August 9th, 2018.

Azkaban Prison,

the North Sea.

Cold.

That was her only feeling, her only sense, as the young girl walked quietly between two men.

Their footsteps echoed mournfully as the three made their way down a long, stone hallway. On both sides were cells, fitted with iron bars, matted with grit and dirt, holding a stone bed, a toilet, and a human being.

As the girl and her escorts passed, grimy hands reached out through metal slots, grasping futilely.

"Please ... " Voices echoed, dozens, up and down the corridor, rasping and pleading. "Help me ... Please ... !"

The girl's head turned neither right nor left. Her guards walked stiff and straight at attention without giving the prisoners a single passing glance. They held wooden sticks in their clenched fingers, the hems of their robes gliding behind them.

The only word to describe the girl was sharp. Sharp eyes, observing and taking in every detail. Sharp cheekbones, sharp chin, sharp, bony elbows. She was slender and graceful and beautiful, a beacon amongst a sea of blackness. She wore muggle clothes: a jumper, some jeans, and trainers. She looked incredibly out of place in Azkaban, but she had a mission, and she wasn't going to cower away, like the guards expected her to.

The girl's wand was tucked safely in the holster strapped onto her right forearm. She knew she didn't need it. None of these prisoners would be getting out any time soon.

The girl and the escorts stopped at the last cell, far separated from the others. Instead of merely bars, there was a metal door, heavy iron with steel enforcements. On the bottom, top, and side were runes, squiggling glyphs and cyphers.

"What are these?" The girl ran a slim finger up and down the carvings.

A gloved hand clamped down on her wrist. The girl glared witheringly at the Auror, and the wizard stared right back, his eyes a surprising bright blue. They were shadowed, deep set below his bushy eyebrows. Chiseled face, strong jaw. Stony expression.

"They're for extra protection. He's slippery, that Lestrange. Can't be too careful."

The Auror still held her firmly, so with a quick twist, she freed herself and stepped away towards the door.

"Open it."

The guards exchanged glances.

The girl's tone was icy, and yet smooth, French, but only slightly. "You have jobs. I have the paperwork, which you've gone over twice since my arrival. Now open the door."

The guard who had grabbed her began to protest in a slimy sort of voice. "Listen, miss,-" there was a notable stress on the word, patronizing and slow, "- are you sure a young 'un like you should be visiting criminals like him-?"

"Open. The door." Her grey eyes flashed, her lips pressed into a thin line.

The second guard, he was taller and lanky, with scraggly hair and a slight goatee, let out an audible sigh and quickly flicked his wand. The runes glowed slightly. Then there was a deep, metallic groan hidden amongst a bevy of the clicks and clattering from the locks and mechanisms.

Then the door creaked open, and that's when she heard it.

Giggling.

The cell was dark, an almost tangible dark that felt oily and messy. It reached out to her, calling her name. Her Obscurus stirred to life and called back, whispering and hissing. Peering inside she saw a man in the darkness, his form obscured from clear view.

The guards seemed to notice her sudden stiffness. "You can come back another time," tall, lanky guard said. "When it's brighter outside, or something."

She ignored him. "I'd like to talk to him," she said quietly. "Alone."

The guards reluctantly left her to stand in the hallway. The girl finally slid out her wand and with a flick of her wrist, she cast the Muffliato charm to prevent any eavesdropping.

In the cell was a stone slab with dirty tangled sheets and a bundle of hay for a pillow. The toilet was tucked in the corner, and there, sitting in the center of the room, was a man.

He was cross legged, like a schoolboy awaiting his teacher. His teeth were bared, yellow and brown, stretched in a wild grin. His face was dirty, his hair dirtier and beyond any human aid.

He was watching her carefully, giggling and mumbling under his breath.

The girl sat down on the grimy floor, meeting his glittering obsidian eyes straight on.

"Hello, Mr. Lestrange," she said. Her voice echoed and bounced off the walls.

He didn't answer her or diminish his smile, he only cocked his head. His eyes were wide and thoughtful, his smile crooked and ugly.

He unsettled her, but she wouldn't let him know that.

"I have a few questions for you," the girl continued, "about a woman. Her name was Meredith. Meredith Gaunt."

At this, she found a reaction. His smile slowly faded, his eyes hardened. His lips were turned downwards into a snarl.

"Meredith?" His voice was raspy and hoarse from disuse.

"Yes."

"She was ... my wife."

"I know." There was a rustling of paper, and she withdrew a file from the waistband of her jeans. The girl opened the file and took out a worn picture. It was a woman, smiling, waving into the camera. She was laughing soundlessly.

"Was this her?"

"Yes. What do you want?"

"You were caught by the Magical Law Enforcement three years after you disappeared from the Battle for Hogwarts," she said, ignoring his question. "You are here on over thirty accounts of first degree murder, torture, and crimes against humanity. You will be remaining in Azkaban for eight lifetimes."

The man giggled, as if she'd told him humorous joke. "Yes. Would have been more mudscum-" his voice raised suddenly into a screech that hurt her ears "-IF THE BLOODY AURORS HADN'T CAUGHT ME!" When no one came in to shut him up, the man pouted.

The girl was utterly unruffled. "Where was your wife when you were captured?" she asked him evenly. "She never showed up at your trial."

The man coughed out a short bark of laughter. "HA!" he sneered. "Come to my trial? The bitch could barely look at me most days." He pitched his voice to girly heights. "' Don't hurt them, they're only Muggles!' or ' they're witches and wizards Rab! How could you?' " Rabastan Lestrange shook his head. "Bah. Useless, blood traitor whore. Don't know how many times I had to punish her. The bitch never learned." He peered at her, frowning. "Who were you, again?"

The girl was silent during his tirade, but her eyes blazed with a quiet fire. "Do you know where your wife is now?"

He snorted. "Does it look like I've been up and about in the last seventeen years trying to find my traitorous wife?"

The girl smiled. It was not a nice smile. "No. It looks like you've been rotting in Azkaban."

The girl stood up and stretched, bones cracking from the chill. Then she tossed Meredith's photo at his feet. Her eyes burned with a righteous fire.

"I just wanted you to know that during your trial on June 15th, 2001, Meredith Lestrange neé Gaunt was giving birth to your child, Cassiopeia Lestrange." She tossed an elegant certificate onto the ground on top of Meredith's picture. The name Cassiopeia Gaunt-Lestrange was written in a beautiful cursive script.

Rabastan only stared at the paper without expression, seemingly unbothered that he had a child he didn't know about. If his lack of response irked her, she hid it well.

"I understand that you had left her a year earlier in order to go on a futile search for more of Lord Voldemort's Horcruxes. I also wanted you to know that your wife, free from your despicable abusive tendencies, died during childbirth as a free woman. Your daughter was given to Wool's Orphanage in Westminster, London. She was adopted by a lovely muggle couple, Dudley Dursley, the cousin of Harry Potter-" Lestrange let out a strange hissing noise "-and his French wife Amelie Dupont." She turned and made to leave. "Forget that I was here. I got what I wanted."

Rabastan lunged towards the girl, but an invisible force immediately threw him back, sending him sprawling across the floor. The runes on the door glowed angrily.

The girl fixed her cold grey eyes on his slumped, panting figure. He now seemed in his own world, his wild black eyes fixed on the stone wall to her right. Eurus could hear him muttering things under his breath.

"Muggles ... scum ... that bitch ... "

"I'm quite glad I was adopted by Muggles, Dad," she said, a smirk playing across her lips. "They were much better parents than you could have ever hoped to be."

With that, Eurus Dursley left her biological father on the floor, his scarred face drawn in terrifying realization, mouth open in a shriek of fury. Her silencing spell held, even as the cell doors slammed closed.

The guards were chatting rather vulgarly about their wives when the girl walked out of Rabastan Lestrange's cell.

Goatee Guard glanced at her steady hands and tilted chin. "I'm impressed," he said. "That bloke's not had a straight head since his brother and sister-in-law died. You handled yourself well if you're not some traumatized puddle."

Bushy Eyebrow guard snickered.

She rolled her eyes. "Right," she said dryly. "If you would escort me out, I would be much obliged." Her voice made no room for dilydallying. The two guards swiftly ushered her from the top of Azkaban Tower to the ground floor, where they bid her goodbye. She ignored them and slipped on a wind breaker before leaving without another word.

The two guards watched her trudge her way down the long, stone walkway, the screaming wind and freezing wind swaying her left and right. Soon, she was only speck amongst the dark. The sea splashed and stormed on both sides, spraying her with saltwater. At the end, she stopped, spun on her heel, and apparated away.

The guards stared at the empty stone path.

"She gave me the creeps," said Bushy Eyebrows.

Goatee nodded sagely. "Yep. Did she look familiar to you?"

"Eh? A little, I suppose. Still creepy though."

"Definitely."

"After we're done in this shithole, you wanna head to the Leaky Cauldron for a shot?"

"I'll buy if you feed the prisoners."

"Deal."

The two guards walked back inside the lonely Azkaban prison, the waves of the North Sea roaring in their wake.

Eurus apparated back to 4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey, in the middle of the night. Her watch read 1:00 AM by the time she stumbled up the steps to her grandparent's home.

4 Privet Drive and every other house on the streets were exact replicas of each other: brown roof tiles, neat brickwork, Dutch-Tudor style. Not small, but not too big either.

A nice neighborhood with nice houses with nice people inside.

She hated it with a burning passion.

Eurus tried the door. Locked. Well, damn. She let out an angry breath, steam flowing from her mouth. It was a chilly August evening, barely fifty. Fall would be coming faster than usual.

She briefly contemplated apparating to her room in the attic, but immediately brushed it aside. She was luckily enough that her grandparents and great aunt hadn't woken up from her apparation to her street. Apparating to her room was pushing it. She sighed and walked around the side of the house, intending to climb a tree and army crawl on a branch to her attic window.

That's when she remembered: they didn't have a tree anymore. Her grandfather hired a handyman to cut it down last week.

Well, damn.

Cursing under her breath, Eurus steeled herself and rang the doorbell once, twice, three times until the lights in the house turned on.

She could hear muffled snarling and grumbling m before the door was wrenched open at a frightening speed. Peering down at his granddaughter through swollen, watery eyes Vernon Dursley, patriarch of 4 Privet Drive. Behind him was what looked like his twin, Marjorie "Marge" Dursley.

Vernon and Marge, were not, in fact, twins, however much they looked like each other. Marge was older by three years. Both had thinning, blonde-grey hair on round mottled heads. The Dursley siblings were large in width but very strong, with meaty hands and stocky limbs. They were the human replica of swine was how Eurus liked to think of them.

She hated them more than the house, and they knew it full well.

"What the bloody hell are you doing out here?!" Vernon snarled. He was looking at her like someone would look at a cockroach or a spider, with unveiled disgust. "You were asleep! Did you ruddy sneak out?!"

"I was just visiting someone. Lost track of time, Vern." She attempted to edge past him into the house, but he quickly snatched her arm in a vice. Eurus winced as her grandpa dragged her inside, heedless of her ribs as they banged against the door jamb. Marge lumbered after them as she shut the door, although not before glancing furtively up and down the deserted street.

Vernon shoved her roughly into the loveseat. Eurus sat there, slouched, arms crossed and fuming, a very different picture from when she was calm and cool and strong within the four walls of Azkaban.

This was different. She was at home. She was in hell.

Her grandfather loomed over her. She could hear his voice, demanding to know where she was, that she should hope to God that she wasn't doing You-Know-What and it didn't matter if she was of age in her world, she would not do anything strange or unnatural in his house and was she listening to him?

She wasn't.

Eurus' eyes were trained on a picture frame on the living room mantle. Her father, her mother, and Eurus, years ago, happy as could be. She wished they were here, alive, so that she didn't have to live with her awful grandparents and her fat, ugly whale of an aunt.

There was an ugly smacking sound and her head was suddenly wrenched to the side.

"PAY ATTENTION!" Aunt Marge was roaring. "Where were you?! What were you doing?!"

The interrogation seemed to wake up her grandmother, Petunia. The tall, frail woman crept down the stairs, eyes wide and hands white knuckling the banister. She was simple nightgown and pink hair curlers were nestled throughout her tangled curls.

"V-Vernon? What's -?"

Vernon leveled an angry gaze on his wife. "Go back to bed, Petunia," he barked.

Eurus attempted desperately to meet her grandmother's gaze, begging with her eyes to speak up, but, as usual, Petunia looked away and fled to the refuge of her bedroom.

Eurus was left at the mercy of the Dursley siblings.

This was not going to be a good night.