A Place Where Rivers Burn

I suppose I should be grateful. I should call her "sister" and be a good little serf. Let her live her life in peace and quiet, whilst I grow wither here, wither, and die in oblivion.

She calls me sister. She visits me once a day, here in the towers, where the old bat Lady Madeline watches me like a hawk. She sips tea and asks about my heath, a perfectly manicured concern her shield against any guilt she might otherwise feel.

My sister.

We had the same name once. Minerva. Not the kindest name a child can have, but a name that fit my soul and my bones and my genes.

She calls me Miranda now. I am her sister. I am the child sister of the most upstanding and upright Minerva McGonagall.

No sister conceived of woman am I, but of the darkest magic.

I know this, because it was I who found the spell. When I was Minerva, when the demons were too strong, when the need to survive was stronger than the sense in my head, I found the spell in one of the old books in the restricted section of the library. I had been a teacher then for years, working desperately to curb my errant thoughts and passions, to be the most upright of Gryffindor leaders.

I was failing miserably. Too many lonely nights, too many memories of darker times, of youthful mistakes. I craved the darker side of my nature too often, and I was losing that battle. Something had to be done, or all would be lost.

I found the spell. Or did the spell find me? It lay there on the page, seductive in its simplicity. So easy. So pure. Perfect.

Quietly, so as not to arouse suspicion, I began to gather the necessary ingredients. Difficult to procure, but not impossible. Slowly, without any real thought to outcome or consequence, I laid my plan. I set my goal.

I would become Gryffindor, to the bone. I would purge myself of all dark impulses, of those sadistic needs that life forces upon the body and soul of a woman.

I was a fool, even then. Now I am a wretch, and my own better self is Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts. Head of Gryffindor.

Did anyone even notice, I wonder? She aged overnight. When the separation occurred, I arrived naked and shivering on the floor of the flat she'd rented for the spell. A private flat, in a building where no questions were asked. We performed the spell as one woman, and came out as two. One older, one younger, mirror images on time lapse.

We slept for almost a day and a half, my naked body curled in her robed arms, tears streaking both our faces as the reality of what we'd done eased its way into our exhausted psyches. Twin sisters, one pure, one vile, but sisters nonetheless.

Still I feel shame at her look when we awoke. I had been kissing her throat, caressing her unnaturally aged body, a dark arousal unhampered by any sort of moral stricture or rational judgement. I saw. I wanted. I took.

She'd pushed me away, shocked and horrified at what she saw, the young, passionate, darkly needy side of her own personality.

Who could stare in the face of their own evil and not be repulsed?

She thought she was being kind. She brought me to Hogwarts through a private portkey, brought me directly to Lady Madeline, the kind old Gryffindor in the painting who had taken a liking to us as children. In tears she confessed our crime, and begged the old witch to help us put ourselves into one again.

That was ten years ago.

I walk the towers of Hogwarts like a ghost, aging slowly, prisoner of all the passions Minerva McGonagall could not bear to carry. She grows older, wise and kind and just the perfect mixture of sternness and compassion; I grow younger, dreaming of burning rivers and erotic enticements. She gains acclaim; I grow madder by the day.

Would her students understand if I broke free of this prison? Would they recognize me as their stern Transfigurations teacher? Or would they wonder at my wild eyes, and would they be frightened of my mad ways?

Lady Madeline has spelled the corridors of the tower where they keep me. She assures me they are looking for a cure, a counterspell. But I know I am to be kept here, subservient to Minerva McGonagall, growing viler, more corrupt, more mad, as she grows purer, cleaner, more wise.

Would she take me in now? Now that she has her rank and her authority and her place at the High Table? Who would take in their darker half, had they the opportunity to keep it imprisoned?

Perhaps some night I shall kill her. Clear through the fog in my mind, remember the spells that used to come easily to me, break free of this prison. I'll go to her bed, to that frigid bed where she lies in sweet, pure dreams, and strangle her with my bear hands.

Perhaps I shall take her place, lock her in this bloody tower, cloak myself in her image, seduce a student or two, frame her for murder, get pissed and bitchy at the High Table, anything to ruin her life as she's ruined mine.

Maybe I'll take a nice hot bath, drink tea.

Or maybe I'll head to London, and set the Thames afire.

Maybe I'll go to New York, and set the Statue of Liberty to doing the chachacha in the harbor.

Maybe I'll lie here in this tower, and wait for my food, and wait for my captors to try yet again to fix the mess we've made of my life.

Maybe I'll just sleep for a while.

End