Sewn silence

At Hogwarts, the name Morcant meant little. Just another old pure-blood family cold, proper, forgettable.

Tyberus was the same. Silent, polite, the "backup friend" in his housemates' plans. They admired the mask, never noticing the tremor in his hands, the scars tugging at his lips, the storm behind his eyes.

Silence had been sewn into him long before school. Every summer, his parents reminded him: a Morcant heir should be seen, not heard. Needle. Thread. Flesh. Pain that lingered long after the stitches came undone.

Even the twins sometimes pressed him too far a teasing question, a careless giggle and the silence frayed. Something snapped inside, a scream he could not make, a fury he could not release. He pressed his lips together, swallowed it down, and let the mask settle back over him.

To them, he was cold, distant, untouchable.
To himself, he was a boy whose voice had been stolen, whose screams still lived in his chest.
And for the twins ,fragile, unbroken he bore it. Because if not him, then them.

No one noticed until they finally did.