vesania

“I rarely put effort into things that aren’t worth it Rabastan.” 

Rodolphus was more than used to returning home to an empty house these days. Bellatrix had her own life to lead and Rodolphus was the same. When they’d gotten married, he’d inherited the manor and Rabastan had moved to one of the smaller Lestrange properties. Maybe that had been unnecessary. After all, there were already too many rooms for too few people and the emptiness was oppressive. Rodolphus was used to being a lone. This night was no different.

Except it was. 

The thing about marble was that it caused things to echo, so when Rodolphus heard a sound from the northern wing of the house, his wand was out in flash. If Bellatrix was home, which he doubted, she had little reason to go there. In fact, Rodolphus couldn’t remember the last time he’d even traveled to that part of the mansion. It had always been his father’s and Rodolphus found little room for himself there.

He saw the open door when he approached and when he stepped into the doorway, Rodolphus recognized the silhouette of his brother working his way through the office. The air in here was stale and Rodolphus tried to remember the last time he’d inhabited this room. When he and Rabastan were younger, this room was hallowed ground. You never entered the study of Lestrange Sr. and if you ever did, you would forever remember why. Maybe it was the sight of the younger Lestrange rummaging through their father’s study with little ceremony or maybe it was how well Rabastan fit behind that desk, but something made Rodolphus’ lips curl back at the image. It bothered Rodolphus beyond measure how much Rabastan looked like their father. His younger brother and his father had the same olive hues - so there were times when Rodolphus wanted to do nothing more than claw Rabastan’s eyes out.

Finally, he spoke up:

“If you’ve settled on living the life of a petty criminal, you must know that robbing your brother’s house doesn’t really count.”

With a quick spell, Rodolphus closed all the drawers Rabastan had opened. The harsh snap! of wood slamming shut echoed through the house.

Father’s study or not, this was still legally Rodolphus’ shit.

“Where have you been these days? If you had stayed away any longer, some of us might have started thinking you were dead.”

The stiff air, disrupted from his own invasion, held the distinct presence of another human. Rabastan did not need to see the scowl staring down at him, lips curled in entitlement and authority unwarranted in the sacred territory of their father’s memory, to know the thoughts of his brother. Anger and distrust clogged the room, lingering on the back of his throat with every breath.

Making no indications that he had heard the smooth inflections of a voice once familiar, Rabastan continued to search the drawer. Deft fingers pushed and pulled at the papers stacked between the wooden walls, brushing over the small print of insignificant letters and contracts with barely any concentration. He did not care for the secrets of the past. Before he could reach the bottom of the yellowed pages, Rabastan found instincts pulling his hands away from the quickly closing wood.  

The sudden motion, childish in the nature of an exhausted sibling rivalry, granted his brother his wish: a reaction. Finally looking to the doorway with olive eyes filled with little more than apathetic boredom, Rabastan regarded his brother. He had changed in the time they had spent apart.

Pushing himself off the dust-lined floor, moving each limb in the calculated motion of caution, Rabastan looked toward the syllables reaching out for his attention. Standing straight with the proper posture bred into him from birth, Rabastan remained behind the heavy desk in an ungrateful display of spite. He could see the irritation dancing across Rodolphus’s every emotion. For his own amusement, Rabastan let himself fall unceremoniously into the chair that had been haphazardly pushed from behind the desk.

Light feet urged the chair to twirl as Rabastan let green eyes wander over his surroundings. As a child he had never been invited into his father’s study, only warned of the consequences he would face upon his trespassing. That did not stop him and his brother from venturing into the forbidden room when shadows stretched across the manner in the dimmed light of the candles.