Mended

Thirteen

Lorna begins each day with such verve and tenacity that it creates a whiplash effect. One moment you're groggy, sipping your morning coffee while rubbing the sleep for your eyes, the next you're racking your brain to come up with the answer to one of endless questions being thrown your direction. The moment she had learned to string words into sentences, talking became her favorite hobby.

Lorna was blind to just how bad things were for the two of them, Danu has done her best to keep the bare cupboards closed when she wandered into the kitchen, she was much too young to notice that anything of value that Severus had left in the home at Spinner's End was now missing and had yet to begin asking why her mother was skipping most of her meals and her clothes were constantly needing altering to fit her rapid weight loss. Her many late-night stays with the Weasley's were meant to be fun, not a means to allow her mother to work a second job at a local apothecary.

The jewelry Severus had gifted her had been the first to go, sold at a jeweler in Diagon Alley, likely for far less than Severus had purchased them for. The silk gowns he had zipped up her back as she trembled at the bathroom sink before going to meet The Dark Lord were the next. The bits and bobs lining the bookshelves in their parlor that Severus had left behind were worth a few meals. The only things remaining of him was the golden band on her hand, the cauldron Draco had brought by the day Severus had been released from Saint Mungo's, the scarf he had left Lorna, and a few handwritten notes in a wooden box atop her dresser. His discarded wedding band had not been safe, it was sold the same day the string of pearls he regularly clasped around her neck had gone.

She had lost count of the number of times her right thumb and index finger wrapped around that thin, golden band, prepared to remove it and add it to the pile of items to sell, but backing out at the last moment. She couldn't do it. One day, if Lorna wanted it, the ring would belong to her. Until then, it would remain safe on her finger, just where Severus had left it.

Severus was seeing someone else, had been since he had left her. Molly liked to think that the other woman was the reason as to why Severus left, perhaps he met her, fell madly in love, and ran off to the beach to live another life, with a new family. For a while, Danu believed it, too. Now, she simply did not care. Molly urged her to file for divorce, to serve him for support for Lorna as well. If Severus wanted a divorce in order to live a life with Cathleen, he would need to be a man and come to her himself.

Danu dodges Lorna's right hand wielding a long twig as she prances around the room shouting spells she had picked up, and thrusting the twig through the air as if it were a sword. From his golden frame, her great-great-great-great grandfather, Phineas Nigellus Black watches her with a look of pride. Harry had recently left the portrait there with her, against her will. No one else wanted him in their home, he felt guilty simply chucking it or locking it in a closet, and for whatever reason Phineas was not telling, had requested to be reunited with her. For the most part, Phineas leaves this portrait empty, opting instead to spend the majority of his time at Hogwarts in the Headmaster's Office. He stops by several times a week, watches Lorna for a few moments, and then leaves without a word.

"She will make an excellent addition to Slytherin." Phineas remarks for the thousandth time.

"She will be whatever she will be and will make an excellent addition to any house The Sorting Hat chooses." Danu reminds him once more.

"No." Phineas says dryly as Lorna shouts Wingardium Leviosa in an attempt to lift her stuffed hippogriff from the floor. "This one will be a Slytherin. I can feel it."

"We'll see, Phineas." Danu replies as she makes her way out of the room to pour a glass of water, an attempt to calm her shaking hands. Harry would be meeting her at The Burrow in half an hour so that the two of them could venture to Clagmar Coast.