Before There Was Memory

A seven year old girl ran down the path to the village, staying close to the overgrown hedgerows near the side and looking as though she wished to loose herself in them. Her stringing black hair flew out behind her and her bare feet hardly hit the ground. Her dress was ragged and grey, with stains all over the front, but her face was clean and her eyes-- although filled with fear-- were bright, as though she at least had the capacity to be a happy child.

As she got closer and closer to the village proper she began to run faster, though there was a slight hesitancy etched on her small features. Normally she would not be seen anywhere near the village, but now she had to go there, now it was important. Her brother would not go, he was hiding in a tree cowering from the sounds that came from their small house, but she knew that something must be done. Merope knew.

She stepped onto the main village road, and almost instantly collided with someone. She fell backwards onto the well-packed dirt of the street and stared up at the one she had knocked into. The sun was behind him, so that his entire body was surrounded by light and as the tall boy offered out his hand to pull her up, Merope took it wondering if he were an angel.

His long nose wrinkled as she got to her feet, she barely came up to his chest and she guessed that he was eleven, older than her or Morfin and almost an adult in her small eyes.

"You've got to help me," she burst out, tugging on his hand. "It's my ma. I think she's dead! He's killing her like a muggle would! So they don't know! Please help!" Breathlessly she began to pull him towards the path, but he was stronger than her, and he held her back easily.

"Stop lass. What's wrong? Who's killing who? What's going on?" He narrowed his eyes. "Aren't you from that shack down on the other side of the village?"

She did not even register her house being called a shack. All Merope knew was that her beloved mother was dying, and that she and Morfin would be alone with Pa. And that was bad.

"Yes, that's it! Please hurry!" Then she began to cry, something that she tried never to do. The boy looked stricken, and he knelt.

"Oh dear. Do stop. I'll get help, just wait a moment." Merope would have gone to the ends of the Earth for this boy now, and sure enough he returned within minutes with the local constable

They ran back down to her house, but when Merope flew through the hedge and saw Morfin, on the ground surrounded by snakes and sobbing she knew. It was too late.

"Ma," she whispered in Parseltongue, and sank to her knees next to Morfin, letting a snake curl itself around her arm. The boy and constable looked disturbed at this form of grieving, but Merope no longer saw them, nor did she see the body being carried out of their house, or her father being led away. He would escape the muggle authorities, she knew. Wipe their memories. But she and Morfin would not escape, could not.

A month later she sat in the garden; her dress spread around her legs, covering them, a snake that Morfin had not yet killed slithering up her arm. Morfin hated her now, said that it had taken her too long. She knew that he was right. Morfin went to the school now. Pa said he should learn some up there, before Pa taught him what he really needed to know. Merope was alone with Pa. Alone when he beat her and cursed at her. He called her a Squib, although she could not be, having inherited the tongue.

Under her dress, cold against her heart, now lay Slytherin's locket, taken off of her mother's body and passed down to the next female in the family. She touched it with a finger as she heard horse hooves nearing. She looked up, and her mouth formed a round "o" when she saw the boy jump down off the horse.

He surveyed the house with his nose turned up, before looking down at her.

"Er.... All right?" he asked, and she nodded, looking up at him with eyes that held wonder, fear and a certain amount of desperation. "Good...." he said, kicking at the dirt with the toe of a well-shined boot. "See you later then," he said, as he remounted the horse and road off, dust billowing out behind him.

Merope's eye followed him, and then stared at the spot where he had been, until the sun began to go down and her father yelled at her to get supper on the table now, or do it with the Jelly-Legs curse upon her.