I write sins, not tragedies (Sienna)

[Deleted]

Disguise

After her conversation with Casi, Lúthien felt a deep and compelling need to seek out human contact. Her grip on her sanity and humanity was still weak and fragile and she needed a friend. Sienna had always been a friend to her and she'd been the bridesmaid at her first wedding. She missed the beautiful woman that had been her close friend for many years while they went to summer camp together. They'd bonded and found a sense of kinship that Lúthien had neglected when her life had started to fall apart. Now that the reminder had come back that her life was balancing on the edge of a knife she wanted to remember the days that she hadn't been running for her life and trying desperately in her darker moments to hold on to anything.

She'd brought her flute and had gone into London, which was risk enough on it's own. She just knew she needed to see the only person she could call her best friend. She had made sure she wasn't hunted too actively before she'd come back out of hiding after her break down. She was recovering, but far from stable. She could almost feel the mask fall apart. She hadn't used polyjuice today, choosing a face plastered on top of her own by her abilities as a metamorphmagi in stead. She had gotten to the apartment she'd managed to discover belonged to her old friend. She cast a few chars to ensure not everybody would be woken by the sound of her flute and took a deep breath.

Placing the instrument to her lips, she started playing, pouring her heart out before she even saw Sienna. She told the story of fear and pain and loss with every single note. She dwelt long on the heartbreak and the absolute desolation of the void of hope she was forced to live in. She tried and tried again to do something to feel less lost but the darkness always seemed to catch up to her. She played and played until at long last she saw a familiar face. She was certain no explanations would be needed. The music combined with the fact she was on the run ought to be enough to inform Sienna exactly who was out there. Still, she had her wand out in a mere moment.

"Don't make me hurt you. I need a friend and I'm pretty sure you're the only one I have left. Will you please come talk to me? You can turn me in tomorrow if you wish, just be my friend tonight?" She pleaded, an unfamiliar sense of openness about her that Sienna wouldn't exactly be familiar with. Still, her voice was her own, as was her music. She was certain to know exactly who she was.

Sienna Aurélie Linslee

[Sienna Aurélie Linslee]

Early May 2025

It had been an incredibly long day, it was very late, but Si wasn’t ready to turn in for the night quite yet. She’d finished a batch of potions for the apothecary that had kept her later than normal, and there was definitely a large part of her that just wanted to sleep the stress off. But she wasn’t a workaholic, and she didn’t much like people who made work their whole lives. So Sienna was settled comfortably on the couch in her small flat, having just set the kettle to boil, and flipping idly through the latest issue of Witch Weekly (don’t judge her, skimming the baking tips and gossip columns was the perfect way to unwind and take her mind off work).

Her eyes wandered from the article she’d just finished to her closed bedroom door. Gus had stopped by earlier in the night, drunk from wherever he’d been and whatever he’d been up to, and Si hadn’t asked too many questions before leading him to her (undoubtedly familiar) bedroom and tucking him in. Maybe it would have been the wiser thing to keep him on the couch, but…well, since when had Si ever been smart about Gus? Her cat had immediately gone to join him (what a traitor) so Sienna had closed the door to have a little privacy.

When the flute music started, Si frowned as she set the magazine down. It was beautiful…but very out-of-place, and it had been a long time since Sienna had heard anybody play the flute so skillfully and with such emotion. It must have been years already since the last time Si had gone to that summer camp, the one her father had found shortly after she’d received her Beauxbatons letter. That story wasn’t very interesting – he’d been worried his daughter, as a Muggleborn, would have trouble integrating into the magical community. The camp was supposed to be a place to make friends with witches and wizards from all over Europe, rather than just the French-speaking community. Even after everything, Si supposed, that part had been successful.

Finally curious enough to go investigate, Si opened the door and was immediately met by an unfamiliar woman pointing a wand at her. Si couldn’t help herself, and took a step back from the sheer shock of such an unlikely (and frankly nightmarish) sight. It was accompanied by a gasp after the woman spoke and the pieces began to start coming together in Sienna’s head. “H-how…” she couldn’t find her voice, and she frantically wracked her brain for what she’d done with her wand (until she realized with a sinking feeling that it was still by the couch where she’d left it).

Sienna couldn’t settle between looking at the woman (Lúthien?) or the wand pointed right at her. Her brain had stopped working – what was the protocol for something like this? What was she supposed to do? So she timidly opened the door a little wider (because if someone pointing their wand at you wanted to talk then you just did it), and asked with a cracked voice, “d-do you w-want to come in?”

@luthien

[Deleted]

Perhaps things would have gone a lot smoother if Lúthien had chosen to be nice to Sienna. It simply wasn't that easy. The first summer she'd met Sienna she'd been dealing with some issues, although very different from this time. Still, the other girl had made her feel like life would go back to normal eventually and that she was on the right track to get where ever it was she was going. Lúthien needed that again now, more than anything. Perhaps that was why she decided to seek out Sienna, for the feeling that everything woudl be fine. She was too upset to think rationally and had considered so many things that might go wrong that she almost stopped herself from going but she couldn't manage in the end. She had shown up and was now threatening somebody because she needed their help. There was no way that could go wrong, right?

The first aspect of it going wrong barely registered. The part where Sienna hadn't uttered her name and looked utterly shocked. It took a long time for her to realise that was probably due to the fact that she wasn't wearing her own face. Well, that was such a habit now that she almost forgot that meant people didn't recognise her. So as Sienna offered her to come in she took that in two possible ways. She dove into the mind of the other woman for a mind to check for hazards prior to actually walking in. She found where the woman had her wand (easy) and the fact there was a guy in her bed (unexpected) and that she didn't have anything that she currently needed to worry about. She'd done a very quick sweep on the guy, but that had been very short because she didn't want to be overly impolite and dig. He wasn't a threat though. At most a drunk and a empty headed pretty boy more likely to be trouble than worth the trouble. She dismissed him almost instantly.

She took two steps in, heading for the coffee table and picking up Sienna's wand and sticking it in her own robes as a precaution. "Who's pretty boy?" She asked, vaguely motioning to the closed bedroom door. She was half curious as she fell on the sofa, taking a moment to try and regain her breath. She burried her face in her head after a few seconds, crying as all the blonde drained from her dark hair and her face restored. She felt safe enough and keeping up the other identity took far more energy than she currently had. She had a few spare bottles of polyjuice on her in case of emergency either way. She raised her head from her hands, tears staining her face as she took a few shaky breaths. "I'm so sorry Si. I just couldn't take any risks. Everything...." She took a breath and fought back the fears as she pulled a piece of cloth from her robes to dry her face. "Everything is falling apart and I didn't know who else to turn to." She said in a small voice.

She motioned for Sienna to sit. "I mean, if you want to I wouldn't mind if you tell the aurors I stopped by for a visit but I'd appreciate it if you didn't try to do anything funny while I'm still here. I really don't want to try and save myself by hurting you." She looked at Sienna with a deep and penetrating look. "You're all I have left. Please." And for the first time in over seven years, Lúthien found herself pleading for something that she couldn't be sure she'd get. For the first time in a long time she was pleading to begin with because she couldn't play games or somehow worm her way out of this mess any way that she usually might have tried. She felt broken and ruined. Ruined, like her biological mother had seen her and managed to say straight to her face. It hurt, even after all these years. More so because it was starting to feel like she'd been right from the very start. Everything she touched seemed to end up ruined in one way or another. "Please Sienna, will you help me?" She asked the other woman, the desperation almost audible in her voice. If Sienna remembered anything about her, she'd realise how serious it was and hopefully, she'd show mercy.

Sienna Aurélie Linslee