Acheron

"And when man faces destiny, destiny ends and man comes into his own."

--Andrè Maulrax, The Voices of Silence

Clarissa Potter crossed her skinny dangling legs and swayed them back and forth from her front pew in St. Dymphna's Cathedral, humming to herself and lightly observing her surroundings. Her gray eyes looked over the golden statue of a young woman with a flower, standing on stone blocks with sandaled feet and looking down on her with compassion. Around her were people--lots of people, none of whom she could remember meeting--clothed in finer garments than she had seen before in her life, let alone been close enough to touch. She twiddled her thumbs quietly, watching them: one woman had a handkerchief to her cheek; another was checking her watch in aggravation. A man in the corner was snoring gently, and his comrade beside him seemed to have pulled out some paperwork and a pen. Crying, checking your watch, sleeping and working seemed to be the common activities at the Cathedral. Grandmother Frances had told her that everyone was there to mourn her mother's death--to mourn means to be sad about, you know. Grandmother Frances had told her that, too. But the people around her didn't look very sad. Even the few women with handkerchiefs to their cheeks didn't have red eyes like her Mummy had had when she cried.

But there, in the back, she saw someone she recognized. The middle-aged woman smiled through her tears, and waved. She had gray hair already, but Mummy had said once that it was because her mummy had gray hair when she was young, too, and she couldn't afford to waste money on silly things like hair dye the way the Malfoys did. Clarissa didn't care. She thought it looked pretty that way, different then her own black hair, though Mummy said her hair would look that way when she got older. Just when she was going to yell out her name, Ceris, and go to hug her, a big man with a large chin grabbed Ceris' arms and led her out of the building.

Clarissa was sorry. Ceris had had red eyes, and the handkerchief pressed to her cheek was wet with tears.

-*-

No mountain's too high for you to climb,

All you need to do is have some climbing faith.

"Boys don't cry."

No river's too wide for you to make it through,

All you have to do is believe it when you pray.

Crossing his arms, James scowled. He didn't need this. He didn't need her. He didn't need this, he didn't need her, he didn't need her custody papers, her House Elf, or any of her money. He didn't need her mansion, for that matter, or that king sized bed he'd slept in last night. HE could get along just fine on the streets, sleeping in cardboard boxes and begging for food--

No, he did need her. His mum had almost cut her right arm off and sold it to keep them from that: it was his responsibility to take the easy life when it was given to him.

He still paid her no mind.

He hadn't known of her existence until that day, after all: a day he had thought couldn't have gotten any worse, by the looks of things. It had been storming outside again, and Mr. MacDougal had refused to let him play Quidditch in the rain with the new Shooting Stars the Malfoys had donated to the office. Rather than play dolls with Clarissa, talk with Susanna, or borrow one of Joanna's many books, he had set himself to looking out a folorn window, trying with all of his might to remember her name--Nora Anne Welsh Potter, Nora Anne Welsh Potter, Nora Anne Welsh Potter... as he tried not to cry, because he needed to set an example for his younger sisters. He was a boy, and boys didn't cry.

Coming from his insides, it was his lifeline. Coming from The Lady, that phrase would be the death of him.

Because when they had left London and the Ministry- and everything they had ever known, along with it-and arrived at The Mansion, things had gone from bad to worse. She had shunted them into their separate bedrooms to speak with the man who had been waiting in the living room: a Malfoy, with silver-rimmed glasses and a smirk.

After it was obvious The Lady wasn't coming back, the Potter children had congregated in Susanna's room; Susanna, being Susanna, had been extremely impressed with The Lady's associates. "A Malfoy, of all people!" Her words rang in one ear and out the other, closing every door to the droning man at the lectern. "Imagine how rich she must be! Who would have thought we'd ever know someone who drinks tea with a Malfoy? Why, we might even get to meet one, someday!" Joanna had rolled her eyes at her younger sister and explained that Malfoys were people, just like everyone else, and there was no need to make a fuss over them. Meanwhile, Clarissa had begun staring into space and Susanna, hands clasped, waited impatiently for her to finish so that her gushing could continue undisturbed. James had kept his mouth shut: he'd heard things about the Malfoys that his younger sisters didn't need to hear.

And then you will see,

The morning will come,

And every day will be bright as the sun

All things considered, the Potters weren't really 'the Potters', but 'Nora's kids.' Their father, rich and well-known, had done his best to support them, but when he had disappeared in 1966 it was no surprise to Nora and her children.

Nora kept all four children under close watch, despite her sons foul temper; her oldest daughters rude comments to all who dared speak, the spoiled and self-centered middle child and her youngest daughters avoidance of the world. They were all disgustingly human, but they were a family.

James had always wondered if he and his sisters were ever too hard on their mum. None of them had ever wanted to be difficult to tend to, it just sort of... happened. Susanna just sort of happened to turn her nose up at her peas, Joanna just sort of happened to spend too much time reading and not enough time washing the dishes, so she had to do them before she left for work; James just sort of happened to get so out of control with the Filibuster's Fireworks that they left ash marks on the carpet.

As Nora's kids, they were different from the rest of the Potter dynasty: Yeshan had had eight brothers, and only two of them remained in contact with the family, one making bi-yearly visits to the flat and the other only keeping correspondence by owls. As kids they were different, individual and separate in their actions and their opinions. Their opinions of The Lady, in particular.

Susanna had been enraptured by her presence, once placed in the proper surroundings. He supposed if he were a girl he would have been, too--maybe. She was the very image of grandeur, with her amazing dress robes, sparkling in gold and silver and interwoven with blue satin. Her house, which he had aptly titled, 'The Mansion', was larger than any they'd ever seen, and at least six times larger than any he had ever occupied. But James didn't care about any of that. To him, she was just a lady who had swirled her way into his life, not trying to replace his mother, but rise above her.

Clarissa hadn't much of an opinion on The Lady, James didn't think--at six years old, she couldn't have been old enough to form one, he figured. She must have been happy about her many eloquent things, because Clarissa had always had a liking for pretty things, though she didn't seem to express it. He had yet to learn the massive difference between eloquent and pretty, and the attraction of each.

Jeanna was the sister he was proud of. The nine year-old done more than not care about her surroundings: she had refused to notice them altogether. She hadn't spoken a word at the missing muggle clothes from her wardrobe, or taken note of the opportunity to have her own bedroom for the first time in her life. She had just walked down to the library, calmly and coolly, taken a thick, leather-covered book from the shelves, dusted it off, and carried it to her room, where she read through the pages and didn't initiate a word to anyone. The Lady had had to send her maid up to get her for dinner, at which point she had merely adjusted her glasses, marked her page in the book, and come downstairs.

So all of your fears,

Cast them on me,

All I ever wanted was you to see

The song continued, pounding in his ears like a bursting headache. The singer: a man, bald, with a voice and posture reminiscent to that of a frog, was just another unfamiliar face in the crowd, doing his duty to what was left of the Potter dynasty. He wasn't someone who actually cared about his mum: no one here cared about her. He looked about behind him before The Lady could pull him back, to see that not a single person was truly paying attention to what was going on. James wondered if they even knew his mother's name, let alone what she had gone through for her family. For her friends.

I'll be your cloud up in the sky,

I'll be your shoulder when you cry,

I'll hear your voices when you call me,

I am your Angel

They had never fit in with wizarding society--not since their father had disappeared--and were too 'eccentric' for most of the muggles. Which was just as well, since Nora wouldn't have known how to act around muggles, anyway. She had never known how to act around people, in general: too quiet to grasp attention and too shy to make an impression, she had been left to socialize with the 'starving artists' and 'street urchins' of wizarding society, for those types most certainly do exist. She had just barely supported her children with her meager job as a journalist for a small town newspaper, The Daily Prophet. She had tried her best, James was fiercely proud of that, but after six years of it, his sisters had begun to look worse for wear. He didn't know how he had looked: he hadn't looked in a mirror. His father had inherited a fortune, James had heard, but they hadn't knowledge of the Gringotts' vault number or the key, so their family was left with nothing.

And when all hope is gone, I'm near,

No matter how far you are, I'm near,

It makes no difference who you are,

I'm your Angel

James didn't know how or why it happened. Maybe she caught it from the building she worked in. Maybe one of her friends had been exposed to it, and passed it on. Maybe she had had it all along, and it had just caught up with her--he didn't know. All he knew was that it was a muggle disease that could have been cured, had the medi-wizards been notified soon enough. James had seen the signs, even if they hadn't--she had skipped on work for a full week, when she usually didn't even take a midnight break, and she had stayed in bed the entire time, vomiting into a pan. That was at first--later, she hadn't even the energy or the insides to vomit anymore, and she just lay there in bed, jerking every once in awhile in her sleep. Then, finally, she didn't wake up at all.

I saw your teardrops, and I heard you cry

All you need is time

Seek me and you shall find

You have everything and you're still alone

Susanna had been the first to find her. Her scream had woken the entire house, with James running to her side and, after checking her pulse, grimly determined her death--thinking back on it, he didn't even know at what hour she had died in the morning, or even during the night before. He had raced out of the flat, down to the second floor and pounded on Ceris's door. She had come, and...

It doesn't have to be this way

Let me show you a better day

Oh and then you will see

The morning will come

And all of your days will be bright as the sun

She was gone. Forever.