Cicatrix

[hereticalvision]

Title : Cicatrix
Author : hereticalvision
Rating : PG-13
Word Count : 2k
Characters : Black sisters and their partners
Summary : The question of who murdered the Black sisters is a matter of perspective.
Disclaimer : All characters depicted herein are owned by JKR et al. This was written for pleasure, not profit. No infringement intended.

Authors Note

Comments

[hrymfaxe]

Oh my goodness! This is a fantastic tale. I really like how you jump between different time periods without ever loosing me along the way, and how you use that to show the evolving (or devolving?) relationship between the Black sisters.

I felt the impact of these lines in my bones:
Just a taste of the danger, the forbidden. Not like Bella, never like Bella. Bella wanted to carve things up and burn the world down.

Not one Slytherin in the pack, not one who could think of how to keep it all. And she herself was a Slytherin barely worthy of the name; she couldn’t even work out how to keep her family together, not at seventeen and not at forty-five.

And this paragraph rocked my world:
Sirius thought that Narcissa had never challenged anything a day in her life, that she done her duty with Lucius and ignored his dalliances and indifference in the hope that he would come to love her in the end

[hereticalvision]

Thank you so much for the long, thoughtful comment, it made my day. So glad you liked it!

[train_lindz]

I really, really, really, really, really, really like this.

Really.

I have a hidden secret love for the Black sisters and their familiar relationship and this just hit the spot. In particular I like the jumping through the timeframes and the transistions of using 'When Andromeda was six..." when switching between the relationships with which sister.

Well done!!!

[hereticalvision]

Thank you so much :)
I've seen a lot of great Andromeda fic, and also lots of lovely post-DH Narcissa-Andromeda reconciliations so I wanted to try a different angle. What if Andromeda didn't turn her back on her family as a conscious decision, and what if she had bitterness of her own. Those were the ideas I wanted to explore and I'm really glad it struck a chord for you.

[zia_montrose]

This was an interesting take of the relationship between the Black sisters. I'm impressed with the unique way you structured it--almost like you've inset little bits of poetry between the prose. And the lines beginning with "When Andromeda was four" strike me as some sort of creepy nursery rhyme. : )

I especially like how you've made Narcissa a force to be reckoned with: "Narcissa behaved as though she’d never wept in all her life" and "Anyone who ever thought Narcissa weak had clearly failed to pay attention". And how you've shown Sirius to have been duped on that count.

I think all those things can be read in or between the lines of canon--that Narcissa is strong in her own way, that Sirius underestimates people he doesn't approve of, and that Slytherins exhibit their strength in a much different manner than the Gryffindors. And I really liked the way you ended it: because the good among the strong always fight. Good people sacrifice themselves, good people lose. And that’s why the war happens again and again and again.

[hereticalvision]

This comm is just lovely, everyone posts such thougthful comments. Thank you and I'm glad you liked it :)

[brissygirl]

First thing of yours I have read.

Very interesting take on the lives of the Black family.

Narcissa is such a bitch, doing anything to hang onto Lucius even at the cost of her own sister.

Bella is just a lunatic!

You really captured Andromeda's pain and heartbreak throughout the story. Ted sounds like he truly loved Andromeda even if at first she couldn't believe him.

[hereticalvision]

Hi, glad to see you here!
Thanks for the feedback. It seems like you took from the story what I was trying to get across and that makes me do the dance of joy. *peers around office* No one here?
*does the dance of joy*

[shimotsuki]

This is really powerful. I like the structure very much, the way there's a rhythm to the sentences. The backstory about Andromeda, Narcissa, and Lucius is a twist on Black family complications I haven't seen before, and boy does it make for a compelling dynamic between the two sisters.

And it breaks my heart to see Andromeda think of herself as weak. Maybe she chose Ted out of more necessity than bravery in this story, but to go on living when she's lost both her families takes its own kind of strength, even if she doesn't see it.

There are so many small details here that paint these women as complex and three-dimensional (well, okay, maybe not Bella so much -- she's officially so messed up it's hard to see her as three-dimensional...) and really show how their relationships have changed over time.

A lot of food for thought here -- deeply disturbing, in a breathtaking and compelling way!

[shimotsuki]

Thank you for the lovely comment. I really was interested in the idea that maybe Andromeda was pushed more than she jumped, because I think too often we do live with regrets that are less about how things turned out and more about how they came to be.