In the Shadow of Azkaban

Volume II: LXXIX

Warning: Please be aware that this chapter involves gruesome depictions of death.

Marat's Point-of-View
Mykonos, Greece
August 1896

The loud snap broke out against the terracotta floor. The living area had been silent up until that point. It was about time we started fresh. Anew. As a family.

But I only counted three heads.

Antoinette, Kassia, and Morganna were strewn about the floor until my little girl rose up and ran straight for my arms. I felt her clasp her hands across my back, and the shirt I wore began soaking with tears.

"Kass. What went wrong? Where's Marvolo?" I held Morganna a bit tighter, bracing for her response.

He had always been volatile. Perhaps he attempted to kill the three, or worse, call upon Xilia.

But I knew as soon as Kass' eyes met mine, that it was something bigger than that.

"No!"

I watched Marvolo scream and thrash about in his bed in Kassia's memory.

The tone of his voice descended, and his little face lit up a beet red hue. He had been bloody pissed. And for good reason.

"I'm not going. Iskra isn't my mother! And my father only cares about that baby. I was here first, and I won't leave."

Kassia's mind started racing while she decided.

If I let him continue, Xilia or Orion will hear and come to his so-called rescue. If I force him to go, he could use his magic against me or any one of us. If we somehow manage to get him to Greece, he will be miserable. He would most likely give away our location to his grandmother or uncle, and we would constantly fear for our lives. He cannot go with us. Marat will either despise or thank me later, and I'll have to live with the consequences.

I felt the weight on her chest while she gestured for Antoinette to take Morganna.

"Marvolo. I love you. And I'm sorry." Kassia couldn't even look him in the eyes when she drew her wand.

Her arm drug upward to aim at his face.

"Obliviate."

Kassia twisted her wand clockwise and stood almost motionless as the memories drew into her wand, and then she waited a few seconds before switching to counter-clockwise to alter the memories.

And I visualized them.

All of our bodies were situated in the main foyer. Mangled.

Antoinette and Kassia's throats had been slit, and the blood still produced thumping sounds as it poured out of their throats. It trickled off their skin and pooled on the floor beneath them. Kassia's hand twitched a few times, and Antoinette let out one last gasp of air. Her chest caved in afterward.

They must have been killed last.

Ominis' body laid beside them. His eyes were plucked out while his wand had been shoved down his throat. It poked out of the skin by the nape of his neck. Both the palms of his hands held one of his glassed-over eyeballs. Lailah had been bundled next to him. Smothered.

Marat and Iskra were holding hands, but their clasped palms led up to shoulders that were ripped from their torsos. So, that even in the afterlife, they couldn't be together. Markov had been murdered in the same manner as Lailah, and his tiny body seemed almost invisible swaddled up above their decapitated appendages.

Once they were satisfied with their heinous acts, the Ashwinders stood above the fabricated scene, vaporizing our false bodies while Marvolo's face peered through the banister upstairs.

I forced my mind from hers to gather my own perspective.

This would traumatize Marvolo for perhaps the rest of his life. But as much as I hated the prospect, Kassia had done one thing correct.

She was thorough. She made it believable.

And she made the best choice she could in that moment.

Marvolo would grow up to hopefully despise the purebloods like the ones that murdered his family.

I let go of Morganna and stood to face my aunt. I grabbed her hands in mine and spoke quietly, "Kassia. You did the right thing. Don't blame yourself for any of it. It was my fault. Not yours. I should have realized he would refuse and devised accordingly."

I wrapped my arms around her thin frame, and after a few moments, she did the same to me. We were already a broken family, but at least we were free from Xilia's torment.

I would look for my son when he was of an appropriate age of understanding and remove the tainted memories.

He would then realize that we did what we could for all of us. Even him.