Reactance | James Potter

prologue

   EVIL IS A shade. A deep, merciless shade that relishes in impenetrable darkness. It's not a color; it cannot be found on a wheel or in nature. It's not the blankness of the sky on a clear night or ink from a bottle.

  Evil is unmatchable. It weighs on hearts like a shackle accompanied by metal chains, clanging from one's leg as a silent reminder that they're trapped. Rooted to this invisible force. Captured, held, sentenced.

  Evil isn't a creature or a person. Evil is what goes bump — the scary stories that mothers tell their children to keep them in line. Evil is that dark shadow on the wall that keeps us awake, even when there's nothing truly there aside from a coat hung on a hook. To simply put it, evil is not anything at all. It's inside each of us, but it presents in different forms: for some fear, others desire.

   Evil is a shade. One only recognisable once it's too late, when it has already begun creeping up on you. Evil turns out all the lights and reaches for everything it can touch.

   And, if it grabs you, it will never let you go.

THE AIR WAS unbelievably cold. The breeze travelled through his wet clothes, where he could feel the water against his skin. His long hair was stuck together in clumps about his head; covered in a thin layer of ice, matted against his hot forehead.

Droplets collected beneath his eyes and spilled down his sculpted cheekbones in streams. As he walked along the sidewalk, thick black boots stomping in puddles with loud squeaks, his entire body trembled. Whether it be from the cold, rainy weather, from the unmatchable feeling of relief fleeting through his veins, or perhaps even from the small, minuscule amount of regret that still managed to toy at his heartstrings.

Regret. He shouldn't have done this. He shouldn't have left.

He came to a heavy stop at the edge of the gate, where the latch was always left unlocked and where the metal spikes aligned, heart hammering away in his chest and his mind filled with fuzzy noise.
There was a moment of great, silent pause; he simply stood there, the rain pouring down heavier atop his head as though encouraging him to continue on.

I don't belong here, he thought to himself again. And this was true, he was very far from where he was meant to be.

With his left elbow, he knocked into the gate. It gave easily, swinging forward and aside to allow entry onto the grounds. He inhaled deeply, his fingers gripping onto his wand a little harsher than necessary as he started up the long drive. The magical, dark brown twig tapped against the soaked material of his trouser leg.

Lanterns flickered alight on either side of him with every step he took; the dim, yellow colour illuminated only small areas of the gravel path beneath his feet but it was enough to see. The large, stone fountain was still running even at the late hour. Water seemed to be overflowing from it, splashing against an invisible barrier around the bath as to not flood the courtyard.

The manor looked darker in the nighttime, like more of a brown than the tan that it actually was. The great building stretched across the entire property almost: acres and acres of land, much too big a house for the simple family that lived inside.

He clambered up the marble steps, one after another. Stomp, stomp, stomp! The overhead of the front entrance covered him now, shielding him from the rain. Thunder still boomed behind him, lightning flashing across the charcoal grey sky in beams of blue light. He could feel himself flinching at the sound of the storm.