The Eagle and The Snake: A Tragic Love Story

86. What Is Mine

Luna and Carly really were the queens of the school.
Their reputation for being fearsome, grew even bigger after Carly's fight with Ginny.
Everyone knew her and Luna were not to be messed with.
Their old bullies moved out of the way and lowered their heads respectfully, when they saw Luna and Carly coming.
At least half of the school was afraid of them and what they could do.
They really were the pair that could do no wrong, in most people's eyes.

The girls were almost not looking forward to leaving Hogwarts for the Christmas holidays.
At school they were queens, but at the Malfoy Manor, they were just 2 more death eaters, living in a home that was not their own.
This was why Carly decided to visit the Potter Manor for the first time, as soon as the holidays began.
Voldemort had forced the Ministry to allow the girls to take their apparition test the moment they stepped off the train. So, the pair could now go anywhere they liked, without being tracked.
However, if they used magic, on a non pure-blood property, the Trace would still alert the Ministry of the magic they performed.

"Well. This is is" mumbled Carly, as she looked up at the looming Potter Manor in front of her.
"This isn't quite what I had expected" admitted Luna.
The Manor had fallen in despair somewhat, and vines crawled up the sides of the building like veins.
Carly just hoped that the inside of the Manor looked better than the outside.
She took a deep breath and inserted the key into the door, which the Ministry had provided her with, and she twisted it, unlocking the door.

Luna and Carly couldn't help but gasp as they pushed open the door and stepped inside the building.
Despite the thick layer of dust that had settled on everything, the Manor was beautiful.
The Malfoy Manor had a dark and almost gloomy feel to it, as did 12 Grimmauld Place. But the Potter Manor felt open and light, as if it was filled with nothing but good magic.
"I guess this settles it, everyone in your family is crazy rich" announced Luna.
"Was rich. They are all dead now" Carly corrected.
"Dead or not, they were rich, and they've left you a lot of stuff" replied Luna.

A grand chandelier hung from the high ceiling above the staircase.
Portraits covered the walls, and expensive furniture filled every room.
"So, what do you want to see first?" Asked Luna.
"I think I want to see the room my father grew up in" answered Carly.
"I assume that will be upstairs then... Lead the way, since this is your new home" encouraged Luna.
"I think it will take a long time before I can call this place home"
"You're right. It's going to take us weeks to make this place habitable, and months before we can actually live in it".

"That's not what I meant... Although this place belongs to me now, I don't feel any attachment to it. I have no memories of this place, and for all I know I never even came here as a baby. My Potter grandparents died before Harry and I were born. So, it's unlikely that either of us were ever brought here by our father, since he resided in Godric's Hollow with Lily... Even if I do end up living here with you one day, it will take a long time before I can call this place home" admitted Carly.

"I'm not expecting you to call it home overnight. It took you ages to refer to the Malfoy Manor as home, and you've been living there for over a year. However, I think that if we do decide to move in here next summer, you will end up calling it home pretty quickly. The Malfoy Manor is not yours, nor will you ever have any claim to it, unless you plan on marrying your cousin Draco" said Luna.
"Gross" shuddered Carly.

"Let me finish. The Malfoy Manor is owned by other people. And even though we are welcome to live there for as long as we please, it can never be our own home. The building belongs to Lucius and Narcissa. And the dark lord uses it as a base to hold his death eater meetings. So it will never feel homely to us. Narcissa also mothers us, as if we were her own children, which is why we can't stay at the Malfoy Manor forever, because we would never be allowed to grow up. But if the two of live together, here, we can make it our own. We can decorate it how we like, and fill it with love and joy. So that it never gives off evil vibes like the Malfoy Manor does" finished Luna.

"I guess you've got a point. That Manor was their home, and this Manor is ours. If we spent all Christmas making it look nice, then perhaps we can move in over the summer" smiled Carly.
"We'll be adults soon, so we won't need to be looked after by Narcissa. We will be able to do our own thing, including choosing where we want to live" replied Luna.
"Let's go and look around then, at what will one day be our home" announced Carly, before taking hold of Luna's hand and pulling her upstairs.

They easily found James's room, as it was still covered in Gryffindor banners and scarfs, and Quidditch memorabilia littered every inch of the floor.
They also found the master bedroom, which held the bed that Euphemia and Fleamont had died in together.
The girls also came across around a dozen other uncluttered bedrooms that hadn't been used in nearly a hundred years.

Once the girls had looked around upstairs, they retreated to the ground floor to inspect the dining room, drawing room, potions lab, kitchen, and dancing hall.
The room they found the most exciting was the vault under the Manor.
Instead of having a cellar under the building, like the Malfoy Manor had, the Potter Manor had a vault that was full of jewels. Every gem imaginable was in hundreds of pieces of jewellery, that completely decked the room.
Carly took several items out while Luna's back was turned, before they headed up to inspect the vast grounds.

A thin layer of snow covered the Potter grounds, a pitiful amount compared to what they were used to at Hogwarts, but the grounds still looked beautiful.
And once the girls had seen enough, they apparated back to the Malfoy Manor, where Narcissa had prepared a glorious meal for them to tuck into.
Although both girls felt very grown up, they also secretly liked having Narcissa wait on them, since neither of them were very good cooks.