Chapter 119: 5-3

Crash—the sound of shattering. The common room had become a gathering place for agitated boys from the dormitory.

"What's wrong, everyone? What's going on inside—"

"Oh, our Lady Maria! You're the only one who can help now!"

Pushing his way through the crowd, Seamus leaped out and grabbed my arm. Just like that, guided by the pressing crowd around me, I was led to the front of the fifth-year boys' dormitory.

"Ron seems to be keeping him under control for now, but—Harry is..."

"...I see."

I gave a wry smile at Seamus's utterly terrified face. It seemed my troublesome little brother's temper had exploded once again inside. And this time, with an unprecedented ferocity. While making sure of the arguing sounds of those familiar voices faintly echoing, I gently opened the door.

"Harry? Ron?"

"I'm disillusioned. They were scum────both Dad and Sirius!"

A voice trembling with despair. A boy confused by disappointment and the betrayal of his father, his hero. Ah, I see──today is that day.

"Calm down. Everyone makes mistakes. Besides, look──your dad was only fifteen, right?"

"I'm fifteen too!"

I slipped behind the bitterly shouting Harry and quietly hugged him. I saw the tension leave Ron's shoulders in front of me.

"Ron, leave this to me."

"Gladly."

Looking completely exhausted, Ron patted my shoulder as if passing the baton and left the room. It was just me and Harry alone in the dormitory.

"I saw Snape's memory. Dad──Dad and Sirius were bullying Snape. They were doing awful things to him. Mum hated Dad──and Lupin didn't even try to stop it."

"Yeah."

"It's the worst. To think the day would come when I'd feel sorry for Snape. And that it's Dad's fault. It's because of Dad and the others that I'm going through this right now!"

I nestled close to the former 'me', who was suffering from the suddenly thrust reality. The idealized image of his parents inside Harry had completely died. If only I could have taught him, even little by little, that Dad and Mum were also just 'human'. It was a regret that could never be fulfilled, for Maria possessed no memories of those parents.

"Your feelings are────Harry, what is that?"

A part of the floor seemed to glint, catching my eye.—Shards?

"Harry, what are you holding─Harry!?"

The object tightly clutched in Harry's hand──it was the two-way mirror. The mirror's surface had been ruthlessly shattered.

"What have you done!!"

I snatched away what used to be the mirror. With the excess momentum, the remaining shards sliced a straight line across my palm. I felt no pain. This was no time for that.

My god—with this, I don't know if we'll be able to contact Sirius in an emergency. If that happens──'I' will be tricked.

"I have to tell Sirius... Harry, a parchment and quill,"

The downcast Harry grabbed my wrist. —It hurt. It hurt far more than my sliced palm.

"Harry...?"

"Is Sirius that important? Even after the awful things he did? Even though he was that kind of man?"

"Harry, it's true that Sirius might have taken pranks too far in the past, but—"

"──I don't understand why Maria loves Sirius so much! Even at the graveyard, you were always right by his side. I was watching, hidden under the Invisibility Cloak. I saw it right there. Maria──the way Maria looks at Sirius is weird! Are you saying you love Sirius more than me!? If that's the case, you should just hurry up and become family with him──just go become Maria Black!"

"Harry!"

As I restrained the infuriated Harry, clack, something hit my foot. It fell from Harry's pocket. I don't know what part of my brain made the decision──but I was frantically pulling it out.

"...Why do you, have this."

A locket gleaming ominously in gold and green──it was Slytherin's locket, the Horcrux.

"Why did you keep quiet about this! Have you been carrying it around all this time!?"

My anger exploded. So that's why Harry had been acting so strangely. That's why he had become so aggressive.

Harry had been driven mad by Dark Magic.

"Give it back!"

Lunging at me, Harry snatched the locket back. No good. As long as he holds that, there will be no peace in Harry's heart.

"Harry, hand it over. That is──something bad. It's the absolute worst thing for you."

"Oh? What is it, then? Explain it properly. —You can't, can you? You're always like this."

Just like the letter 'S' engraved in the center of the locket, Harry's eyes were blazing. It was a dangerous gleam.

"You act like you know everything, yet you keep your mouth shut. I never know what you're plotting or with whom. You constantly treat me like a child, just watching from behind all high and mighty, and despite that, you go and get yourself hurt in places I don't know about──how do you think I feel when I welcome you back?"

"You're just like Dumbledore. You don't tell me anything, but you demand I do this and that with a straight face. You think you have the right to lecture me. Try putting yourself in my shoes for once!"

"────"

"What a joke Occlumency is. The more I train with him, the more awful dreams I have! It's getting worse! Yet every single one of you tells me to master it quickly, to try harder──you can only say that because you haven't experienced it! I am trying! What more do you want me to do!?"

"...Harry. Harry, I was wrong. I understand that you're in pain. I know."

"Like hell you know!"

"I do know. ...Because 'I' am you. So please, whatever you do, don't throw away the Occlumency training. I'm begging you. You'll regret it soon. If things stay like this, it will lead to something irreversible."

"That's interesting. And what will happen? You can't say, can you? If you can't tell me, I'm never doing it again."

"Harry!"

I grabbed Harry's hand holding the locket with both of mine. Clatter, what used to be the two-way mirror made a light sound on the floor.

"Harry, please. It has to be you. Please reconsider."

"I'll consider it if Maria stops being so secretive."

"Don't be selfish."

"Selfish? This is selfish? Aren't you the ones at fault for constantly hiding things from me!?"

"I don't hide things because I want to! It's because of this──because you're like this────that Sirius is going to be sacrificed!"

Gasp—. The air grew incredibly tense. Harry's round eyes were wide open to their limits. Inside my head, instinctual alarm bells were ringing, alongside 'my' Sirius sinking into the Veil, and the Sirius who had pushed me away, telling me not to mourn.

"...Sirius, Sirius, Sirius──beloved Sirius! Ah, right. It's all for Sirius. Now it's perfectly clear. I'm being messed up this badly because of Sirius."

"No! Why don't you understand—I..."

"You're the one who doesn't understand! Even though you don't know──you don't know how I feel. You don't know how terrifying it is. You don't know how much it hurts. You don't know how──how I'm enduring all this all by myself──"

—'All by myself'.

Snap.

The final thread holding my sanity together, snapped.

"──Stop playing the tragic victim!!"

I gasped. It hurt. It was agonizing. How could there be something so cruel?

"You have Maria, don't you! ────'I' didn't have anyone!"

Throwing the words like a physical blow. I screamed. Overflowing. Spilling out. Boiling over.

"Sirius looks at you! Even though he never looked at 'me'! You have Maria as your absolute ally, someone to share the pain of abuse and the weight of your mission, someone you can whine to, and you're surrounded by people who are friendly to you!"

"Even Malfoy, who was a nuisance, is on your side! You don't have to face Voldemort alone, and you don't have to shoulder the burden of the lives that will die from now on all by yourself. You didn't have to go through a trial sitting on pins and needles facing the risk of expulsion!"

"You are loved so much──you have it so much easier than 'me'────because you have 'Maria'!"

Do you know how much Maria has protected you? How much she took on the burdens of Harry Potter? How much she poured her heart into creating a world where Harry Potter could live easily?

'What a pitiful Maria'──the hateful whispers of a woman invaded my brain.

"You should be more grateful! You should thank 'Maria'! Do you have any idea how much a Harry Potter without 'Maria' would lose—"

My head was being scrambled into a mess.

Cedric, dying without understanding anything. Hedwig, shot down from the sky. George, clinging to Fred in tears. Snape, who cried only once. Sirius, vanishing into the Veil. —Cedric, dying with a smile.

"And yet, I didn't have a Maria."

The one who is all alone—is 'me'.

"...I don't understand, what you're saying."

Harry's eyes were filled with fear. Looking at Maria—Harry was terrified.

"Of course you don't. How could you. There's no way. There's no way you──could ever understand 'me'."

I tore at my hair. It was red. (To think I was actually black-haired.) It had loose waves. (To think my hair used to be an untidy mess.) A girl's voice. (To think I used to be a boy.) A clear forehead. (To think there was a lightning-bolt scar─) You, of all people, could never understand.

How could you, who gained Maria, ever know the Harry Potter without Maria────!

"I don't understand──I don't want this──I don't need this──I don't need something like this──── I don't need Maria!"

Those were the words that ended everything.

"I see."

I tore the locket away from Harry. My heart was eerily calm. My emotions had died. Maria had died.

"In that case────you can just become a 'Hero' all by yourself, too."

I abandoned myself—Maria.

I left the room, leaving Harry behind. Only Ron and Hermione were in the common room. Seeing the figures of my best friends, I finally remembered how to breathe.

"That took quite a while. Are you alright, Maria? How is Harry?"

"Everyone else went to dinner. And then, well, there was quite a lot of shouting, you know? It had me on edge. What on earth were you guys talking about?"

Avoiding the two who ran up to me with worried looks, I headed for the exit.

"Maria?"

"Maria?"

Right now, more than anything, I didn't want to be called 'Maria'.

—Maria wasn't needed anymore.

"—Maria!"

My shoulder was grabbed. I hadn't even realized where I was walking. In front of me was a door. —The Room of Requirement.

"Granger came flying all the way to the Slytherin dormitory. That Granger, mind you. So, when you guys──what happened to your hand!"

In the corridor behind me, drops of red were left in my wake. Blood. I had cut myself with the mirror shards, and the nails of my clenched fist had dug deeply into the flesh, gouging the wound.

It hurts.

"We need to get you to Madam Pomfrey right away──Maria?"

I touched his robe. A green robe. The robe I had always hated.

It hurts.

I rested my forehead against pale blond hair. It softly tickled my cheek and felt nice. The color I had always hated.

It hurts.

I grabbed the arm that hesitated mid-air. His hand was stroking my back. The warmth I had always hated.

It hurts.

It hurts.

It hurts.

It hurts.

In truth, I had already...

"Help me, Draco."

I was at my limit.