Snow Vein

Chapter 1

I stand by Zane’s freshly dug grave two weeks later. They havn't yet put him in, all they've done is dig out the hole. I feel so guilty. It’s all my fault. I could’ve protected him.

                How? How could I have saved him? No matter how many times I ask myself this question I can’t find an answer.

Suddenly I flash back to the day I last saw him alive, the day he died.

The sun was finally taking a break from shining its impossible heat down upon us, as it slipped down behind the hills in the distance. The moon soon came up and took its place, rising higher up into the sky. I sat in my bedroom and finished up the last of my letter, signing my name at the bottom. My owl, Thorne, was ruffling his feathers impatiently, wishing to stretch his wings for a bit. I folded the letter and put my family seal on it.

Our seal is a phoenix in flight.

                "Alright Thorne, take this to Vexen, Xandria, and Xena Riddle." I said as I strapped the letter to his leg and stroked his black feathers.

                Thorne flapped his wings and gave a loud 'sqwack' before he flew out of my open balcony door. I watched him fly off until he was barely a speck in the sky. The moon was now completely full and casting its white glow over my family's estate.

                "Snow!" My father yelled from downstairs.

 "Coming dad!" I shouted back as I closed my balcony doors. I rushed downstairs, passing our house elf on the way down. I found my father standing in the family room, holding a letter in his hand.

                "Yes dad?" I said once I entered the room. He looked up at me with his piercing grey eyes that I had inherited from him.

                "I just received a letter from the Ministry of Magic that you used magic." He informed me, his eyes showing all the anger that had seeped into his words.

                "I didn't use magic dad." I replied, my heart beating fast.

                "So the Ministry just sends fake letters about somebody using magic from a Black Ember wand?" He asked. My dad wasn’t good with punishments, but when it comes to breaking rules he knows how to let you know how he feels.

                "Dad, you need to believe me, I didn't. I haven't even touched my wand today." I said honestly, keeping my cool even though he wasn't. Just then a cream colored owl swooped into the room from an open window, holding an official-looking letter in its beak.

                The owl dropped the letter into my father's opened hands, and then flew out the window once more. My father said something unintelligible then snapped open the parchment.

                I stood in front of him in silence while he read his letter, wondering what it contained. I looked out the window as I thought about the Riddle triplets, as I sometimes call my three best friends. I wondered if they had gotten my letter and if they had written back. I missed all my friends at Hogwarts so much and I couldn't wait to get back so I could see them again. I had been traveling all summer with my family so I didn't get to see any of them.

                "Well, um, it seems here that you didn't use magic..." My father said awkwardly, he's never good with admitting he's wrong or apologies.

                "It seems as though your... brother, was using your wand when he preformed the magic." My father said, his voice angry again.