Two Cousins, One Camouflaged Barn, and a Lifetime of Leftovers (Plus a Diary Worth Bleeding For)
Saturday, April 7th, 2009 | 6:02 p.m. | Location: Potter-Peverell-Grey Apartment, Magical London (Unplottable, Rude, and Possibly Sentient)
Tagline: The Home That Keeps Giving, Even When You're Not Sure You're Ready to Receive
The door sealed itself behind them with a smug hiss. Seraphina didn't flinch she never did but she did narrow her eyes like she suspected the house of sass.
Outside, the beasts of the Hunt reclined with old-money arrogance in the glamoured trailer-turned-palace. Velvet hay. Blood-orange lighting. Cursed sound system playing ambient thunder. Basically the fae equivalent of a five-star spa for eldritch pets.
Inside?
Home.
And not just because the tiles warmed when you were sad. Or the lights adjusted for the aesthetic of your trauma. Or because the tea steeped itself if you thought too loudly about mortality.
This home had opinions.
Today's opinion?
Grief should come with soft carpets and sharper tea.
Seraphina collapsed on one end of the massive couch that could legally qualify as a therapy seat. She nursed her mug of "Mournful Grey" like it was spiked with coping mechanisms. Caius dropped into the other side with all the grace of a royal whose soul had been sandpapered in silence.
Neither spoke.
They didn't need to.
She broke first. Quietly. Like peeling off a scab that had been on too long.
"The cupboard was under the stairs," she said. "Smelled like mold and self-worth rot. I used to count spiders like they were prayer beads. I was so small I thought if I was quiet enough, maybe they'd forget I existed."
Caius stayed still. No flinch. No pity. Just listening. Just boiling fury kept in a glass bottle.
"My aunt hated me. Said I looked like my mother but with none of the charm and all of the curse." Her laugh was brittle. "She wasn't wrong."
Then the voice softened. "But when it came for us that demon, with its teeth like cracked time she didn't give me up. Didn't even scream my name. Just told me to stay in the cupboard. Told me she was sorry."
The silence stretched like skin over bone.
Caius's voice when it came was jagged silk. "You were supposed to be with Catherine."
She nodded once. "She never showed."
"She would have," he snapped. "She wouldn't leave you."
"I know," Seraphina whispered. "That's what scares me."
Ding.
The apartment chimed. A sound like a memory sharpening.
At the hallway's edge, a new door bled into existence moody grey, enchanted lacquer, a handle shaped like a promise made under duress.
"Well, that's new," Seraphina said. "I've never seen it happen in real time before."
"It's probably sentient now. That's what happens when too many unresolved childhoods cohabitate."
Caius raised an eyebrow and stepped through the door.
Inside?
A room carved from memory, myth, and quiet grief.
A low bed dressed in dusk-colored silks. A wall of books some real, some memory-stitched. Weapon racks. Scented spell oils. Night lamps with fae runes. Ambient lighting set to "Brooding With Purpose."
And the photos.
Photos that shouldn't exist.
But did.
Potter-Peverell-Grey family portraits.
Twenty-eight members in one frame. Alive. Warm. Laughing like war was centuries away. James and Lily Potter-Peverell cradling baby Seraphina. His own parents, smiling, whole. His mother's hair was starlight-threaded ink, her eyes not just sapphire, but crushed sapphire, with that same playful curl of judgment he saw in the mirror. His father
Finnian Caius Grey.
The man who smiled with too many teeth and held power like a birthright. White-blond hair like snow laced with starlight. Eyes like glass swords. Caius had his face.
Too much.
It hurt.
A lot.
He dropped into the chair beside the desk. No dramatic gasp. No tragic violin swell.
Just grief. Quiet and careful.
The journal was waiting.
Simple leather. Black as night promises. Stamped in silver: F.C.G.
He opened it.
Inside, his father's handwriting ran like marching orders laced with poetry.
> To my son—
If you're reading this, you're alive.
You're angry.
You're a Grey.
Good.
Be better than me. Be everything the Courts couldn't crush.
Protect your cousin. She'll be fire and shadow.
You'll be storm and blade.
You are my legacy.
You are what I couldn't finish.
Now burn the world until it yields.
The Hunt is in your blood. Run with it.
Caius swallowed. Then flipped the page.
His mother's handwriting.
Flowing. Elegant. Slightly mad.
> My darling boy,
You are loved more than any word could hold.
If you've found this, we are gone. I am sorry.
We did everything we could to protect you.
You are our storm-child, our joy.
Let the stars watch you. Let the dark keep you safe.
You were never alone.
Trust your instinct. If something cages you, kill first. Ask later.
Love,
Your mother,
Evangeline Elise Grey of the Shadeglass Court.
The ink shimmered with old magic and something else something soft.
He shut the journal. His hands trembled once. Then steadied.
At the door, Seraphina leaned against the frame, tea in hand.
"This place never stops," she murmured.
"It knows what you need," Caius said softly.
"Yeah." She held up her mug. "And what we need is tea. And maybe a few tactical explosions."
He smiled.
It was rare. It was real.
Then the apartment chimed again. Soft. Warm. The fireplace lit itself. The kitchen arranged a new plate of cucumber-and-sass sandwiches. A kettle began to boil.
Outside, the trailer of ancient predators settled deeper into magical slumber. A Nightmare huffed once in approval.
Inside, two cousins finally remembered what it felt like to belong.
To be seen.
To be family.
Caius looked back at the photos. At himself, held in the arms of a mother who smelled of prophecy and comfort. At his father, fierce and wild-eyed.
"I love Nightmare Court magic," he said again. "It never gives you what you want."
Seraphina grinned. "Only what you didn't know you were starving for."
They clinked their mugs together.
And in the distance, something in the house whispered:
Welcome home.