The Girl At The Water's Edge PV

October 2025 | 8:30 PM | @Olivia Williams

The lake held it's breath. Cade Darkbound sat with his knees drawn up, elbows resting loosely on them, sketchbook untouched at his side. The boards beneath him creaked now and then. They were very old, and Cade liked old things. Things that endured and remembered storms without being wholly destroyed. It was partly why he was so fascinated by the school's architecture. It was why every free moment he got he sat and tried to enjoy the sounds of it. The subtle music of time.

It was cold enough to bite, but not enough to chase him inside. He liked this edge of the grounds- the boathouse was far enough from the castle to feel private, but close enough to be ignored. No patrols, no gossip, and no noise. Just the rhythmic lapping of water against stone, and the distant hoot of owls. The moon was high, not quite full but close enough that he could feel something in the air. He had developed a strange awareness like a pressure behind his eyes or a breath held too long. The moon could do that to people. Especially people like Astrid.

He closed his eyes, breathing deep, appreciating the sting of the cold air in his lungs. Astrid would be locked up at home one of these coming nights. Not by force, not anymore. She insisted on it now, built the ritual herself. She didn't trust herself not to hurt anyone. Still, Cade had never once been afraid of her but he knew better than to argue with her.

He hadn't written to her this week. Not because he forgot, but he didn't quite know what to say. He was reading about boggart-repulsion in Defense. Learning more about moon phases in Astronomy. Mixing essence of belladonna in Potions. And all of it made him feel especially guilty. Because he got to learn and grow while Astrid got to manage and contain. That guilt lived under his ribs like a second heart. A private pulsing thing he could never talk about.

Cade picked up his charcoal stick and opened his sketchbook to a fresh page. The first marks were light. He wasn't trying to draw anything in particular. Just movement and thought. Just enough to settle the itch in his bones. The moon's reflection on the water caught his attention next, he watched how it shivered slightly, despite the stillness. Like it, too, was pretending to be calm. He tilted his head and considered that. Just how many people walked around pretending they weren't trembling?

Cade sighed softly. Sometimes he imagined what it would have been like if things had been different. If Astrid had gone to Hogwarts. She would've been sorted into Hufflepuff, no question, always the first to defend someone smaller. She would've made the Quidditch team probably, she was fearless like that. She'd have joined every club that let her and laughed at how quiet he was in class, made him friends he wouldn't have made on his own. She alone could have made this wide castle feel like home.

Instead she had to live with potions and scars and rules. And Cade got to have this. A part of him hated Hogwarts for that. No... it wasn't Hogwarts. It was the world. The school actually admitted pupils like Astrid, but his sister felt protective of him. She feared that her own arrival, her condition and reputation might have weighed him down. "You don't need to be the boy with the werewolf sister," she once told him. "Not when they're finally seeing you for who you are. And besides, now that they've decided I'm safe enough? It doesn't feel like acceptance. If feels like... pity." And those words struck him like a well aimed knockback jinx. She'd already internalized years of exclusion. When you grow up being told you're too dangerous to go, being suddenly invited felt hollow. Their parents had compromised with a private tutor experienced in magical trauma who came in three days a week. And while she expressed happiness, Cade couldn't help but feel a gut-wrenching guilt toward the entire situation.

He took another breath, pushing the charcoal harder now. The strokes darkened and took shape. A closed door and a child's hand pressed against it. His fingers slowed. He'd drawn this before... Admittedly, too many times before. And that's when he heard it- the soft shift of movement somewhere by the boats. A board creaked. Someone else was here.

Cade blinked, trance broken. He didn't turn his head even if every atom in his body told him to check if it was an errant dugbog. He didn't fancy the idea of running to the hospital wing for a minor bite to the ankle. But eventually she stepped into his peripheral vision-- a small shape, wrapped in a Gryffindor scarf too big for her. Second year, maybe. Cade kept his eyes on the lake for a moment longer, giving her the chance to slip past him if that's what she wanted. But she paused there and Cade shifted his notebook clearing his throat. "You can sit if you want. Or not. Either is fine."