNA - also known as the bane of her new sociopathic existence.
Astarte Potter threw a silencing spell in the direction of the vocal intrusion instead. Her furiously-charmed silence was so strong that she didn’t even notice the presence of her persistent intruder until he ran through her bedroom doorway and yanked the cool, black silk of the pillow from her eyes.
The teenage witch groaned, and glared at the pair of green eyes identical to her own. “What the hell, brother?”
“You’ve been avoiding me,” Harry Potter glared back.
“Have I?” Astarte frowned. She didn’t think she’d been deliberately avoiding him; but then again, she hadn’t exactly gone out of her way to have anything to do with her human trouble-magnet of a brother. After all, her life didn’t revolve around him- oh, wait, it had until she’d lost her ability to love in the ritual. No wonder it seemed to him like she was deliberately exerting effort to dodge the boy.
“Yes! You didn’t invite me for dueling practice, you haven’t been enforcing my study schedule. You haven’t even shown me any of those new spells that you found to use against Voldemort!”
That was what her previous, non-sociopathic self had been doing all day? Holding the hands of an immature adolescent (she steadfastly ignored the fact that she, as his twin, was the same age) and coddling him though some war that she had no obligation to participate in, all in the name of sisterly love?
How quaint. Too bad the new and improved Astarte Potter had no intention of expending any effort for anyone but herself.
“Go practice yourself,” she waved him off with the barest flick of her wrist. “I’m sure Dumbledore will be ever-so happy to aid his favorite student in Voldemort’s prophesied defeat. And you do have access to the Brightest Witch of Her Age, so a little homework help and spell research must be oh-so simple. In fact, Harry, I hardly see why you ever needed my help at all!”
“Really?” Harry beamed in pride, ignorant to his sister’s sarcastic undertones.
“Yes, of course!” Astarte smirked to herself as the great Chosen One ran out of Grimmauld Place to the shrill sound of Walburga Black’s screams of “filthy half-bloods!” and “blood-traitors” “sullying” the House of Black. Now, she really needed to get to updating the wards to keep her brother and the rest of Dumbledore’s pets out of her house - it was her house, and hers alone, because if Harry had forgotten to read the fine print and complete the Black Family Magic rituals necessary to transfer headship of the family to an individual outside the main line of succession, well. His loss, her gain.
The full strength Black Family Magic? All hers. The Black fortune, passed from Sirius? Belonged to her. The magically-powerful, highly-concentrated (yet unfortunately dormant, as she was too old for it to make many outward changes) Black blood? Again, all Astarte Potter-Black’s.
Her previous self had been planning to help Harry perform the rituals as a birthday present instead, but why exactly would she give all that power to someone else? She scoffed. And now, as a full year hadn’t elapsed without the Black family being claimed, even that little shit Draco Malfoy could say good-bye to her money and power.
Hmmm… perhaps she should take a trip into the hidden Black artifact vaults. Who knew what precious dark artifacts could be down there, and what experiments Astarte could perform with them?