Chapter Text
The sun was beaming merrily down, soft wisps of twirling particles and rich warmth. The plants ate it up greedily, leeching it from the air, lapping at the golden rays. Hattie sat amidst the plot of wildflowers, legs crossed and laurels in her lap, whilst she braided a verdant crown. Her attention was focused solely on the in-and-out weaving of the stems, of folding the leaves just so — she wanted it to be perfect .
“All in the golden afternoon,” she hummed, sloe eyes hooding. Her mouth quirked in a small smile as she completed the circlet. Hattie allowed it to rest atop her head, hands working to smooth her red hair. She gathered the tresses to one side, fingers combing lazily through her hair.
Her smile faded. Her eyes were dark, her smile gone, and she was kneeling in the grass and the wildflowers and the sunlight and —
“I hope this is fun,” she whispered, face devoid of anything and everything.
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The Hogwarts Express was a lurid splash of color against the grey of the station. The life had been drained from the surroundings, leaving only a foul mimicry of what was once a wondrous place. The people, too, were exhausted of their usual vibrancy; their faces were worn with a bone deep tiredness — the kind spawned from long nights wrought with worry, of comfort wrenched from one’s hands.
Hattie found it dreadfully boring.
Despair was only interesting in sparse amounts — knocking someone to their knees, dangling hope in front of their eyes, and then letting the floor beneath them collapse, and relishing in the utter despair wrent from their chest as they fell and fell and fell — that was fun.
This, however, was not that. This was drowning, choking on a societies’ worth of festering fear. Don’t misconstrue her words, though — Hattie enjoyed poking and prodding at corpses, investigating and understanding them. But she much preferred her corpses to be fresh, with the life still lingering upon them. To have her fingers dance across the last vestiges of life, the bits that clung to the unliving, the warmth in a cooling body — that was invigorating.
She digressed. This method was not one she would use, and perhaps the root cause in why she found so little enjoyment in it. This was not her game — not completely — and therefore she found less satisfaction in watching it play out. A game was always so much more fun from the inside, was it not?
“Hattie,” Hermione greeted, a wan smile playing at her lips. “Did you get my letters? You never did respond…”
Hattie pulled her into an embrace, which startled her terribly, and pulled her into a twirl. “Of course,” she said. “But I hadn’t any time to reply, or really the will to — writing is so tedious, is it not?”
“Oh, Hattie,” Hermione sighed. “So you did read them then? And the… and the news? You’re not worried? As much as you are a slytherin, and don’t mind prancing around with purebloods —,” she stopped herself, the blood draining from her face as she twisted her head around. “My point is, aren’t you worried about… you-know-who? ”
The whisper did not deter her, and Hattie responded casually, “Well, no, not really. There’s not much to worry about in my life, being completely honest, and I find that I’m more excited than anything: something big is going to happen soon, can you not feel it?”
Hermione’s expression shuttered, momentarily closing herself off — then bloomed with anger. “Do you not care about anything but yourself?” she hissed. “Fun this, fun that — don’t you see that others are being affected by this, I’m being affected by this? I’m a — I’m a mudblood, Hattie, and my parents are muggles — don’t you think you can feel some sort of compassion for us?”
A few passerbys turned their heads to look, eavesdropping quite impolitely, and Hattie plastered on a soft, reassuring smile. “I haven’t any need to worry, Hermione,” she said, “because there is no need. Nothing will happen to you, or your family, or anyone you deem a friend. In fact, I would suggest you do not worry at all, because those affected by the coming events will only be those perfectly deserving. And do not misconstrue my words — I am neither on the side of purebloods or muggleborn, I am on the side of myself, and all will work out in the conclusion.”
Hermione, certain that this would not be the last time she spoke these words, asked, “And what does that mean?”
“It means you should enjoy your year at Hogwarts as I will be doing.”
Hattie smiled.
(Her cheeks were beginning to hurt.)
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The sorting began and ended, the feast was laid out, and yet nothing went quite right: there was no buzz of excitement, the thrill of energy lacing the air, the chatter of students and professors echoing throughout the Great Hall. None of it was going as it should, as attested by the somber atmosphere that hung over everyone’s heads like the dreadful, ever-waiting reminder of the end. Hattie neither liked or disliked it, finding instead that there was some strange, inexplicable feeling lingering on her mind instead. It was something she couldn’t quite put, just as Hogwarts was not quite Hogwarts, and the sorting had not been the sorting.
More than a few of the Slytherins had shot her weighted glances, heavy with accusations and interpretations and other nonconsequential things. Hattie ignored them, finding familiarity in the act and some odd enjoyment in that. It was a very odd day when Hattie enjoyed the familiar, and she was finding it to be a very odd day, or night as it was.
And yet there was something off, and she could not place it.
“Hattie?” murmured Draco, attempting to garner her attention.
“Not now,” she replied, waving him off. “I’m trying to place just what is off.”
There was a moment of silence, blissful, well-earned silence, and then the return of quiet that wasn’t actually quiet, but laden with potent emotions and thoughts and oh, she wished they would stop that so she could focus.
“It is a lot quieter,” said Draco. “And… a lot is different from last year. Have you… Have you checked the Prophet, yet?”
“Goodness, Draco, yes I’ve both seen and read the Prophet, I know that Voldemort is back, I know that there is violence and chaos and everything else going on and but that’s not what I’m talking about!”
There was a prickling beneath the surface of her skin. It as irritating in a way she didn’t quite recognize, that she hadn’t felt in some time, or perhaps ever. It was familiar, though, in that sort of way that meant you knew, distantly, what it was or what caused it. And then it clicked — the anxiousness, the tugging sensation — it was time.
“Excuse my outburst,” she said. “I’ve a contract to be fulfilled and it’s nearing its culmination. How long now?” she continued, primarily to herself. “A month? No — a week?”
A gleam entered her eyes, fanatic and misplaced in their dark depths.
“A day.”
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It was the cusp before dawn, the darkest hour. Hattie walked, unnoticed and unhurried, down the halls of Hogwarts, leading to the place and item she sought.
“Oh, do you sleepwalk too?” asked a girl, bright-eyed and tiny, more pixie than girl. “Though I suppose it’s more apt to say that I sleepwalk then wakewalk, because I tend to wake up mid-journey and continue on anyway.”
“Hello, Luna Lovegood,” Hattie said, eyes impossibly wide, mirrored in too-big blue eyes, similar and yet altogether two vastly different things. “Tonight I neither sleepwalk nor wakewalk, but chase the end of all things. I find myself impatient, in spite of everything,” she confided, pausing in her pursuit.
“Oh,” said Luna. “I find that impatience makes the conclusion all the more exciting, but also more likely to blow up in your face. It happened to my mum, you know.”
“I know.” A pause. “I know. Luna Lovegood, I have a question for you: Do you think that the mind and the soul are two different things, or one and the same?”
“Different or separate? Because I think those are two very different words, but not at all separate. Though to answer your question, I think that that the soul and mind are connected, but not one thing pretending to be two. In fact, I think the mind is the soul, but not just the soul. Everything has a bit of a soul in them, don’t they? Except nargles, of course, those exist because of others’ souls, not their own. Or does that make others’ souls their souls? Shared souls?”
Hattie patted her head, stopping the rapidly devolving speech. “Oh, dear girl, you’ve too much sight and not enough eyes.”
Luna blinked. “I think I have just the right amount of eyes. Unless you’re saying that humans are supposed to have more than two, and we’ve all been fooled into believing otherwise?”
Barking a laugh, Hattie said, “Oh, it’s all too fun to talk with you! Perhaps I should have joined Ravenclaw — riddles are all too fun, too fun indeed! But I’m afraid I must cut our conversation short; I’ve places to be and heirlooms to be retrieving. You know, family obligations and that rot.” She received a surprisingly solemn nod to that, and smiled indulgently. “Perhaps we’ll meet again, Luna Lovegood. ”
“Perhaps, perhaps not.”
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The headmaster’s office was surprisingly empty, or perhaps not so much: Hattie entered without difficulty or preamble, passing the gargoyles and ascending the stairs, opening the door and reaching her destination. The sorting hat sat on Dumbledore’s desk, brim sealed tight and for all intents and purposes, in stasis for the next sorting ceremony. Hattie payed this no mind.
The portraits were whispering to each other, convening at one corner, a few brazen ones calling out to her. Hattie payed this no mind.
There was nothing, absolutely nothing, on her mind right now besides that niggling, infuriating, exciting feeling, right there on the forefront of her mind — the unerring certainty that this was it, here it was, it’s time it’s time it’s time .
She reached into the hat.
Her fingers brushed cool metal, clasping around the hilt, Gryffindor’s sword heavy with promise and fate, with an eons’ old oath.
Hattie grinned: teeth and something — everything — sharp.