crushed - remus lupin

-twenty-

Everything was dark.

Out of the blackness, Celeste could make out a table, covered with every instrument of torture one could imagine. She could practically taste the metallic scent of blood that surrounded the room.

Oh Merlin.

A voice resounded from the darkness.

"Such a disappointment."

Abraxas Malfoy.

Another higher voice joined his.

"There's always a runt."

Valyn Malfoy.

"A waste of pure blood."

Lucius's voice echoed.

Celeste felt a white-hot pain on her back, searing the skin where she had been 'marked'.

She had only ever seen it in a mirror once, and she hoped never to do so again.

Carvings of 'traitor', 'disappointment', 'bitch', 'runt', and slashes that had been made in anger lay there, serving as a reminder of who she really was.

Nothing more than a mistake, a fault in the system, an error that never should have occurred.

She wasn't meant to be the way she was, and her parents loved to remind her how easily she could be taken out of the rotation.

Those scars, some now nearly five years old, still felt fresh.

Then all she could feel was the cold.

Why was she cold?

Celeste sat up from what she had figured out was the floor of her dorm room.

The nightmare may not have been real, but the scars still were, no matter how badly Celeste wished they weren't.

Her roommates lay sound asleep, dreaming in a blissful way that Celeste would never understand. Dreams of clouds and sheep and rainbows, not of bloodstains, screams, and scars.

Finally giving up on sleep, Celeste tiptoed out of the dorm, leaving Marlene's content snores behind her.

She figured she'd do her routine for whenever she had a bad dream, and that seemed to be happening more and more often. When those nightmares would shock her awake, Celeste would go down to the common room, grab some homework and hot chocolate, and work until the sun rose.

It was silly, but she figured that she should be productive with her trauma. It made her feel less worthless.

Surprisingly, Celeste was not the only one awake at this late hour of the night, or should I say early hour of the morning. Remus was laying in his dormitory, staring at the ceiling, and tracing the scars on his face with his fingers.

He too had nightmares practically every night. Dreams of the moon, of his friends being harmed, and the most frightening one of all. Celeste's body crumpled on the floor. This particular dream was made even worse by the fact that in it, Remus was the one to hurt her in his werewolf form. It was really what he feared the most.

Remus was never sure how to handle these nights, and usually ended up laying awake until daybreak, leaving his dorm more exhausted than when he entered the night before.

But this time was different. He didn't know why, but something was telling him to go down to the common room.

Remus had never believed it fate or destiny. At least, he hasn't until he spotted the white-blonde haired angel asleep on the couch in front of the fire.