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It was the summer before her third year of Hogwarts when Parvati pulled off her socks at the end of the day and found her soulmate mark.
It was quite early for her mark to appear, although Padma had found hers the week before, which leant a strange aura of inevitability about the whole affair. Padma's tattoo had been grown up and elegant, a stylised flourish of bluebells, placed just above her navel. Exactly the sort of tattoo her sister had dreamed of as a little girl: one that promised a future of refinement and delicacy.
Parvati's mark was not exactly elegant. It was a vibrant splash of pink on the curve of her ankle, in a shape that was already familiar to her – a lipstick mark. The shape of a kiss. It was frivolous, almost sloppy – and the sight of it made her heart beat faster.
Yes, she thought to herself. This is how it's supposed to be. I want my future to be fun.
She buried her face in her pillow and squealed with happiness – then put her socks back on, and ran downstairs to tell her parents.
When she returned to Hogwarts a month later, Parvati had a new collection of fluffy bedsocks and opaque tights packed away in her trunk, and butterflies in her stomach. Despite her excitement, something had kept her from writing to Lavender about what had happened. Perhaps it was because she still hadn't even shown her mark to anyone, Padma included. Although she'd never thought she would be the kind of person to keep her mark secret, now that she had seen it something about it felt too personal to share.
(Perhaps it was because she had been waiting for Lavender to write first, miraculously saying that she had gotten her mark on the exact same day, just like in a romance book.)
So without ever really making the decision to do so, Parvati kept her socks on, pleaded out of having her toenails painted, and at night, dreamed in vibrant colour about what it would be like when she met her soulmate for the first time.
She was far from alone in that, at least. Every girl in their year seemed to be chattering about marks – who had gotten theirs already, what they wanted theirs to be, and – most elusive of all – what it meant.
“Apparently,” Lavender said, reading aloud from the latest issue of Magical Miss while Parvati painted her fingernails, “if you have a mark on your stomach, it means that you'll meet your soulmate later in life.”
Parvati laughed. “Oh no! I'll have to tell Padma the bad news.”
“Of course, Professor Trelawney says that iconomancy is much more complicated than that...” Lavender sighed. “Okay, let's do you!”
Parvati looked up in shock, smearing the nail she was working on, but before she could say anything, Lavender was reading.
“Mark on the ankles or feet… You can be a bit of a wallflower, your soulmate is someone who will bring you out of your shell and lead you on an adventure – the handsome knight to your beautiful princess.” Lavender giggled. “A wallflower? Clearly they've never met you, 'Vati.”
“How did you know I had my mark?” Parvati asked, her voice a little shaky.
“You've been acting weird about your feet all year,” Lavender said. “I figured if it was anything else, you'd tell me.”
“So, you're not mad? That I didn't tell you?”
“Of course not!”
Suddenly, Parvati could breathe again.
“I understand,” Lavender continued. “You want it to be special, just for your soulmate, right? I think it's romantic to do it that way. It's like a fairy story.”
Parvati smiled. “I should have known you'd understand. My family kept bugging me about it…”
“Ugh, I can imagine!” Lavender pulled a face. “It's fine, honestly 'Vati. Who knows? Perhaps when I get mine I'll do the same!”
But, as it turned out, Lavender didn't get hers – not that year, anyway. By the time their fourth year at Hogwarts had arrived and she was still markless, Lavender was starting to get worried, although she tried to hide it.
“Plenty of people get by just fine and never get a mark at all!”
It was true, but Lavender wasn't plenty of people. She wanted the romance of a mark, the promise of something beautiful in her future, just as much as Parvati had.
“Come on, we're late for dinner!”
The two of them had rushed back to the dormitory so that Lavender could change her top, after a particularly noxious plant in last-period Herbology had splattered purple goo all over it. Sometimes, magic could be gross.
“Two seconds!” Lavender promised.
Parvati didn't bother to turn her back when Lavender was taking her top off – after four years living together, Lavender's bra strap was nothing she hadn't seen before.
Except today it was. A vibrant, achingly familiar streak of pink marked the smooth dark curve of Lavender's shoulder.
“Lavender.”
“Two! Seconds!”
“No, Lavender, stop! Look!” Parvati grabbed her friend by the arm and dragged her over to the mirror. “Right there!”
“Oh my God.” As soon as she saw what Parvati was pointing to, the shirt dropped from Lavender's hands. She started craning her head, trying to get a better look in the dim evening light. “Oh my God! Parvati, I -”
Lavender stopped when she saw her friend's face. “What? Is something wrong with it? You look like you've seen a ghost!”
Parvati was staring, dumbstruck at the reflection. At first she hadn't been sure, but now she was certain. It was a match.
“It's the same.”
“What's the same? I – Oh my God.”
Parvati was pulling off her shoe, yanking down her tights, not caring how undignified it was. When she revealed the lipstick kiss on her ankle, Lavender gasped.
They stood there for a few seconds in silence, staring at each other. Lavender in just a skirt and bra, Parvati with her tights half-off, balanced awkwardly on one leg – it should have been silly, but Parvati had never felt more serious in her life.
And then she started to smile.
“Hey, soulmate.”
That made Lavender shriek and throw her arms around her, which made Parvati shriek too. She felt like she was flying, like she was as light as air – like she did every time with Lavender. Maybe she had always known, deep down, the two of them were meant to be.
“Didn't I always say it?” Lavender was saying, somewhere in between the tears and the giggling. “Didn't I say we'd be best friends forever?”
Parvati's smile faltered, though only for a moment. It was silly – Lavender was everything she could ever have wanted as a soulmate – only, the thousand times she's dreamed of this moment, “friends” was never the word spoken.
But she loved Lavender with all her heart, and so she put such thoughts out of her mind, and joined Lavender's laughter.
“Just think! We can grow old reading each other's tea leaves.”
“And have a big bond ceremony with Padma as a witness.”
Planning a future together with Lavender, Parvati's unease vanished quickly away. Of course, they missed dinner that night after all – but that was alright. They sneaked down to the kitchen together instead, holding hands the entire way.
Soulmates stuck together through thick and thin. Not because they had to, or felt obliged – it was something you did without being asked, just because they needed you. They would always need you, in both good times and bad.
However, if Parvati was going to comment, Lavender's ill-advised three month relationship with Ron Weasley was not one of the good times. After weeks and weeks of listening to Lavender sigh and looking pointedly away whenever the couple were within tongue distance, Parvati was almost glad when they finally broke up.
But that didn't give her a break from hearing about Ron. Now, instead of wistful longing, Lavender was filling every moment they had alone with ranting.
“I should have known,” Lavender fumed. “I always suspected there was something between them. Even before they got their marks and started parading it around, I mean – but he swore they were just friends. That prick! He was lying to me the whole time – that's the worst thing.”
“The worst,” Parvati echoed dutifully, although she wasn't really listening. Most of her attention was focussed on re-reading her Charms essay, but she had still heard enough to know that Lavender had come up with three different “worst things” this evening alone.
“And even worse, I fell for it. I really thought he was – was like me!”
Lavender's voice cracked. The break from the usual script caught Parvati's attention, and she looked up from her essay.
“What do you mean, like you?”
“You know.” Lavender looked uncomfortable. “Not – I mean, soulmates who are just friends, you know?”
Her voice was shaking with emotion, and Parvati knew she wasn't telling the whole truth – but before she could ask, Lavender continued:
“But I should have known, shouldn't I? I mean, Hermione's obviously fancied him for years. I just…” She sighed. “But I guess I was kidding myself. Fate wouldn't do that, would it?”
The bitterness in Lavender's voice was shocking.
“It's not right, to feel that way about your soulmate, and them not to feel the same.” Lavender shook her head. “It's just… wrong.”
“Lavender, I…”
Parvati's stomach was churning with emotion, fear and hope and doubt and every other little feeling she'd squashed down for years coming flooding out. For a second she froze, reaching for words that wouldn't come, but there was only one answer she could give.
She surged forward, and kissed her soulmate for the first time.
Lavender went still underneath her, and Parvati pulled back, sitting beside her. Lavender looked shocked – almost scared – and for a moment, Parvati was certain she had ruined everything.
She didn't care.
“What… why did you do that?” Lavender asked.
“Why do you think?”
“Don't -” Lavender's breath hitched. “Don't feel sorry for me, okay. I don't need that from you.”
Parvati wrinkled her brow. “… What?”
“Don't act like you feel something you don't, just because I got broken up with!” Lavender snapped. “You're my soulmate. You're meant to be honest with me!”
“But I thought you wanted me to kiss you!”
“Yeah, well.” Lavender looked down. “That doesn't change anything.”
“You're not making any sense!” Parvati scowled. “Lavender, I am being honest. I'm sorry if you don't feel the same but I – I love you. I'm in love with you. I have been since our second year, and I – I'll always be your friend, but I can't stop myself wanting this as well.”
By the end of her speech, Lavender was staring at her, open-mouthed.
“But you never...”
Parvati shrugged. “You didn't want me to.”
“I did.” Lavender reached out and grabbed Parvati's hand, weaving their fingers together. “'Vati, I… Oh, for God's sake, will you just kiss me again?”
Their lips met hurriedly, desperately, as if whatever this was might disappear at any moment. Then they kissed again, slower, and again – and it started to sink in. This was what destiny had in store for them. To be together – to be in love. They could spend a lifetime doing this.
When they broke apart for air, Parvati was smiling so hard her cheeks hurt.
“I love you,” Lavender said, her hand on Parvati's cheek. “God, why did that take us so long?”
“Because we're both stubborn idiots?” Parvati suggested.
“Yeah, that's probably it.” Lavender laughed, and fell back against the bed. “But I'm your idiot.”
“Too right you are.”
They were still holding hands. Parvati looked down at their fingers, brown and black interlaced, and she felt for the first time like she had a path ahead of her, a future she was heading towards.
She had never been happier.
On the floor of the corridor outside the infirmary, Parvati watched the sun slowly rising outside with aching eyes.
The battle was over. She still couldn't believe it, although she was covered with cuts and bruises from that last desperate fight. But although the courtyards of Hogwarts had fallen silent, a second battle was now raging inside, as the Healers fought to save those most wounded in the final push against Voldemort and his Death Eaters.
In a chair a couple of metres away, a grey-haired woman was sleeping. Beyond her, a man wept quietly into his husband's shoulder. This was the corridor of the waiting, the loved ones, the next of kin. And Parvati was waiting for Lavender.
She was alone. Padma had found her earlier, and her parents, but she had sent them away to go celebrate with the rest of the world. Technically, Parvati shouldn't even have been here – it wasn't like she and Lavender were officially bonded – but Madam Pomfrey had declared that didn't care about such details on a day like this.
Lavender's parents weren't at Hogwarts. They had left the country that spring, fearful in spite of their pureblood status. Lavender had dripped with scorn in the Room of Requirement when she heard the news, snarling that it was everyone's duty to stand and fight. Later that night, she had shaken in Parvati's arms, more frightened than she would allow anyone else to see.
They probably hadn't even heard that the war was over, a decisive victory won in a final battle which might still claim the life of their lion-hearted daughter.
Perhaps they had been right to run.
When the Healer came through the door, all heads turned to face her. When she walked towards Parvati, her heart froze in her chest. She could feel everyone watching her, their jealousy and their fear searing her skin.
“Parvati Patil?” She nodded her response. “You can see her now.”
Parvati got to her feet, nearly stumbling on unsteady legs. The Healer offered her a hand, but she caught herself without it. The Healer led the way along the corridor, Parvati shuffling along in her wake.
“She's a fighter, that one,” the Healer commented, almost off-hand. “The state she was in… she's got a long road ahead of her, but it looks like she's going to pull through.”
Parvati's breath stuttered out of her in one long sigh, and when she breathed in, she felt like a different woman. The cloud hanging over her vanished, and suddenly she was walking on air.
The Healer showed her into a make-shift ward, what had once been a disused classroom. There, behind dustsheets hung as curtains, was Lavender.
“You can wait here with her. Don't wake the other patients.”
The Healer bustled off again, leaving Parvati to stare at the love she had nearly lost today. Lavender's skin was ashen, so bloodless it almost looked blue, and her torso caved unnaturally inwards under the sheets. Starkest of all, a fresh white dressing covered half of her face, its brightness sharp against her dark skin.
Parvati picked up the chair that waited for her beside the bed and carried it around to Lavender's other side. She wanted Lavender to be able to see her when she woke up.
Then she sat down and, finally, allowed herself to rest.
“'Vati?”
Parvati woke up with a start. It took her a few seconds to remember where she was – the smell of antiseptic, the uncomfortable chair, Lavender's hand in hers…
Lavender's hand squeezing hers back.
“Parvati.” Lavender smiled, her head turned just enough to see Parvati's face. “I was so worried about you.”
“Isn't that supposed to be my line?” Parvati asked with a smile, although she felt close to tears.
“What… what happened?”
“You got hurt real bad,” Parvati told her. “But it's okay. You're going to be okay. And Lavender – it's over. We did it, we won. He's dead.”
“Oh.”
Lavender made a hiccuping noise, and a tear rolled down her cheek. She put a hand up to wipe it away. After a moment, her hand found the bandage on her face.
“My face feels funny,” she said, slowly.
“They gave you some potions,” Parvati explained. “You're going to have some scars, I think.”
To her surprise, Lavender smiled. “I've heard that girls like scars.”
“I'm sure you'll look very rugged,” Parvati agreed. “But you've always been my hero.”
And then she was crying.
“'Vati… Babe, no, come here…”
Lavender was trying to shuffle herself sideways to make enough room on the bed for both of them.
“Don't do that. The Healers -”
“I don't care,” Lavender said, as fierce as ever. “Come on.”
Parvati laughed, wetly, and did as she was told. The bed wasn't really big enough for them both, and she was only just able to keep from falling off – but in this, she agreed with Lavender. She didn't care, if it meant they could hold each other right now.
“I can't believe we made it,” she whispered into the top of Lavender's head. “I know we always said we'd win, but -”
“I know.” Lavender leant her head against Parvati's shoulder. “'Vati. Let's get bonded.”
Parvati's heart skipped a beat. “You mean it?”
“Course. As soon as we can get it organised.” Lavender sighed. “I want a future with you.”
“We'll have one,” Parvati promised. “We can have a big ceremony with beautiful dresses. We'll get a flat in the city together, somewhere near Diagon Alley, and we'll fill it with cushions and nail varnish and herbal tea -”
“I don't care about any of that stuff,” Lavender said softly. “So long as we're together.”
“We will be,” Parvati promised. “Always. I'll be the first thing you see every morning, and the last thing you see at night. You're never getting rid of me now, you hear? You're stuck with me for life.”
Lavender didn't answer. After a few seconds, Parvati realised that she had fallen asleep.
She didn't care. She would tell Lavender again, every day if she needed to, for all the days they had together – their long, beautiful future together, stretching out ahead like a string of fairy lights glittering where once there had only been darkness.
And for now, she would sleep, with her soulmate in her arms and a smile on her face, waiting to see what the morning would bring.