How to Make a... Future | Sebastian Sallow x F!OC| One Shot Collection

Cicatrix

A/N: Hello! This is short fluffy drabble I wrote in response to a question on tumblr about Aurélie's scars. Though this takes place after the events of Villain, it contains no hard spoilers, just some hints that they've been through some stuff.

-x-

Sebastian Sallow was no idiot, by any means.

Having been raised by two fiercely academic professors, he'd spent much of his childhood with his nose buried in a book, studying magical theory and practicing wandless magic well before he'd taken his epochal trip to Ollivander's. Needless to say, by the time he arrived at Hogwarts — armed with a dragon heartstring wand and an itching desire to point it at everything — his intelligence was rivalled only by that of his sisters: the Sallow twins, though grieving the tragic death of their parents, were the brightest pair of students the school had seen in recent memory, an unstoppable force of Slytherin brains, resourcefulness, and ambition who were destined for greatness despite their unfortunate beginnings.

In fact, so brilliant was Sebastian's studious mind that when those unfortunate beginnings turned into unfortunate endings — starting with his sister's curse and ending with his uncle's death — his grades remained so impeccably high that even the strictest professors were loathe to punish him too severely when he repeatedly broke curfew to steal books.

Much to the chagrin of his peers, excelling in his studies was, to put it mildly, downright bloody easy, and though his natural proclivity towards excellence often put him on the receiving end of bitter remarks and jealous taunts, Sebastian took pride in the fact that despite everything that had been taken from him, his intelligence remained unfaltering.

That is, until he fell in love.

Little did he know that the thing that would ultimately turn his brain from highly efficient machine into flobberworm mush would come not in the form of N.E.W.T studies or brutal exam revisions, but from a girl who was so beautiful she rendered him incapable of coherent speech, rational thought and, perhaps most difficult of all, an inability to restrain himself from pulling her onto his lap and staring at her all gooey-eyed like he was now, their faces so close he could count every sun-kissed freckle across her nose.

To think he'd once thought himself too smart to ever fall in love.

What an idiot.

'You have a scar.' Aurelie was the first to break the silence they'd been enjoying for the better part of the afternoon, tilting her head to inspect the two faint scars that adorned his bottom lip. 'What happened?'

Sebastian had to hold his breath as her fingers ghosted the corner of his mouth; though the great weeping willow they'd settled under for the day offered some privacy from the shrewd eyes and wagging tongues of their fellow Feldcroft residents, it wasn't quite an appropriate place to enact all the romantic fantasies he imagined whenever she was perched in his lap like this.

'Flying —' He cleared his throat. 'Flying accident.'

'Quidditch?'

'No, uh —' Me crash broom. Biiiig idiot. 'I borrowed my father's broomstick when I was seven. Crashed into the side of the house.'

'Silly,' she murmured, giggling so close to his mouth that he inhaled it.

Sebastian nodded: the only response he could reasonably manage as her breath fanned pleasantly across his face, as warm and sweet as the summer air in his lungs.

Yes. Me stupid. Give smooch.

'You have scars, too,' he observed, his feather-light touch mirroring hers as he traced the delicate scars along her jawbone.

Though they did little to mar her beauty, the three long scratches seemed somehow too violent for features so fine, like cracks in an ornately gilded mirror, or chips in an otherwise pristine marble slab. He'd often wondered how she'd gotten them, but the mere thought of her suffering any sort of pain was so intolerable that he'd never found the courage to ask.

Seeming to sense the disquieted tone of his thoughts, Aurélie caught his fingers and pressed them to her cheek, effectively short-circuiting his brain again.

Me like touch face.

'Oh, those,' she said mildly, leaning into his touch. 'Gardening mishap.'

Sebastian could only grunt questioningly in reply, struck dumb again by the gentle warmth of her skin and how softly it yielded beneath his calloused palm. It wasn't often she let him touch her so willingly; after all, there were scars that ran deeper than her marked skin, barely healed wounds that were so fresh and tender that she flinched away if he wasn't careful enough, slow enough. Part of loving this tentative girl was learning to control the moments his brain flipped off and his rambunctious heart took over, when his once infallible logic and reason were trumped by his big, dumb heart.

Theirs was a love that had exploded into existence at the start of their seventh year only to smoulder away inexorably for the rest of it until the flames inevitably reared up to engulf them. Now, a month after graduation, both a little scorched around the edges, neither of them were quite used to being together together, still reeling from the events that had nearly torn them apart while trying to navigate a future they'd never seen coming.

Of course, Sebastian had known from the beginning that his future was bound to hers — but never like this.

'Papa raised Venomous Tentacular when we lived in France,' Aurélie explained, closing her eyes as he stroked his thumb across her cheek. 'Maman was not happy about it. She argued that it was too dangerous to keep such aggressive plants in his greenhouses, especially with a curious daughter in tow.' She cracked open an eye to peek at him, a little wry grin teasing the corner of her lips. 'She didn't approve of my enthusiasm for gardening. Apparently, "it's not becoming of a lady to have dirt caked under her nails all the time." But Papa insisted.'

'Hufflepuff's and their plants,' Sebastian murmured, surprised he was able to string together four words that actually made sense.

'Yes,' she said, glancing up through her lashes with a smile tinged with pain. Sebastian returned it in kind, his own smile heavy with the burdens he shouldered. He knew how it felt to have the warmth of every happy memory tempered by the cold indifference of loss, every fond recollection skewed by sorrow. Like a favourite landscape seen through a rain-lashed window, familiar yet distorted, so too where his own memories of his past, of Anne and his parents, his childhood.

With a patience that was new to him, Sebastian waited in quiet observance while Aurélie disappeared across that great chasm of death to visit a happier time, letting her own tainted memories sweep her away until the rustling of summer wind through willow branches brought her back to him.

'Well,' she said, shifting her faraway gaze to meet his, 'you can imagine her horror when a Tentacular seedling reared up unexpectedly and scratched me.' She gestured at her face, tilting her chin back to show him the full extent of the damage her gardening mishap had left behind. Sebastian instinctively leaned forward, wanting so badly to kiss, to soothe, to mend, but mindful, as always, of taking his time.

Pretty.

'It was the worst fight my parents ever had,' she sighed. 'Maman was distraught, said that I'd ruined my face and that Papa had been irresponsible to let me near them. She tried every remedy under the sun to erase the scars — magical and mundane, Healers and Herbologists... even a Curse Breaker when she got really desperate. But magical wounds leave scars, so...'

She trailed off with a shrug, and Sebastian thought that if he didn't kiss away the lingering sadness from her face right then and there, he might actually explode.

'And what did your Papa think?' he asked, his voice a reverent whisper as the tip of his nose brushed hers.

'He used to say that my scars were simply "physical evidence of my curious nature and adventurous spirit",' she whispered back, repeating her father's words with perfect recollection. 'And that they only made me more beautiful.'

'Wise man, that Papa of yours.'

No more sad. Me smooch now.

When he leaned in again, dipping his head to brush his nose along her jawline, she didn't move away.