Chapter Text
Sometime in 1877…
The Badeaux manor had always stood in the winding, dark curtain of trees that lined the west border of Germany. Its sinister, dark structure had been there before it was called Badeaux, before its plot of land had been named the Black Forest.
Through the twisting, gnarled branches of the forbidden forest, stood the imposing presence of the dark manor, a symbol of status for the family who resided in it. A family well known for their strides in furthering the reaches of dark arts, and a family whose bloodline was dwindling, down to the last heir—a woman.
A lone wizard watched a great gathering in the manor's courtyard—more than just the imposing family, they’d summoned a whole horde of their followers.
The man kept his distance, just close enough to hear the murmur of chanting, cloaked figures gathered around a central figure—a woman, with a bundle of… something, held in her arms. From the man’s distance, he could make out her expression—it was empty. Nearly lifeless. It was a look he recognized, someone under the effect of the Imperius curse, or some other mind-stealing curse. Common amongst their ilk.
He fiddled with his wand, eyes narrowing as he attempted to get a better look at the crowd, scanning the faces to see if the man he was hunting was among their ranks. So far, zilch.
A lead had brought him here—he knew that the man he hunted had been here, at least once before. While he couldn’t envision his target participating in a dark arts cult, he supposed anything was possible at this point. Perhaps he’d seen the final heir of the Badeaux family as the perfect conquest to add to the other high profile notches in his bedpost.
There was no way to tell, of course, since the target wasn’t here now. Another dead end in his personal goal, but in some ways it would still pay off, the Auror had, afterall, uncovered the hidden location for a whole coven of dark wizards. He’d just have to mark it on a map and call it in, and his team could raid the place.
Despite knowing he had to leave to do so, he stayed where he was, leaning against the thick trunk of a dark tree.
He had a bad feeling.
He couldn’t take his eyes off of the squirming bundle in the central woman’s arms.
An animal? Sacrifices of that nature were common in those dark arts cults, the Badeaux family especially. They liked rabbits.
Perhaps it was naivety, or his brain unconsciously trying not to connect the right dots, but when the woman lifted the bundle and the cloth fell away, the man’s almond shaped eyes widened in horror at the sight of a squirming babe, their cries echoing through the courtyard.
The earth beneath his feet began to tremble, and it wasn’t from the rancorous cheers of the crowd—it was magic.
Raw magic.
He couldn’t quite sense it, or put his finger on it, but the man could feel that it was powerful and old magic, it weighed down the air, made it harder to breathe from its sheer presence.
And it was coming from the child.
That was bad. That was very bad.
The man didn’t waste another second before he burst out of the line of trees—one Auror in the middle of at least a hundred dark wizards. And that wailing— it was as if the woman was holding up a mandrake, not a child.
There was an immediate outroar, wizzes of deadly magic flying past the man’s head as he desperately ducked and dove between people, trying to get to the center.
“Protect the child!” One voice hollered above the din, and each cloaked figure scrambled to do so, to stop the Auror that was breaking through their ranks.
The man watched other wizards fall lifeless to stray Killing Curse blasts, aimed for him. Bright, crackling blasts of magic shot in every which way, the earth erupting with casts of Confringo, Bombarda, and other such deadly spells.
Above, fearsome dark storm clouds rolled overhead, lighting up with reddish flashes of lightning, filling the space with deafening claps of thunder. Was it serendipitous that a thunderstorm was rolling in just now, or was it something else? Clouds, summoned from the suffocating pressure of raw magic?
Between the dark wizards clamoring to kill him, and the eardrum shattering sound of the child’s fading wails, the wizard wasn’t sure if he was going to make it out of this one alive.
A split second decision was going to end it all for him, he thought, but as he finally caught sight of the wailing child—he knew he was going to make it out alive. For the sake of an innocent life, he had to. It was why he’d become an Auror in the first place, for a moment like this.
He cast his wand towards the child, a ripple of light magic whooshing through the air, enveloping the child in a protective bubble, silencing her cries and putting her to sleep.
Two elder faces swam into view—the matriarch and patriarch of this coven, surrounding their daughter on either side, a woman with pale brown hair and dark, lifeless gray eyes. She still held the babe out, as if she were still presenting her to the crowd.
Instead, despite her parents trying to get her to move, to hand her over, she made it easy for the intruding wizard to grab the child right from her hands, before his form swirled into nothingness.
~~~
“Oh- A-Apollo, please d-don’t- oh, Loki you’re s-spilling, love, you’re-” A ginger-haired woman worriedly cleaned up after her two young boys, twins. One with light ginger hair like her’s, and one with chestnut brown hair like their father’s. An auspicious arrival of course, twins were always a good omen, however, nobody ever mentioned how much of a handful they were!
It was a little late for a tea party, but the boys insisted on staying up to wait for their daddy to come home, and when her husband wasn’t present, their mother had a hard time saying no to them. They all worried when he left—even the twins, who scarcely knew what kinds of dangers their father encountered in his line of work as an Auror.
“Lorelei, let me help,” Came the low chuckle of the woman’s brother, running a hand through his auburn hair before he reached over to lift up the rowdier of the two boys under his arm, Apollo, cleaning up the cake he’d just smeared all over his chubby little cheeks. And, reaching out to set down the half-full teacup full of milk that the boy had enchanted to levitate. “Perhaps they’re a little too young to learn about high tea etiquette, hm?”
Lorelei took that moment to clean up the bit of milk little Loki had spilled, laughing softly. “P-Perhaps you’re r-right, but it d-doesn’t hurt t-to try,” she replied, shaking her head as she gazed lovingly down at her two boys, a hand falling to her swollen belly—soon, another would join their family.
“Gerhart, you don’t think Chiharu’s…”
Suddenly, the very man in question Apparated right in the center of the room, misjudging his landing and stumbling into the table—knocking a few dishes off of it, and frightening his wife and two sons. Clutched to his chest was a bundle of tattered fabric, and a scarily still mass. His arrival had brought another thing—an oppressive atmosphere, like the pressure that heralded a bad storm.
“Daddy!” The boy with lighter hair shrieked, stumbling out of his chair to hide behind his mother’s. “Blood!”
“Chiha-haru?!” Lorelei gasped, pushing her chair back (careful not to hit Apollo, or Loki, who had joined her side) as she jumped to her feet, skirts swishing with the movement as she made it to his side. “He’s bleeding! Gerhart, do something, he’s bleeding!”
The auburn haired man fumbled for his wand—it wasn’t something he kept on him very often, besides in case of emergencies. He’d chosen to live like a muggle, and preferred to do everything the muggle way.
“It’s not my blood!” Chiharu barked, a little harshly, but they were all clamoring over the wrong person. “Gerhart, you have to help me seal her magic, now!”
“Wh-who-?” Lorelei tugged at the fabric, only then realizing what her husband held in his arms when she peeled it away, revealing the restless slumbering, pale form of a young child. A shock of white hair covered her head, with long white eyelashes resting on her hollow cheeks. Her husband handed the child off to her while he and her brother got to work in sealing the girl’s magic.
The brown-haired man had to walk the other one through the individual components of the magic circle, which, along with a longer incantation, would seal the magic of the child before them. It was an old spell, one that Chiharu only knew from his time as an Auror, certainly not one that would be taught in school anymore. It wasn’t even taught to him in his training, rather, something he’d studied on his own.
The two men worked together to draw out the magic circle on the wood floor, Gerhart doing a bulk of it- despite Chiharu's knowledge of the spell, the older man had always been more skilled in the precise construction of magical circles, a nearly obsolete form of magical casting.
When it was done, Lorelei stepped forward to lay the slumbering child in the center of the circle, before stepping back, hands laid on top of the heads of the two boys whose faces were pressed into her skirts. Laid out in front of them, one could tell that they’d misjudged how young she was- she wasn’t a baby, rather, just a malnourished toddler. She could have even been the same age as the boys at the woman’s side.
The two wizards pointed their wands at the magic circle, speaking out the ancient incantation, the chalk lines lighting up with a whitish blue magic. Air blew through the closed off room, blowing out a few candles and whipping Lorelei’s hair around her face. When she blinked, the gusts of wind had quieted, and the circle was no longer glowing.
Chiharu had stepped forward to lift the child back up, who now slumbered much more peacefully.
The pressure in the air lessened before it was gone entirely, sealed away with the child’s unstable magic.
“Now will ya tell us what’s going on?” Gerhart asked, slipping his wand back into his pocket as he gazed down at the child, lips pressing into a thin line. “Where did you… how…?”
“It’s… a long story. I was following that last lead, to find my brother, and… she was at the center of this cult, I think it was the Badeaux family’s manor. I just… it was stupid and dangerous, but I just knew I had to get her out of there. I didn’t even end up seeing Ryu, he’s probably long gone…” Chiharu shook his head, happy to hand the young child over to his wife. “...I think she may be his, though. He was a da- uh, darn, scoundrel, it wouldn’t surprise me if his conquest had led him to the Badeaux heir. And this little one has his… hair.”
Lorelei cooed at the sleeping child—despite the clear signs of mistreatment, the little girl looked so sweet. She just needed a warm home, and loving parents...
“So, you’re going to take her to the Ministry?” Gerhart asked, an unhidden note of distaste in his tone. His stance on the wizard’s ‘government’ was very known.
To the older man’s surprise, Chiharu hesitated, pressing his lips together and shaking his head as he ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I’ll… I’ll have to tell them about the location of that manor so we can plan a raid, but I’m…” he took a deep breath, shaking his head again. “I’m going to leave her out of it. I think the less that’s known about her, the better.”
“We’ll t-take her in,” Lorelei piped up, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, as she brushed a finger down the little girl’s pale cheek. “Chiharu, w-we can hide her u-until our next o-one is l-large enough that we can p-pass them off as twins.”
Chiharu was conflicted, of course, saying no to his wife over anything was terribly difficult for the man. But…
“I don’t think… she should be raised anywhere near the wizarding world. There’s no way to be sure every dark wizard that knows of her existence will be rounded up, she might not be safe. If Gerhart is okay with it, I… thought that perhaps he might take her in. He may not use magic, but he’s more powerful than I am, and he doesn’t have three little ones to worry about,” Chiharu said, meaningfully, as he laid a gentle hand on his wife’s belly.
“But Gerhart doesn’t know the first thing about raising a baby!” Lorelei protested, as her elder brother gently took the child from her arms. “Wouldn’t you rather keep a closer eye on her, too? You’re the Auror here…”
“Hey now, I know a thing or two about kids,” Gerhart huffed, looking down at the sleeping child, his gaze softening. She was so… little. “I watch your’s all the time. I’ll take her in. Does… uh, does she have a name?”
The room fell silent, all eyes looking at Chiharu, who turned sheepish. “I- uh… I only heard ‘em refer to her as ‘the child’.”
Gerhart glanced over at his pouting sister—despite having a pair of twins and another on the way, she’d been really adamant about taking the newcomer in, it was obvious she was just barely holding back from whining. “Well… Iunno much about namin’ babies, for as much as I can raise ‘em. You wanna name her, Lei?”
Lorelei perked up immediately, walking back over to peer down at the little girl’s face, smiling a little. “Sh-she looks like a little bunny,” she remarked, reaching up to brush her fingers through the child’s thin, white hair. “M- Maybe, um, Coella…?”
Just then, as if responding to the name, the young child’s dullish gray eyes fluttered open sleepily, looking up at the three new strangers. Her lips opened and closed, eyebrows drawing together as she struggled to get a word out, ending up only babbling, finishing it off with a sleepy little smile. Her head nodded forward, and she rested it on Gerhart’s shoulder, falling right back asleep.
“Hi there…” Gerhart murmured affectionately—it was all the acceptance he’d needed really, and the young girl’s rabbit-like features made her a dead-ringer for the name. “...Welcome to the family, Coella.”
~~~
In the flickering lamplight of an old, dark manor, a toddler slowly felt his way over to a small pile of blocks, silently fiddling with the wooden toys.
“Over here, Ominis…” A woman cooed, tapping on the wooden floor to alert the boy to her location.
The sullen boy’s face lit up at the sound of his favorite aunt’s voice as he pushed himself to his feet, very carefully toddling over to where she knelt, happily falling into her open arms.
“Aunt-tua,” he exclaimed- a little too young to properly separate the words ‘aunt’ and ‘Noctua’.
The blonde woman didn’t mind though, finding it delightfully sweet as she tweaked his cheeks and pressed a sweet kiss to his temple.
“You shouldn’t coddle him like that, Noctua,” An older male voice piped up, sounding reproachful as he glared at the little boy in his sister’s arms. He mumbled incindio under his breath, lighting up a cigar. “Ephraim could already speak in full sentences at that age. Correct him when he messes up.”
“Ephraim tortures kneazles for fun, Ophiuchus,” Noctua replied, fixing her brother with a dirty look.
“That’s just how boys play. Marvolo did the same, before he switched over to muggles,” Ophiuchus replied, a proud note in his tone. “Don’t indoctrinate my youngest. He’s already behind developmentally, I don’t need your new-age thoughts to make him worse.”
Noctua adjusted little Ominis in her arms, glancing at her nephew’s face—noting the way it had fallen. He’d heard and understood his father. “Just because he cannot talk as eloquently yet doesn’t mean he cannot understand you, brother. He’s not behind developmentally, he’s simply… taking his time. Haven’t you heard that still waters oft run deeper than they appear?”
She wished she could whisk her precious nephew away from this awful place, she could already tell he was too… sensitive for this environment. If she left him here, this family would crush him, she just knew it. He deserved a fighting chance. She couldn’t say any of that, though, and run the risk of her brother kicking her out for good.
“He’s incurably blind, and practically stupid, what depth could he possibly be hiding?” The man shook his head. “A damn shame to the Gaunt name.”
The blonde woman pressed her lips together, choosing to pick her battles, “They still haven’t been able to do anything at Saint Mungo’s?”
“Does it look like they’ve done anything for him?” Ophiuchus replied, angrily jabbing his cigar down into a crystal ashtray, shaking his head. “He’s still blind as a damn bat. I’d be surprised if he isn’t a squib, too. So much for the glory of pure bloodlines.”
“Perhaps when I get access to Salazar’s old Scriptorium…” Noctua started, rolling over anything she could do for her poor nephew. Who knew, maybe Salazar’s old journals had a cure for Ominis’ blindness?
Ophiuchus gave his younger sister an irritated side eye. “Perhaps his Scriptorium hasn’t revealed itself to you due to the nature of your inquiries.”
Noctua glared up at her older brother, setting her jaw. It was an issue they’d never settle—her own obsessive research into their beloved ancestor, her attempts to prove that Salazar Slytherin’s teachings didn’t all revolve around pureblood status and the dark arts, that there had to be something deeper.
It was something she’d had a vested interest in for awhile, but since the birth of her nephew, she’d been trying so much harder to access the Hogwart’s founder’s old journals. She wanted to try harder for him, of course.
“Perhaps,” was all she gritted out, leaning down to set Ominis back down next to his toys, smoothing down his blond hair before she stood back up. “I’m going to go help Delphyne set the table.”
There was nothing else she could say to her stubborn brother, and dwelling on the topic would induce a fight, and she certainly didn’t want to do that in front of Ominis.
She paused near the doorway, glancing back at her nephew with a bittersweet smile, as the boy looked up, towards her direction.
Sadly, she murmured, “...Welcome to the family, Ominis.”