Frigus . Sirius Black (Mortem BOOK 2)

chapter seventy-three

note: (relax, it's not that kind of note, no one's dying here) but time skip hehe 

also, enjoy neph and sirius being distgustingly cute with each other because i think we've had enough to angst for a while (or have we?) 

July 7th, 1980 - Grimmauld Place

It had been a long two months for Nephera, slowly trying to heal from everything she had went throught. It was not easy, nor was it a straight-line process, the brunette witch could not rid herself of the guilt she was feeling, no matter how hard Sirius or the rest of their friends tried to convince her that she had no reason to feel that way. 

The fact that she spent most of her days indoors, what with the Ministry still hunting for her, and the ever-looming threat of Riddle and her father. Three months ago, the girl would not have given two shits about the Ministry, or Riddle for that matter. The Ministry was far too stupid to catch her, and she had been dealing with Riddle hunting her down since she was sixteen. Now, though... 

Nephera did not trust herself anymore. She had never been insecure, not in her ability to take care of herself, at least, but that was all before. That was all before she had realized just how easy it would be to wipe away someone's entire personality, to change their entire perception of life, of what was wrong and what wasn't. Dying, she could deal with, dying, she could accept, but being turned again? Having her memories wiped all over again? That, she coulnd't do. 

It was that loss of trust in herself that had made her step away from the Order. Thankfully, in the two and a half weeks she had spent obliviated, Riddle had kept her tucked inside Malfoy Manor, with limited contact with the Order beside that one time where she had damn near killed the four boys. So, as far as the general members of the Order were concerned, nothing had happened to her. She had never been obliviated, she had never been working for Riddle. 

No, as far as the Order was concerned, the girl was simply absent. No one knew why, but no one asked either. Most of them had learned the hard way that it was best to remain in the dark when it came to the witch and her exploits. 

She was painfully aware of the fact that Dumbledore was taking full advantage of the situation, not that it mattered much. The Order had almost slowed down to a full stop, what with loosing so many members in the past year and Riddle moving even more secretly lately. Not to mention the fact that, with the knowledge that Riddle was seeking to plant a spy in their ranks, collective meetings had been banned, reduced to one or two members at the time at most. and generally only incuding two single phrases: 

'Any new leads?' 

'No, the  only thing we can do is keep patrolling,' 

Nephera couldn't be assed with patrols, although the one thing she did care about was her friends going on them. She was almost paranoid, after losing the Prewetts, and Marlene and Dorcas going into hiding, that the next victim of the war would be one of her friends. Or, more accurately, that Riddle would go after one of her friends to draw her out. 

Of course, one couldn't really call that paranoia as much as they could call it a very possible plan of action. Riddle himself had said it too many times 'your friends are your weakness', he had taken advantage of it once, taking away the memories of her friends had made her switch, had made her work for him. Who's to say he wouldn't use her friends again? 

The only thing keeping her grounded was the fact that Sirius had taken time off work. After she had come back, Moody had allowed the boy to take as much time as needed, probably because he had tried to stop Sirius from going to Nephera in the first place. Whatever the reason was, the raven-haired wizard had not left Nephera alone for as much as an hour, partly because he knew she was still healing, and prone to the occasional panic attack and very frequent nightmares, and partly because he himself did not feel safe doing so.