Midnight Glory

Chapter One: Going Under

Now I will tell you what I've done for you,

Fifty thousand tears I've cried,

Screaming, deceiving, and bleeding for you,

And you still won't hear me, (I'm going under)

Don't want your hand this time, I'll save myself,

Maybe I'll wake up for once,

Not tormented daily, defeated by you,

Just when I've thought I've reached the bottom,

I'm dying again....

~Evanescence, Going Under

It was dark in the coldest parts of the castle, on a good night reaching just above freezing. The cold wasn't the pleasant kind you get from playing with friends in the snow, laughing as you built ridiculously childish snowmen or throwing ice filled snowballs at enemies when their backs were turned; more the kind you experienced on the darkest of your nights. Bitter and bone-freezing. Perhaps this was why Slytherins were kept in the dungeons, their hearts were made of ice and couldn't be affected by the chill, Seba thought tiredly, as she quietly swept down the stone flab stairs that descended to the dungeon entrance to the Slytherin Common Room.

She walked with confidence, not bothering to worry about being caught by Filch, he rarely came down to the dungeons. Perhaps afraid of the Death Eater children, she thought with humor. She doubted he would notice her anyway. Her heavy cloak was black, and covered a black turtleneck, and a short black skirt. Thigh-high black leather boots clinked heavily onto the floor, ringing morosely in the drab halls. They were unnaturally quiet, but then that might have something to do with the fact that it was nearing three in the morning.

Casting one last glance around the corridor, she pulled her wand from the inner-folds of the cloak and poked it to a barely noticeable hole in the wall. Instantly, the wall shifted itself to form a space big enough for her to crawl through. 'Lumos' she whispered and the crawl-space was suddenly glowing with would-be warm light, had the night not been particularly cold.

After about ten feet of crawling on her hands and knees, it opened into a room, where several other teenagers, dressed in various states of black and slut-like clothes, were leaning against the bare stone wall, or else sitting in the center of the completely furniture-less room, passing a joint and bottle of fire whiskey.

"Seba, hey..." Molly Oxalis, a fourth year Slytherin, greeted half-heartedly. She was slumped against the wall, her long strands of silky corn-colored hair in disarray. A cigarette hung from the corner of her mouth, but she didn't seem to notice. "Nice of you to join us..."

Seba fought back the urge to wince in distress, but nodded her head in acknowledgement. Molly was known to 'get around' and hadn't spent one night since her 12th birthday not being drunk. But then, Seba could relate to that.

The other Slytherins, all fifth year and older (Molly was the only fourth year allowed to these 'get-togethers' and only because her older brother was a 7th year), nodded in her general direction, before returning to whatever task was at hand.

Draco Malfoy, a Sixth year Seba detested and loathed, was smirking at her with pale lips. His eyes glittered strangely in the darkness, as the room held no lights, and she knew he was trying to be intimidating.

"Save it, Draco. You don't frighten me in the least," she chided in a clipped voice, accepting a bottle of booze from Molly. Draco flashed her a warning glance that she smiled sweetly at, and turned away.

Being a seventh year herself, Seba had been to many of the Slytherin... parties was the only word similar to the ritual held every night. It had started sometime in her fifth year. While Hufflepuffs had Tupperware parties, Ravenclaws had study nights with popcorn, and Gryffindor had the occasional secret Hogsmeade trip to karaoke night at the Three Broomsticks, the Slytherins had these.

They were termed 'slokes' by those who attended, and were held every night after lights out. The room used was an old refugee room from the Grindelwald war, and was only known by the staff and Slokers (someone who regularly attended the bashes). It was only entered by anyone other than the slokers once a year when it was cleaned and checked for damage. After all, it could be needed again one day.

Alcohol and smoking supplies were always provided by one rich bloke or another (usually Draco Malfoy) and they spent the evening getting trashed and stoned to oblivion.

Seba took a long sip from her bottle of whiskey, and swallowed it in one big gulp. She was big on drinking, and hard liquor never gave her much of a sting as it went down her throat.

"Your looking lovely this evening, Blake," Marcus Flint, who still couldn't pass 7th year, whispered seductively into Seba's ear, running one calloused hand up her arm and into her luscious locks of black hair. She narrowed her dark eyes flirtatiously, and leaned into his touch in response. He took this as permission, and began to softly nibble the sensitive flesh of her ear. When he began to pull the constricting cloak from her shoulders, she softly pulled away.

"No, Flint. Leave me," she scolded, straightening her appearance and taking a swig of whiskey. Already her mind was buzzing with the numbness of alcohol, and she welcomed it wholeheartedly. She loved the false sense of security that she felt when drunk. Like all the problems of life disappeared for a moment, one tiniest of seconds.

"You're tantalizing, Blake. Why do you do this to me..." he groaned in frustration and ran a hand through his brown tresses. She smirked at him, displaying her tongue ring with the black ball on top. He stared at it wondrously, licking his lips. He leant in to kiss her, but she stepped back. Laughing at his obvious frustration she let him saunter off.

The room was quickly filling to an almost suffocating level, and the liquor was running dry. Puke was piled in smelly globs on the floor where lightweights hadn't been able to handle the queasiness of their stomachs. She guessed she had been here two or three hours, because she was already hammered beyond belief, staggering as she walked towards the exit. Every light was loud and bright to her eyes, the occupants of the room swirling in one colorless blob, and she cursed stuttering as she crawled back out the way she had come. The floor met her face as she fell out of the entrance, and it reconciled itself magically, as she lay groaning on the floor.

The other kids who were in too bad of shape to make it to the dorms usually crashed in a big heap inside on the weekends, and normally she was one of them. But tonight-rather morning- was one of those rare ones, she felt ashamed and a stranger to herself. Not often did she feel this way, but when it happened, it hit hard. She would stop sloking for a few days, before the need became unbearable and she dragged herself back, insisting she didn't care what she was becoming. What she had become. A shadow of a person.

Sweaty with hangover, she fumbled to the girls' restroom across the corridor. Bracing herself on the tile sink, she pulled herself to her feet, swaying slightly. Staring back at her was a blurry-eyes mess. The heavy black eyeliner she wore always was smudged half-way down her cheeks, and the hoop she wore through her lip was bleeding, and she distantly remembered getting it caught on something. The pulsating pain she couldn't feel but knew was there doubled when she pulled the metal ring out. Blood gushed in large amounts from the small hole, and she winced.

Her face was deathly pale, as always was, and black lipstick smudged all over her face.

She disgraced herself.

All the times she had wished to be a Gryffindor like her parents came rushing back like a tornado and hit her twice as hard. The parents she loved, but hated... The ones who called her unnatural and mentally unstable. The ones who had tried unsuccessfully to admit her to a home for the criminally insane.

Why had she become a Slytherin, she often wondered. Her family were generations of Gryffindors, as her parents mentioned all the time. She was the black sheep, quite literally, but she felt helpless to the power the darkness held sway over her.

Sometimes, the blackness was so much, she nearly felt like screaming. Perhaps she was crazy, she half wondered. Sometimes she seriously thought she was. When she looked in the mirror and didn't see herself, but the black ghost of a lost soul. That was when she did. When she cried her heart out to her silk black pillow, cries full of pain and sorrow, she thought she was crazy. Her body had been pierced and tattooed and the damage was done. She was who she was. She wasn't ashamed of her appearance, although some people, teachers in particular, tended to behave oddly around her, and had no intentions of ever changing the way she dressed.

She filled her hands with water that took ten minutes to run anything close to warm, and splashed it with shaky hands across her face. The mascara and eyeliner she wore ran down her face in a trail of black water, that reminded her of tears. Black tears. She had never watched herself cry, but if she had, she suspected the tears would run with the blackest of black.

With a resigned sigh, she wiped her face till it flushed a healthy pink. The bathroom was deserted, and she slumped to the floor in exhaustion. Fluttering her eyes close, she felt herself slipping into sleepiness.

* * *

She must have fallen asleep, as some time later, she heard female voices in the bathroom she occupied. Not wanting to be found awake, she kept her eyes closed and breathing deep and even.

"... Merlin, the water down here is like ice," a high-pitched voice Seba didn't recognize was saying. It wasn't a Slytherin, she was sure, as she would be familiar with the voice and the person would be familiar with the cold water.

Another voice replied, this one reminding Seba of some Gryffindor twit named Hermione Granger, "Yeah, I know. I can't believe Snape gave us detention. It's not like talking in the corridors is a crime!" Her voice was distressed and agitated. Seba felt like laughing. She loved the way Professor Snape treated Gryffindors.

It was common knowledge to all Slytherins, and if not, taught at an early age, that Gryffindors thought they were better than everybody. While being classified as do-gooders, they broke every school rule and it's grandmother, and was let off easy, saying 'it was in the good of us all.' Yeah, right.

But she hated no one more than Harry Potter and his sidekicks. The epitome of all things soft and fuzzy. Evil was anything that bore the letter 'S' on their robes. Slytherins didn't know friendship, only loyalty. She herself was jealous of Harry perfect Potter, because he knew who loved him, and returned the love. He was admired by all because of something he had had nothing to do with. She seethed with hatred for him.

The difference between her own house and Gryffindor, Seba thought wisely, was the Slytherins would only do something if they themselves benefited from it, while Gryffindors would cut off an arm if it would save a rat's life.

"Really, Hermione he isn't that bad of a teacher, just a little... insufferable," the other voice reasoned somewhat distractedly. The sound of a brush running through hair reached Seba's ears, ringing in the hung over emptiness.

"Virginia Weasley!" Hermione Granger screeched in alarm, her shout of surprise echoing in the stone room. Seba bit back the instinct to wince at that bloody awful voice, but continued her charade of sleep.

So the other immobile voice was Ginny Weasley, a fifth year, and sister to one of Hero's sidekicks. Seba had somewhat taken a liking to the fiery redhead back in her Sixth year, when she had been forced to tutor the lonely girl in Charms. She wasn't too awfully bad for a Gryffindor.

Hermione Granger's voice lowered considerably, and she whispered, "Who do you suppose that girl in all the black is, huh?"

Seba fought the urge to snort.

"Who?" Pause. "Oh, that's Seba Blake. She's a seventh year Slytherin..." Ginny answered.

"She looks like bloody hell, do you think we should check and make sure she's ...alive?" Granger asked uncertainly. She could almost picture the homely girl's face scrunched in distaste, "She reeks of alcohol."

Ginny seemed indecisive also, and answered after a lengthy pause, "Yeah, every year has afternoon classes today. She might not wake up in time."

Please just leave me, she thought frantically, not wanting to have to answer any of the younger student's questions.

A soft nudge in her side ended her thoughts, and groggily, she let her eyelids slip open, revealing the brown/black eyes beneath. The two forms above her swam in and out of focus, finally settling to show concerned faces.

"If you want me to be touched by your concern," she croaked in a voice unlike her own, "don't hold your breath." Ginny half-smiled, but the other girl, with hair the size of a rather large tiger, glared.

"Are you intoxicated, Ms. Blake? I'm a prefect, and can very well turn you in. Slytherin," Granger's voice leaked poison, but Seba just scoffed.

"Please, Granger. I'm not in the mood for formalities. You should have just let me sleep. Get out of my way," rising to her feet, she roughly pushed the two girls aside and stalked out of the room, 'Well! I never!' ringing behind her in disbelief.

She walked the short distance to the black drapes that were the Slytherin Common room, mustered the password (Bertie Botts), and flounced down onto one of the green plush chairs, in front of the roaring fire that's warmth was lost in the darkness.

Watching as the green and red flames danced around each other, licking the charred logs, she felt tears well and her eyes. Confused as to why she might be crying, she pushed them away roughly. She didn't notice the owl that sat beside her, carrying a letter addressed to her until it gave an impatient hoot.

She felt like rolling her eyes at her misfortune when she recognized it as Housie, her family owl. She tore the letter from it's tan talons, and skimmed the contents.

Serafina,

Hello darling. How are things doing at school? We hope you are well and that your grades are progressing, as we so hoped last term.

Christmas is only around the corner, and your father and I were wondering whether or not you would be returning home for the holidays. Your brother and sister hope, as do we, you shall decide to come visit us. You spent the last three winter holidays at Hogwarts, and we all miss your presence greatly.

Grandmother and Grandfather Blake are planning on taking the knight bus over from Russia to spend Christmas weekend with the family, as well as your aunt Malinda and her daughters.

Everyone is well here at home, and Luke had a great seventh birthday. He sends his thanks for the Quaffle you sent, and has spent many hours playing with it in the back on that dratted broomstick.

Please send us you reply ASAP.

With love,

Mum and Daddy.

Seba stared with disgust at the letter. Serafina, her true given name. They *knew* she didn't like when they called her that. She hated it, and had been called Seba (parts taken from both her first and last name; SErAfina Blake) since her tenth birthday. She, in some ways wanted to go home for the holidays, she did miss her brother Luke, even if not her sister Merry...

But her parents always looked at her with disappointment they didn't bother to hide. She had turned out a Slytherin, and they let her know how they disapproved. Disdain came in bounds for the way she dressed and the makeup she wore.

And her grandparents and cousin all looked at her uneasily. As if she would bring Voldemort home with her on the Hogwarts Express and greet them with a warm, 'Hi, my lovely Gryffindor-iffic family, this is my master Voldemort, isn't he just uber-snakelike? We brought poisoned fruitcake!'

Torn, she decided she would brave her family, and wrote a quick reply.

Mom and Dad

Am coming home for Christmas. Expect to be collected at 5:00 on 20 December at King's Cross Station. Send my greeting to Luke... and Merry.

Seba

Satisfied, she folded the short reply in half and tied it to Housie, who squawked and took off to the tunnel that led to where the letter for Slytherins could be brought down to the dungeons by their owls.

Now more than a little tired by her late night sloking, she trudged up to her deserted dorm. It was drafty here, and the only furniture were the three four-poster beds and their owners' trunks and a nightstand for each bed. After changing into a black slip of a nightgown, she pulled her green velvet hanging around her and was asleep before her head had even hit the pillow.

* * *

Despite the fact that Seba liked Professor Snape, she had no interest in the class he taught. Potions was an art of patience and mathematical intelligence. Two things she just didn't possess. She was clouded with frustration as she added powdered asphodel to her simmering cauldron, and wasn't surprised when it burst forth with heavy smoke and a rather nasty fume that made her wretch.

"Miss Blake, what are you doing? This is not culinary class!" she heard Snape chide, but she wasn't really directing her attention to the greasy-haired man. Her eyes were burning from the fumes and she choked back bile that rose in her throat.

Amidst the snickering of the Seventh year Ravenclaws, she managed to point her wand to the cauldron and mutter a filtering spell to somewhat clear the thick smoke. Snape was looking at her with an unreadable expression, and Cho Chang's catty self was smirking in her direction.

Fighting the urge to throw the Avada Kedavra curse at the Ravenclaw for not the first time in her school years, she took her cauldron off of its burner and walked it cautiously to the back.

Constant icy water gurgled from the mouths of sinister looking gargoyles into the sink, and she poured the ruined potion into it, and watched the swirl of murky brown glob disappear down the drain, to be replaced by the liquid ice.

"That's rancid, Blake," a sickeningly familiar voice came to her right. She closed her eyes in preparation before turning face-to-face with none other than the utterly charming Ryan Parolees (A Ravenclaw chaser). He was grinning at her with teeth so white it would make the Cress inventor jealous. She managed a nod of the head, while really wishing to pull the cauldron over his ken-doll face. He made her feel funny and act very much unlike herself. Animal magnetism, she dubbed it.

"What do you want?" she asked, underlining the annoyance in her voice so he would get the point. He didn't.

"Nothing," he defended, sticking his hands up in a sign of surrender. "What's been up in the life of the sexiest Slytherin in the world?" His smile was like the smell of car fuel. Bad for you but totally addicting. Something that smelled bad, but good at the same time.

"Plotting evil deeds in my History of Magic text and printing the dark mark on little children's arms," she elaborated wickedly. The smile in her eyes was missed, and he didn't find it funny, just narrowed his eyes with suspicion.

"Oh, I was joking you boob!"

He grinned embarrassedly, "Oh."

Seba wanted to grin back, but didn't. His face grew serious.

"How come you lot are never nice?" Ryan asked, and she was caught off guard. This conversation was a sacred one, not to be breeched on. Yet. She herself had given the question much thought over the years, and the conclusion she had come up with had been sanded down and perfected for when the day came she would have to give someone her thoughts on it.

"You lot?" she pretended to be dumb for just a moment. Feigning stupid was almost as easy as taking candy from a baby, and almost twice as believable.

"Yes. You lot. Slytherins. Serpent wearers."

"Serpent wearers!" she snorted. A new one to add to 'The Great Big Book of Words to Call The Common Slytherin.' Pg. 89- Serpent Wearers.

Looking into his blue eyes, she was somewhat compelled to answer just from the curiousness in them.

"Because we have to be..."

"But why?" came the response.

"We're loners. We don't like playing by the rules. Most are untrustworthy. Playing nicely with the other children is foreign. We know where we stand, and we accept it. The three other houses act as if we are another species, therefore we must act a different species."

"I think your trustworthy," he told her shyly, ducking his head. She gave a weak smile that she could feel would not reach her eyes.

"Of course you do... but how do you know you can?" stunned pause.

He looked amazed at the insight to the ways of a 'Serpent Wearer' and his eyes grew wider.

"Serafina Blake, Ryan Parolees! To yours seats. 10 points from Ravenclaw!" Professor Snape yelled, indicating the two empty seats on two opposing sides of his classroom. Ryan was so preoccupied he didn't even complain at the unfairness in Snape's point deduction, rather just sat obediently.

* * *

Lunch was always torture to Seba, who sat enclosed at the very end of the Slytherin table, ignored by most, and if not, talked to by the most boring people she had ever met.

One example being Draco Malfoy, who must have a goal in life to make her go crazy and grind his bones into shortbread. Although, on thought, she wished she could do that just now.

"Father says I'm excellent with a sword, Could probably out duel any of the teachers here," he sat boasting one afternoon, two weeks before Christmas break was to take place.

Seba rolled her eyes in annoyed anger. The boy was just so... full of himself, and wouldn't miss the chance to throw his good name in someone else's face. Often hers.

"Sod it, Malfoy," she muttered, and to her surprise he fell silent. Crabbe and Goyle sat loyally at his side, mechanically raising food-filled utensils to their monstrously huge mouths. They often stared blankly, and Seba wondered if they knew how to string a sentence together. Doubtful.

It was a Saturday, thank Merlin, meaning the night was young, and the slokes would be wilder than ever. Weeknights tended to be dry as toast, while on Friday and Saturday nights, loud music was provided, and wild dancing was included in the mixture of drugs and alcohol.

After polishing off a rather bruised apple, Seba gathered herself together, and headed out the Entrance Hall. A nice book was held in her hand, along with some texts she planned to study.

Outside, the sun was high in the sky, and glared at the world below, it's heavy rays full of heat that only felt twice as bad to Seba. She was wearing a bottom-slanted red and black striped skirt, red fishnet stockings, clunky boots, and a black shirt that had a slash across the belly, showing off her belly-ring and the snake tattoo that wrung itself around her navel. It's eyes were a poisonous red, while the snake itself was green. The majority of black made the sun's rays feel like her skin was burning with fire.

She slouched down beside a tree, leaning hard up against it. The lake was to her left, it's current rhythmic and soothing, lapping at the ground like a thirsty dog.

The book she had brought with her was sleek and shiny, titled, The Do's and Don'ts of Young Death Eaters. The idea of it was almost to funny, Draco Malfoy had handed them out in the common room the night previous, with the air of one handing out gold-encrusted diamonds. The author was none other than Lucius Malfoy himself, the evil little bastard.

She had stared at it wondrously for a while, before bursting into a fit of unbelieving laughter. The idea was appalling! There was actually a handbook to becoming a Death Eater!

She flipped to the first page out of pure curiosity, as she had no intention of becoming a hem-kissing servant to some crack-potted old man.

Creating A Reputation: Chapter One

/Creating the atmosphere of one that is vain, evil, and uncaring is the first steps to becoming a follower of the dark lord. The terms mudblood, Lord Voldemort, and muggle torture coming up in conversation frequently is a subtle hint to others that you are in possession of the dark mark.(see pg. 11 for more details) While appearing neutral while in mixed company, in the..../

Overcome with the absurdity of it all, she tossed the pamphlet into the lake, and watched with a grin on her face as the slow tide took it into the depths of it's purple waters. Utterly ridiculous.

Closing her eyes, she leaned her head back and got lost in her thoughts, humming one of the yelled mournful 'songs' by Marilyn Manson she was so fond of.

* * *

Harry Potter stared at the girl he had never seen before with an almost brutal curiosity. She was somewhat Gothic looking with her clothing style, but pulled it off with the air of an own individual style. The tie around her neck labeled her a Slytherin, and involuntarily, his lip curled with dislike.

She wasn't asleep, he could tell by the way her eyes flickered beneath the closed lids. Her appearance was somewhat foreign, and he recognized the pale tone of her skin, and slight slant of her eyes that she was gyptian. Although a normal gyptian was a bronze tone, the northern fens gyptians' descendants were all deathly pale.

Without warning, one of her heavily blackened eyes swept open, and landed on him. A small grin curved itself onto her lips, and he suddenly felt the urge to blink furiously. Her eyes were captivatingly unique in color, and with the intense way she used them as a disarming weapon was terrifying.

"Harry Potter..." she said, and he blinked at the conviction in which she spoke his name.

"Yes, and who are you?" he stuttered, alarmed to find himself quaking.

A slender black eyebrow rose, the smirk on her face widened, "Seba Blake, little one."

He glared at her mocking tone and took off in the direction of the castle, her laughter echoing behind his steps. Hell no, he thought. I did not just become frightened of some Slytherin Goth. Fuck.

* * *

The snow falls in piles of frosty cloud, swirling around and around in the fierce winds, and the dark figure that walks with difficulty through it, is shivering in the cold. A huge black cloak covers the figure's face, and the footprints it leaves behind were almost covered immediately with fresh mounds of soft snowflakes.

The figure yells a spell, and a jet of purple light floods from the wand and hits a distant checkpoint,

Nodding in satisfaction, the figure turns with a menacing cackle, leaving the green and black form of a skull looming over the castle that is Hogwarts.

It's snakelike tongue and sinister appearances marks it as The Dark Mark.

Voldemort has struck.

Or will strike....

* * *

The alarm went off at little past midnight, as clear and loud as any of the students had every heard it ring before. Instantly, the halls were filled with the sleepy, frightened faces of younger students with their most prized possessions clutched desperately to their breasts.

Seba felt a surge of relief that she had chosen to stay in from the sloke that evening, as all the Slytherins who had chosen to go were being cast alarmed glare by the frazzled professors when the walked to the Great Hall in the less-than-covering cloths they wore. But the room was alive with all the 4 houses' occupants, and the attack was underway. Any moment, the Death Eaters would come spilling from the Entrance Hall, and take one or two of the students, like always.

The alarm had been put in sometime in the year prior, Seba's Sixth, and went off whenever a Death Eater attack was taking place. When you heard the screeching it created, you were to take refuge in the Great Hall as soon as possible. Many of the dreaded attacks had happened, and each time a few students were killed, the teacher's subdued. There was nothing anyone could do, even Potter, and the younger students watched with terrified fascination while the upperclassmen watched in sympathetic helplessness.

The tables had been upturned sometime in the plight, and the youngest students all sat huddled together behind their houses' table. Strength came and numbers, and the held to each other as if they were lost in the forest, with only each other for comfort.

Sounds of doors from farther off being forced open made the hall grow silent with dreaded anticipation. Seba sat near the Slytherin table, with a petite Hufflepuff clutching her arm, not noticing who it was she was grasping. Seba didn't mind though, the younger ones got comfort from the darkness where they could, and she would not deny them what she could not ask for.

With a dramatic pause, the door was thrown open, and wave over wave of black robed forms swarmed in, wands held out in readiness. A grip of fear wound itself around her throat, drowning the words she meant to say to the First Year who was clutching her. Who would be taken this time?

The spells came, bringing the teachers down with ease. Dumbledore, in all his ancient glory, fell hard behind Professor, who was fighting several of his own people with a fierce determination. Seba had never admired him more than in that moment. Their fearless leader.

The girl was crying now, and Seba awkwardly wrapped her slim arms around her, "You are not afraid." She said with conviction, and felt the small girl reside in crying.

"Avada Kedavra," rang sharp and forebodingly through the hall, mingling with the students desperate cries of fear and anguish. It was happening. Again. Closing her eyes, Seba bowed her head in silent prayer to Merlin, as most witches did not believe in god.

After twenty minutes in which constant confusion and endless wails filled the air, the Death Eaters left as quickly as they had come. Students were crying in pain, Cruiciatus was often used, not to kill, but to hurt. Seba had sat with her little friend, eyes close, trying to keep her focus from slipping. Slytherins had no reason to fear these attacks, as the Death Eaters steered clear of them, many were young Death Eaters themselves. Keeping the tears from falling had never been as hard as that night. The child in her arms was crying again so she softly began to sing:

My God, My Tourniquet

Return to me Salvation

My God My Tourniquet

Return to me Salvation

I tried to kill the pain, But only brought more

I lay dying

And I am pouring crimson regret and betrayal

I'm dying, praying, bleeding, and Screami-i-ing

Am I too lost to be saved?

Am I too lost?

She thought the song she sang might not be the best for the situation, but she felt the Hufflepuff being soothed by her gentle voice. Shivering herself, she felt the beginnings of a headache forming behind her eyes, and let herself slip to unconsciousness.

* * *

Never did anyone ever dare to ask what was on the minds of all that were old enough to hold a wand. How was Voldemort doing this? How were his Death Eaters breaking all the wards and protection spells. It was thought by all, but nobody asked, fearful of the answer they may receive.

Some tried to act like nothing was wrong, drowning themselves in stupid jokes and careless fun. Closing their eyes from all the death and anger that surrounded them. When the attacks happened, they were the first to recover from sorrow, and the first to not talk about the pain.

Others spent hours nit-picking and analyzing every little detail. Seba fell into this category. Each movement someone made, every phrase or riddle someone used, she had always found herself breaking down and analyzing. And it drove her absolutely mad with frustration. And all because she couldn't boil down a suitable reason as to why the wards were no longer looking. She was thirsty for knowledge, maybe unhealthily so, and spend restless nights buried by library books, looking for something-anything-that might give her a clue as to how.

Most Slytherins could care less about the attacks, they were only mudbloods and half-bloods being killed, what concern was it of theirs? But Seba took an interest to it that made her dorm mates whisper and question her house loyalty. Not that she cared.

The morning after the attack, the hall was sprayed with black silk, to mourn the death of the two students who had been killed in the attack. Justin Finch-Flechly and Mandy Brocklehurst. Both a year younger than Seba, a Ravenclaw and a Hufflepuff. She was angered by their deaths, but didn't feel the pain. She had become numb to it, and while offering condolences to the victims friends, it really was no loss of hers. She hadn't known either.

The hall was silent, and most weren't eating. Death brought lots of not-needed brooding time. When you closed your eyes, you only had to open them later, so those who fell in the first category were at somewhat of a disadvantage. The hardship came two times as rough when it had been sitting for awhile unopened, and made it harder to cope.

She sighed as she noticed that the only available spot to sit was right beside Draco Malfoy, who's lugs must have been snoring with their bunny rabbits up in the dorms. But for once, his glare was directed not at her, but across the room at Harry Potter. Her eyes traveled to Potter, who was glaring right back, fire and passion in his gaze.

She hated Potter, she hated Potter. They 'hated' each other. Hmm... interesting.

You could almost see the wheels in Seba Blake's mind, as a scathingly brilliant plan began to take shape.