Heilige Nacht
December 24th, 1981, 11:32 p.m.
Wilhelm Wundt Magical Asylum for the Chronically Insane, Schafhausen, Germany.
It’s snowing.
It has been for the past week. Some of the healers despair at the sight of it, wishing that it could be a bit warmer, but Walburga has always liked the snow. It is a rare sight in England, except for a few choice days in London, so when it’s there she always appreciates it.
England—she wonders what’s happening there now. She’s heard whispers of the war, how it’s ended, how the Dark Lord was vanquished, but she doesn’t know much. Walburga isn’t told anything relating to her family, and truth be told she prefers it that way.
There is no family left for her.
She knows Sirius is alive, her parents have told her that much. More on that front, they refuse to divulge. It doesn’t matter, she tells herself. Sirius is as good as dead to her—has been since he scampered out the window like a coward. Walburga doesn’t think about Sirius often these days, especially considering she knows he’s likely still out there with not a care in the world, potter and his underbred ilk beside him. Her thoughts are reserved for her husband and her younger son.
Orion and Regulus stand together, staring staidly at her from their spot perched on her dresser. The photograph is an old one, from over ten years ago, and she almost smiles at the respectable way her younger son manages to comport himself in the photograph, being only ten at the time. Sirius is there as well, but she’s folded the end of the picture that he appears in so he faces the back of the frame.
Walburga finds she hasn’t the heart to tear him off of the picture completely, much to her chagrin.
Shaking off thoughts of her eldest, she observes her surroundings. Her rooms here are plain. The walls are padded—and white, much to her dismay, she never liked that color. There is a twin bed in the corner of the room, creaky and uncomfortable, but these days Walburga has little to no use for it, she doesn’t sleep much. She has a dresser where she keeps all her photographs, and on days where she feels particularly lonely, she finds herself talking to them. If she squints, the photographs can almost seem real, and she could pretend she’s back at Grimmauld Place, a glass of sherry in her hand, instead of here, holding a foam cup filled with grape juice, all the healers see fit to give her.
There is a window as well. Barred, which almost makes her laugh—as if she has anywhere else to go, or would ever be bothered to stoop to suicide—and with a view of the outside. The village the asylum is in is magical, thank god, and quite lovely to look at. It reminds her of that Belgian village Orion took her and the boys to a few years ago. Regulus had adored it, but her eldest had been sulking the entire trip, typical of him in his teenage years.
For all the precautions they’ve taken to make sure she doesn’t harm herself, Walburga has no desire to. Perhaps when she arrived she did—she’d still had some semblance of fight left in her then, weak as she was—but now she takes in her surroundings with an air of resignation. She’ll die in these rooms, she knows that much. She’ll die alone, widowed, and childless, with no one to weep for her but her mother. Father might shed a tear, perhaps even Cygnus, but no more. She’ll be forgotten after their deaths.
Walburga finds that oddly comforting. No one to remember her, no one to care. Only silence.
Her silence is interrupted by a knock on her door, and before she can say whoever is out there can come in, it is opened, and only one person has the gall to enter without her permission.
Kreizler.
“Mrs. Black,” He says, softly. “Are you well?”
“Quite,” she replies, playing with the edges of her robe. Her voice sounds hoarse to her own ears, which is no mystery, as she rarely ever speaks unless she’s being interrogated like she is now by this upjumped half-blood.
“I’m glad to hear it,” Kreizler replies. The man moves past her, then—quite impertinently—takes a seat on her bed. “How has your day been?”
“Well enough,” Walburga replies, taking a sip from her cup. The grape juice is sweet, and she misses the familiar bite of alcohol, but it’ll have to do. “Is there any reason you’ve seen fit to disrupt me on Christmas Eve?”
“Yes,” he says, smiling. “You’ve been progressing in your treatment rather well, I think. You’ve followed my instructions, haven’t hexed any orderlies,” he adds, smirking, and she rolls her eyes. It was only the once—one of the nurses here saw fit to try and brush her hair as if she were some invalid. In those days, her mind was more…scattered, however, and she thought they were going to cut it.
“Don’t cut my hair,” she’d screamed at them, “Orion loves my hair!”
“And,” he continues, “Your behavior has ceased to be erratic, for the most part. Which is why I think you deserve a reward.”
Walburga clenches her jaw, angrily. “I am not some hound to be tossed a ham bone for good behavior,” she hisses out.
“I do not intend to give you a ham bone, Mrs. Black,” He says, an infuriating smirk on his face. “I wanted to see if you’d like to accompany me on a visit.”
“A visit?” She finds herself asking, puzzled.
“To church,” he clarifies, standing up. “There is one in town, across the street, haven’t you heard the bells from here every day?”
She has. Walburga has also heard the choir sing from time to time, though the sounds of it are rather faint, considering the distance. She hasn’t been to church in ages, since Regulus’s funeral, come to think of it. It isn’t that Walburga doesn’t believe in God, she does, it’s just that after everything that has happened to her in the past five years, she cannot bring herself to like him very much.
Whatever problems she has with the Lord can wait, however. Although she’d never had much desire to leave these walls after accepting her fate, Walburga finds that the opportunity to walk about freely, if only for an hour or so, greatly appeals to her.
“Very well,” she says, nodding.
“Good.”
“I don’t,” she stops herself, slightly self-conscious for the first time in ages. “I’m not sure I have the proper attire on,” she points to her nightdress, and Orion’s overlarge robe—some nights, the smell of it lulls her into thinking that he’s sleeping beside her. Walburga hasn’t worn a dress in a little over a year, however, there’s no need for them here. Who has she to impress? She isn’t the matriarch of the Black family anymore.
Kreizler chuckles, shaking his head. “You have a cloak, don’t you? Or a thick coat?”
Walburga nods, moving to her dresser and pulling out a black frock coat. When she catches a glimpse of her hair in the mirror, she almost grimaces. The tight chignon she always kept her hair in when she was Mistress Black is gone, in its place is a loose, frizzy mess of a bun that vaguely resembles the Gibson Girl style of her maiden aunt Cassiopeia. She supposes it’s only appropriate, Aunt Cass also lost her wits a long time ago.
Shaking off any insecurities about her appearance, she dons the frock coat, relishing in the warmth the ermine fur on the inside gives to her. “Shall we go?” She asks, and Kreizler nods.
Walburga follows him out of her room, then out of the corridor, then out of the asylum itself. The guards appear slightly surprised at her being allowed out, but Kreizler is respected enough that it isn’t questioned.
They leave the asylum grounds, and Walburga feels the cold night air on her skin, almost shocked at how much she missed this. She’d always loved winter as a girl. Christmas was her favorite holiday, especially once she married Orion and moved into Grimmauld Place. Decorating the house was something she always looked forward to every year, even more so once the boys were born.
There is nothing to decorate at the asylum, of course, but she doesn’t mind—who would she be decorating for, after all? Kreizler? That dipsomaniac spinster who lives down the hall from her?
Walburga keeps pace with Kreizler, the silence of their walk only interrupted by the faint sounds of the choir. She can hear them more clearly now, though they’re still some distance from the church.
“Tell me, Mrs. Black,” Kreizler asks, hands in his pocket. “Have you heard any mention of Sirius from your parents?”
Walburga tenses slightly, the name bringing a slight scowl to her face. “No. He’s probably off somewhere with that Potter boy, celebrating their victory.”
“James Potter is dead,” he says, bluntly. “As is his wife.”
Walburga stops walking, abruptly. If Potter is dead, could that mean? But no—no, surely not, her parents would tell her so if he’d died, wouldn’t they? She feels dread coiling in her gut, as much as she doesn’t want to feel it, she does. She cannot lose Sirius, not him, he could be married to a muggle for all she cares, she doesn’t want to see him ever again but she does not want him dead, No, this is wrong—
“Sirius lives,” he says, hurriedly, seeing the horror dawning on her face. “But he has been charged for the deaths. The Potters were murdered by the Dark Lord, and many believe it was Sirius who betrayed them to him.”
Walburga could almost scoff at the notion if she hadn’t also just discovered they put her son in Azkaban. “Sirius would never have betrayed those people,” She replies, tartly, and though the words are bitter in her mouth, they are no less true. Sirius may have disdained the lot of them, but he was loyal to his friends.
“From what you’ve told me about him, I’m of a mind to agree,” he tells her, looking up at the night sky. “Then again, people can change—as can our perceptions of them with time.”
“My son did not betray those people,” Walburga says, her voice brokering no room for argument. No, Sirius is innocent—of this, at least. Kreizler thankfully does not probe her further on the topic, but as they walk along the cobblestone streets, all she can think about is her son. Memories of him come flooding back to her, but no matter how hard she tries to bat them away, they surround her. It’s as if a nest of hornets has been dropped on her head, and she’s vainly swatting away at them as they consume her.
What has he been doing? Who has he been doing it with? Is he faring well in Azkaban? She doubts it—Sirius was never one for cages, if he couldn’t tolerate being locked up in Grimmauld Place, a beautiful house where he was waited on hand and foot, he is most certainly not doing well in Azkaban. All the worst thoughts of how he could be handling his imprisonment come to her then, and they suffuse the memories she has of him, and all she sees is the five-year-old boy who ate his birthday cake a day early in a cold, damp cell, surrounded by dementors, crying and whimpering in vain, calling out to her, begging for his mother to come and save him—
“Mrs. Black,” A voice cuts through her nightmarish thoughts, and she whips her head around to see Kreizler facing her with concern. “Are you alright?”
“Of course I’m alright,” She tells him, her voice sounding hoarser than usual.
A flicker of disbelief crosses his face before he pulls out a handkerchief and hands it to her. “You’re crying.”
“I am not—“ Walburga stops when she realizes, to her shame, that there are tears on her face. She snatches the handkerchief out of his hands and wipes her face quickly in order to preserve some semblance of her dignity.
“If you want, we can go back to the—“
“—No,” Walburga cuts Kreizler off, emphatically. “I’m fine. Let’s keep going.”
“We’re already here,” He points up in front of them, and she sees that he’s right—a large chapel stands before them, looming over the street like a giant. Kreizler gives her one final probing look, then turns back and pushes open the door, beckoning her inside.
Walburga follows, and immediately the familiar smell of incense greets her like an old friend. The Corinthian columns of the apse rise before her, and between them, flanked by angels, is the image of Christ, wreathed in a golden halo. His face is wan and beautiful, all hollow cheeks and dark, pleading eyes. Walburga finds herself transfixed by him—she always has.
Kreizler guides her to a pew, and they sit together.
“Do you know,” He turns to her, “Your mother was the one who asked me to do this for you?”
Walburga blinks, bemused. “My mother?”
Kreizler nods. “She thought it would do you some good. I was of a mind to agree.”
Not knowing what to say, she simply nods back at him, rather more tersely than she meant to. They lapse into silence once more, Walburga observing the surroundings around her with a note of longing. The same note of longing she has felt haunt what was left of her faith for so long.
The choir, which had finished the song they had been singing almost as soon as they had stepped into the church, starts up once more, and Walburga knows this song, has loved it for so long. The words are in her grandmother’s tongue rather than her father’s, and though she never was the best at German, the melody is ever-familiar.
“Heilige Nacht, in der der Herr geboren…”
“This was a favorite of mine as a child,” She says, not knowing why she’s telling this to Kreizler except for the simple need to speak.
“Mine as well,” He replies.
“Don’t you have somewhere you need to be?” Walburga says after a moment, fiddling with the sleeves of her coat. She finds herself oddly feeling guilty—a familiar feeling, though not with this man—for as much as she appreciates this visit, she knows what it is to be kept from her family. Why should he entertain the notions of a childless widow rather than his own wife or children?
“I do. Here,” Kreizler smiles at her kindly, then continues: “I always spend Christmas Eve with my patients. I find that it’s the worst night of the year to be alone. My family understands.”
“Do you have children?”
He nods. “Five daughters,” Walburga gapes in horror. Her two sons were certainly handful enough, and boys are meant to be easier—she’d probably have thrown herself off a cliff by now if she had to deal with that amount of girlish nonsense. Kreizler chuckles, seeing her reaction, and answers the question she hasn’t even voiced yet: “They can be a handful sometimes, but they’re worth it. We parents do everything for our children.”
Walburga scowls at that. “I certainly did for mine, and what do I have to show for it? I showered both my boys with good sense, and it slid off them like rain off a wing. One got himself killed, the other clapped up in Azkaban.”
“And yet we love them anyway,” He tells her. “However much they infuriate us, break our hearts, cause us pain, we would still die for them without an ounce of hesitation should push come to shove. The love between a parent and child can be confusing, much like the love between God and humanity. I’m reminded of the words of Saint Augustine: Why do you mean so much to me? he asked the Lord, Help me find the words to explain. Why do I mean so much to you—“
“—That you would command me to love you?” Walburga finishes, the words coming easily to her as years of tutoring by the kindly old nun Mother hired to teach her children claw their way to the surface.
Kreizler nods, and another silence falls over them. Walburga sits back in the pew, allowing the voices of the choir to lull her into an almost dreamlike state. She looks back up at the face of Christ, at the crown of thorns adorning his head, the nails in his hands and feet, and yet for all the pain, for all the suffering he must have experienced at that moment at the hands of people he thought of as his own children, his face is not angry nor disappointed, he does not look confused or betrayed. Instead, his expression is benevolent. Kind, forgiving.
Walburga has not known what it is to forgive for so long—she has let the anger of Sirius’s betrayal consume her all these years, casting him aside, scorning the idea of her son. But for all his sins, and for all of hers, he is still her son. Her first son, and her last. Whatever he has done, the boy who’s grey eyes gazed up at her with nothing but trust and love on that cloudy November day in 1959 is still there.
Christ forgave his children—can’t she do the same?
Yes, she decides. She can. For too long, Walburga has allowed despair and misery to take the reigns of her life—no more. Her son is out there, and he needs her, more than he’s ever needed her his entire life. Walburga will find her way back to him, even if it kills her.
For the first time in years, Walburga feels something other than misery or pain or anger—she feels a swell of something light and airy in her chest, something pure.
For the first time in years, Walburga feels hope.
“…wenn droben wir vor deinem Himmelsthron, wenn wir erst singen dort vor deinem Thron!”