Dark Phoenix (Nico Di Angelo & Harry Potter)

8

Theodore Nott didn't know when it all began. He could vaguely pinpoint it to the middle of his fourth year at Hogwarts, when Cantankerous had taken to rubbing the spot over his inner left forearm frequently, rushing to his study on random occasions, and missing meals altogether.

The change had been subtle at first, and then on the night of the final Triwizard Cup game, while Theodore Nott had been home, ill from a bout of Dragon Pox, he had heard the crack of apparition from the study and Cantankerous hadn't returned for hours.

Following that day, things were never quite the same.

Theodore wanted to ask his father what had happened the night he had apparated. But at the same time, the change in demeanor was not something that aided his plans.

He was offended by his anxiety for making him want to ask these things.

After the Dark Lord's return - and Theodore hadn't even met the man yet - everything seemed to have gone to shit. No longer was his father than man who busied himself over a cauldron - an instrument requiring strict submission and obedience to it - he had become a cauldron himself.

The consequence of most actions was an Unforgiveable to the chest. The Dark Lord did it. Alecto did it. Cantankerous seldom chose to act in such a way, but when he did, he did it with pure intent to harm - just the way one was supposed to cast an Unforgiveable.

After Hogwarts had delivered the first set of envelopes over via Eunice, the Nott barn owl, the absence of a silver prefect's badge was rewarded with an Imperio.

By now, Theodore Nott was familiar with that Unforgiveable. He knew when to expect it before it would hit, knew the warm dullness that would eventually hug his insides, and he knew his father would do it out of disappointment, so the hold on his conscious wasn't as firm as it would've been, had Cantankerous been furious.

He had been instructed to do the usual - study one of the many books in Cantankerous's study, most likely on one of the subjects they would cover that year - and really, it was getting monotonous.

When Alecto Carrow had walked in, Theodore was sitting on the reclining armchair, book propped open on his lap, swinging his legs up and down, over and over again as the spell wore away.

He was twenty pages in and bored out of his mind. The boredom only became palpable and a very much preferred alternative to kill time with when the furious red haired witch had marched into study, wand brandished and ready to strike.

Theodore tensed, and the book fell off his lap.

If there was one pureblood family the Wizarding world could do without, it was the Carrows.

They were an unpredictable ticking time curse, much like Thorfinn Rowle, and if the stories added up, Bellatrix. It was a great unfortune that, with the Dark Lord's return, the Carrows had found themselves made permanent residents of the Nott House, much to the chagrin of the current inhabitants.

But they did as the Dark Lord had ordered, and all Theodore wanted was for the term to start so that he was no longer forced to be at their beck and call when Alecto and Amycus found it tedious to simply cast an Accio.

Cantankerous would turn a blind eye at their mistreatment of his only heir, but it was nothing Theodore was unfamiliar with.

The Carrows, if the Dark Lord's opinion was anything to go by, were favoured over the Notts. Unlike Cantankerous, who found it foolhardy to go about cursing muggles and mudbloods left and right, the Carrows treated it like they would an addiction - they kept feeding it. And when they couldn't engage in the behavior on the daily, sometimes - sometimes Theodore would find himself at the end of their wands.