Briar watched him with curiosity as he shuffled closer. He stumbled when he neared her but managed to steady himself before he fell. He slightly blushed and stuck out his hand with the dandelion in it. He murmured, "For you."
She felt something odd...
Briar had not left the bathroom yet, and her stomach grumbled in protest, but she knew that she couldn't leave if she wanted to keep herself safe.
Folsy wasn't here this time to sneak her food and keep her out of sight; now, she was truly alone.
At some point, she heard the house settle into a silence again. She had enjoyed the stillness in the air, but she still wasn't able to rest. She began to count the specs of dust on her ceiling, grateful that Folsy had not been here to clean them since it gave her something to occupy her mind.
That was how she had been passing the time earlier in the night, but as the night wore on, and her eyes remained wide open, she began to feel a tightness expanding in her chest. She wouldn't be able to sleep in this state, so she just imagined herself back at Hogwarts or at 12 Grimmauld Place or Gran's house to find some comfort.
Even though this was her reality, she didn't have to be mentally present here. He couldn't stop her from this form of escape.
These activities had all occurred some time ago, although time felt infinite to Briar in these moments, even if she knew she likely had been here but a day at that point. Now, she sat with her back pressed up against the bathtub, and her arms wrapped around her knees. She was just watching the door with a sense of helplessness after she thought she heard a noise in her bedroom a few minutes before. Gideon was likely in her bedroom and about to use alohomora to enter the bathroom where she had been seeking refuge, but she had no way of stopping that if he chose to do that.
Another few tense seconds passed until Briar swore she heard a familiar voice whispering her name. She furrowed her eyebrows together and dragged her weak frame to the door to listen more carefully.
"Briar, are you in here?"
Was this a hallucination? She didn't think she had gone long enough without food for her to be hallucinating yet, and unless she had greatly miscalculated how much time had passed, it couldn't be an exhaustion-induced hallucination either.
With trembling fingers, she pushed the door open and peered into the darkness of her room. Her eyes took a moment to adjust, but she began to make out shadowy figures moving about her room when she squinted her eyes.
Stepping into the light casted from the bathroom was her dad. She pressed a hand to her mouth and choked, "Sirius? Is this real? Are you actually here right now?"
He rushed forward and took the trembling girl into his arms. He ran his hands over her hair and murmured, "It's okay, darling. We're here now. We're here."
Briar wondered who we referred to, but Remus stepped up to the pair of them then. He gave her a soft smile, and she felt as though she was wrapped up in her covers at 12 Grimmauld Place once again, something she had been imagining to get through the moments not long before.
Remus interrupted their embrace to whisper, "We need to leave now, Sirius. It isn't safe h-"
The door slammed open, and the lights flickered on then. Briar flinched, but Sirius shoved his daughter behind his back without a second thought. He and Remus both raised their wands at Gideon, who had now taken residence in the doorway of Briar's childhood bedroom.
Gideon raised his own wand in kind while a sick smile grew on his face. He snarled, "I was wondering if the two of you would ever try to set foot in my home like this...Just like in your school years, you two keep trying to take what isn't yours."
Sirius let out a wolfish growl. He spat, "Briar is not yours."
"Oh, of course," Gideon darkly laughed. "She belongs to the dark lord now."
Sirius and Remus both blinked in confusion for a second, but Gideon tilted his head to the side with pouty lips and a mocking tone. "Oh? Did she not tell you about her new allegiance? The dark lord has chosen her, Black... Go on, Briar. Show them."
"I don't care what Voldemort thinks has occurred. He has no claim on my daughter," Sirius bit back.
A primal sound rumbled from Gideon's throat, and he lifted his wand to cast the killing curse at Sirius, but Briar saw this coming and dove with Sirius onto the nearby bathroom floor as the spell blasted a burn mark into her bedroom wall where they had just been standing. Gideon completely ignored Remus as his focus zeroed in on Sirius. He rushed forward to cast the killing curse at the pair again, but Sirius frantically lifted his wand and casted it first.
The world moved into slow motion as Briar watched as the bright green light flashed out from her dad's wand and struck Gideon Davies in the chest. Gideon's face crumpled as pain shot through his body, but he soon fell to his knees and let out a cry. His eyes rolled into the back of his head when his skull hit the floor on his descent. She knew that it was the panic of the moment, but when Gideon Davies took his last breath, she swore that little gasp of air was all she could hear, despite the chaos in the room at the time.
Remus' eyes widened, but he rushed over to Sirius and Briar immediately. He panted, "We need to leave -- now."
Sirius vaulted to his feet and picked Briar up as well. When the two men told each other where they planned to apparate to, Briar didn't hear a word of it. She felt Sirius hand grip hers when he apparated them from the room, but she didn't register that she was leaving until her feet had settled on the grass in front of an unfamiliar building.
It was pitch black outside, and the crescent moon and smattering of stars shone a little light down on the pair. Briar took a few moments to catch her breath, but when she finally looked up at Sirius, she exhaled, "He's gone."
Sirius was as pale as a sheet when he nodded at his daughter. He had just killed someone, something he had never planned on doing. He knew that it had to be done to protect them both, but his blood ran cold at the thought of those green bolts flickering across the room to strike his old classmate.
His small nod made the reality start to set in for Briar. She covered her face as she cried. She repeated, "He's gone. He's gone. He's finally gone."
At first, her tears made him think with a sort of horror that Briar was grieving the man she had called her father for 15 years, but when the word finally slipped through her lips, he knew that these were not tears of sadness.
Briar's personal monster had finally been vanquished, and he felt slightly comforted by the fact that he was able to provide this relief for his daughter.
He pulled the 17 year old into his arms for a tight embrace as she blubbered her way into this realization. "Come on, darling, we have to get inside. Neville and his gran are waiting," Sirius sighed after a moment.
At the mention of her soulmate, Briar rushed into the unfamiliar building. He was standing in the entry room with hands pressed to either cheek as he paced about frantically. He had tear stains lining his round cheeks, and Briar knew her own cheeks had certainly matched his. She raced forward, and her quick steps caught his attention immediately. He turned to identify the sound, and they both rushed towards each other to catch one another in an embrace.
With hands gripping her tightly, Neville cried out, "Oh my god, Briar...Oh my god..."
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