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The house was too loud.
Ariana pressed her hands against her ears, she screwed her eyes tightly shut as she cowered under her blankets, she didn't everything to block out the noise - but nothing helped.
The noise was everywhere - it was outside, it was inside, it was whispering and screaming in her head. It was the magic again, twisting and flaring, a storm she couldn’t control - a storm she couldn't stop.
She tried to hide from it, squeezing her eyes shut as tightly as she possibly could, her knuckles whitening as she curled her hands into tight fists over her ears that pulled painfully on her hair, but the sounds outside kept breaking through: the shouts, the crashing furniture, and the awful, awful, echoing thud of something heavy hitting the floor.
They were angry.
As their yelling got louder, as their fight grew angrier and angrier outside her room, she began to sob, rocking back and forth in the corner of the room, wrapped in her blanket as if it was a shield protecting her from the outside world.
Stop.
Her small frame trembled as she cowered and pressed herself down into the wooden floorboards beneath her, trying to ground herself, trying to remind herself that she was safe.
But the house wasn’t safe anymore. The walls, once her sanctuary, were closing in, suffocating her with the weight of the magic in the air. The room grew darker and darker as shadows crept up the wall, the very air growing heavy with her magic.
Stop, stop.
She could hear her bothers outside, yelling at each other with an anger she hadn't heard in a long time. There was another voice, cruel and loud and furious.
And she could feel it - the raw, unchecked power magic that was slowly building and building as her control slipped, threatening to tear her world apart.
Ariana’s breath hitched, her heart pounding so hard it hurt as tears flooded down her cheeks.
“Albus… Aberforth…” She called their names, but her voice was too small, too weak to cut through the chaos. Her hands went to her head, clutching at her hair as if she could pull the magic out, tear it away from her body. But it was too deep inside her, coiled and festering, ready to explode.
Stop, stop, stop.
She had to stop them.
She had to make it stop.
Ariana struggled to her feet, legs shaking beneath her.
Her brothers were hurting each other, and she couldn’t bare it. Albus's angry voice echoed through the house, filled with desperation and pain. Aberforth was pleading, his words sharp and frantic. And then there was the stranger - his cold, cruel voice like a knife cutting through the air.
“No, no, no!” Ariana sobbed, stumbling forward. The magic inside her twisted, a serpent writhing in her chest, seeking any gap that would release it. She tried to reach out, to cry out for them, but the words caught in her throat. The power was building, too much for her to contain. All she could cry was a desperate please. "Stop!"
She stepped into the hallway, where the battle raged. Spells crackled through the air, the light blinding her, the scent of magic heavy on the air. She saw Albus's face, twisted with anger, saw Aberforth eyes wide with horror as he realized what was happening.
A spell shot past her, narrowly missing her shoulder. The magic inside her flared in panicked response, a burst of light and heat that left her gasping for breath as her control slipped. She tried to scream, to warn them, but the sound was lost in the din.
"Ariana!" One of them cried, their identity lost to the chaos.
Ariana raised her hands, intending to reach out, to stop the madness. But the magic inside her surged, wild and uncontrollable, and in that moment, everything went wrong.
Stop!
There was a blinding flash of light, a terrible, searing pain in her chest, and then - her world shattered.
It all stopped...
Ariana felt herself falling, the floor rushing up to meet her. Her vision blurred as the pain consumed her, sharp and overwhelming. She tried to breathe, but the air wouldn’t come. She tried to move, but she was too weak - her limbs didn't respond. The sounds around her faded, the voices growing distant, until all she could hear was her own heartbeat, echoing in her skull.
No, no, no...
“This can’t be happening…” her brother's voice was a faint whisper, barely audible as the darkness closed in. She reached out, her fingers brushing against the cold, hard floor, but there was nothing to hold onto, no hand to hold and grip as the terrible darkness consumed her.
Her body convulsed, the pain too much to bear, and then - silence.
The last thing she saw was Aberforth’s face, his eyes filled with something she couldn’t name. And then there was only darkness.
The room was deathly still. Aberforth was the first to move, dropping to his knees beside Ariana’s lifeless body. His hands shook as he cradled her, spells of healing spilling from his trembling lip as he tried to will the life back into her still form.
But she was gone.
They'd killed her.
“No…” Aberforth’s voice broke, his grief tearing through him like a physical wound. He looked up, his eyes blazing with rage and anguish. “Albus, what have you done?”
Albus stood frozen, his wand still outstretched, his face as pale as a ghost as he looked down at his brother cradling the body of their sister.
“Aberforth, I...” Albus began, but the words died in his throat. He had no excuse, no explanation. Their sister was dead, and nothing he could say would change that. "I didn't see who-"
“You brought him here!” Aberforth’s voice was raw, filled with venom. “You-” His voice choked off, replaced by a sob that tore through him. He buried his face in Ariana’s hair, his shoulders shaking with grief. "What did you do?"
Gellert stood in the doorway, his expression unreadable. For a moment, he simply watched the scene unfold, then he turned and slipped away, barely noticed by the grieving brothers.
Albus took a step toward Aberforth, towards Ariana, but his brother recoiled, curling protectively over the body of their sister and glaring at him with eyes filled with an incomprehensible feeling of hatred.
“This is your fault,” Aberforth whispered, his voice filled with the weight of a thousand unspoken accusations. “She’s dead because of you."
No...
Albus fell to his knees, unable to hold himself up any longer. The guilt crushed him, hollowing him out until there was nothing left but regret and sorrow.
“This can’t be happening..."
Ariana lay between them, forever silent.