A House of Shadows

Adrian Selwyn woke up to soft light drifting through his window over his sheets and his face, as well as the sound of something outside exploding.

The boy rolled his eyes, groaning against the light although he rose. The sheets were pushed back and he slid out of the bed with little resistance. The aged floorboards creaked slightly under his feet.

"Not morning. Still rest," Lutain argued quietly, still coiled on his magically heated stone near the wardrobe.

"For you. I'm not that lucky," Adrian corrected, yawning while opening the large wardrobe to select the outfit for the day.

Adrian Lestrange, his name practically a nickname to the actual legal name registered with the ministry: Hadrianus Selwyn, a name that evidently had some sort of latin prefix and suffix root word meaning he wasn't aware of. He didn't care. The name was similar enough to Harry that it wouldn't be questioned if any mistakes happened.

There was a sense of...relief, that accompanied his name changing legally and secretly in the ministry of magic archive. He was… he wasn't part of the Potters anymore; he was completely separated.

And then Bella dragged him out of bed months ago in the middle of the night, nearly having Lutain bite her if not for Nagini arriving and hissing something to the small lethal serpent.

Adrian, still practically asleep, hadn't understood what was going on. He flailed, shouted, and set fire to a few things (which Bella found absolutely adorable, the sadist she was).

When he came to after being stunned, he was given a potion and a ritual knife he was apparently supposed to drag across his palm.

Adrian hadn't quite understood but, somehow through the loud rambles and Bella's excited squeals, he had managed to grasp the basics that it was some sort of blood adoption- something to physically alter his features. Adrian was aware he looked identical to his renowned father. It was inconvenient. The blood adoption was supposed to change that.

Adrian knew that he was useful; they wouldn't outright kill him. He was important, or necessary for plans he hadn't quite understood yet. So he did what was expected, and drank whatever concoction Bella had given him.

It was certainly strange, Adrian thought later, that he possessed absolutely no physical features of either of the Lestranges after the ritual was over. His features were delicate. He had high, aristocratic cheekbones. His eyes were large and framed with dark, medium lashes, and he had a thin nose and sharp jaw. His hair was straight with an almost blueish hue in bright lighting.

Bellatrix had apparently been stunned and nearly obsessive when Adrian had returned from the blood adoption ritual. It wasn't until Nagini had commented on his hair that it clicked just who had adopted him.

Adrian wretched himself sick.

That was the night when Harry James Potter became Hadrianus "Adrian" Selwyn.

"Can I have a mouse?" Lutain yawned, jarring Adrian's attention back to the here and now. The little snake unhinged his jaw with a snap of cartilage.

"Maybe," Harry mused, watching as Lutain's tongue flickered in understanding. He had been working on teaching Lutain English, it was useful for spying on others.

Harry grabbed a change of clothing, sliding into the shirt and trousers.

He heard another crash from outside, causing him to peer out grudgingly.

Well, nothing was broken, or on fire.

"Master, time to go?" Lutain asked, rising and wavering in the air. Adrian turned, reaching down with his left arm where Lutain coiled loosely around the wrist and pulled himself up his arm up towards Adrian's shoulders.

The two descended the large although poorly maintained stairs, sliding around the loose railing to pad towards the kitchen where platters of food had already been prepared, courtesy of the house elf.

Rodolphus, seated at the nearby table, didn't bother to look up when Adrian kicked out a nearby chair and dropped into it.

"We have business." Rodolphus muttered, not looking up from his paper. Instead he flipped through it, reading intently a section Adrian had not the patience or interest to care about.

"Don't you always?" Adrian muttered under his breath, glancing under his darkened straight bangs, noticing the slight quirk of the elder man's mouth.

"That we do," He agreed without showing actual interest. "Bella's out with someone from the ministry."

"Torturing?" Adrian guessed dryly, poking at the now mangled contents of his breakfast. Rodolphus neither confirmed nor denied it. It was a rhetorical question anyway.

With his eleventh birthday only a few weeks away, Adrian Selwyn was getting used to the new dynamic of his house. Although archaic and ghastly with few, if any, morals, it was immeasurably better than the tainted memories of the orphanage or the Dursleys.

At first it had horrified him and made him sick to his stomach, made him lock himself away from the rest of the people who lived here. No amount of coaxing or cooing from Bellatrix could convince him to open the enchanted door.

It had taken a week and the only reason he left was the house elf's inability to bring a mouse alongside his meals. Lutain was ravenous. Bellatrix had made a peace offering of a living chipmunk.

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