Rivals | D.M

44. The Dark Mark

Aster's POV

First things first, I needed to teach myself how to apparate. If my father wasn't going to let me join him, I had to find my own way into the Death Eater meetings.

The thought terrified me. Becoming a Death Eater. I was completely against their agenda, their livelihood, but, I couldn't let me father do this alone, I couldn't let Draco do this alone. No matter how fucking terrified I was, how dangerous this whole concept even was, I couldn't be ignorant any  longer. Who was I if I just watched it all happen? I was a coward if I did that. My father may have sacrificed himself for me but I didn't ask for that. I didn't ask for him to dive straight into the one thing he had been running from his entire life. The wickedness of the Flint name.

That was why my Uncle wanted to see me. It was all making sense now.

I had been so blind for so long.

I was seventeen, old enough to apparate legally, I just hadn't taken the test yet. I had one lesson at the start of the year which involved disappearing from one section of the hall and appearing in a marked hoop at the other. It was incredibly difficult and I had only managed to do it once. I knew I needed a license but I didn't have time to obtain one.

So here I was, standing on one side of my bedroom, willing my body to disappear and reappear in my bathroom next door.

My body was tense, my fists clenched at my sides, my wand in my pocket.

Fuck, why was this so hard?

It had taken me a while to calm down after the conversation in the kitchen. I hadn't left my room since, and every now and then my brain caught up with my emotions and I felt my body shake and my heart pound.

I need to find out why the Dark Lord wanted my father so badly. This 'theory' of his was making my mind run a million miles per hour. I knew my father was smart, he was renowned for his magical theories and I knew it could be dangerous. One of the first things my father taught me was the first fundamental law of magic.

Tamper with the deepest mysteries - the source of life, the essence of self- only if prepared for consequences of the most extreme and dangerous kind.

As far as I knew, he didn't study dark magic theories. But over the years, I hadn't been interested in what my father worked on, I had been distracted. I had no idea what he was currently working on. When I was younger, it was mostly theories on protection spells and enchantments - how they worked, their permanency, the layers they needed to be achieved perfectly. I wasn't surprised he had put new protection spells over the house, it wouldn't surprise me if thevery reason I couldn't apparate right now was because of them. But I couldn't see a reason why the Dark Lord needed my father for a protection spell? I'm sure he was well versed in enchantments himself.

I sighed in defeat. It looked like I wasn't going to be able to apparate inside the house. I needed to practice outside.

Getting around my father was easy. He would be too busy inside his study to realise I was out of the house. But my mother was the problem, her incessant need to keep me under house arrest and the fact she was so stressed and upset about what was going on was going to make it hard.

I looked over to my school trunk sitting open wide on my bed. My potions book laid carelessly on top of a pile of clothes.

An idea clicked in my head.

Possibly immoral but I needed to help my father.

I ran to my bathroom, pushing phials and bottles to the side to find the bottle I needed. A sleeping draught. Something I kept for when I couldn't sleep.