Chapter FifteenSeverus
I awoke, drenched in sweat, my nightshirt stuck to my skin. The nightmares had returned, those awful dreams that so defined who I was, and what I'd been. Only when they persisted did I feel the need to satisfy my darker urges. Now they recurred with greater intensity.
My mind drifted as I remembered that time and place so long ago, when my life changed forever.
I worshipped my father. The tall lean strong-willed God-fearing scholar and magistrate Albert Black lavished love and affection on my mother and my sister Louisa.
When Father met a premature death in a drowning accident, we clung to one another in our shared devastation and grief. Mother found herself unable to cope with her grief and often turned to me for solace and comfort. I saw nothing amiss in her ne
