Into Darkness (Morana)

"It is terribly, terribly dark down here," Adonis whispered to himself. He knew he was in the dungeons, and for once he'd actually wanted to go there, whereas usually he just ended up in places by pure accident.

However, as he didn't take Potions and hardly knew about this area, he was unaware of how dark it would actually be. Obviously, there was enough light for students to manage through without problems, otherwise there was sure to be a complaint, but that hardly applied to the place he was in. He wasn't exactly where the classrooms were located, so to speak. Not to mention that he was used to the outdoors, and was therefore unaccustomed to interior darkness, which he simply couldn't see through.

One door opened to reveal a storage closet and an angry Mrs Norris before Adonis slammed it shut and ran further down the hall. Being that his eyes were still trying to get used to the lighting, or lack thereof, he ran into something soft, most likely a person from rapid deduction, bouncing back off of it onto the cold floor.

Morana was just standing there, in the darkest corner. She used to do that quite often. Snakes were used to it, others were sometimes really terrified, when they found out she was watching them. Nobody except for Morana knew why she was doing this. But the reasons were basic. She loved shadows. And even mre she loved control. She knew so many things. She manipulated people by her sweet smile into illusion she likes them, that they are her friends. That was what Morana did.

"Little raven, lost in the dark," she said when she saw the little boy and smirked for herself in the shadows. She was curious if he finds her in all these dark corners around. It made her chuckle first. Than she closed her piercing eyes and started humming. Her dark, husky voice was perfect for punk songs and she loved to sing them.

Girl, Slytherin probably from the manipulative tones, older student, fond of dark clothes, likes to lurk in the shadows, seemed to enjoy mentally torturing others... Pity Adonis hardly knew anyone, and those that he'd met didn't fit this description in the slightest.

Tracing the sounds, he located the other person, blending into her corner like she was made for it. "What's your name?" Adonis asked, trying to break the veil of black with his eyes, but still failing.

Morana laughed quietly, but darkly enough to scare half of the school for life. "You boy, you are so much alike me. I can smell it," she said with strange and dark happiness in her voice. It was also that hint of insanity hidden inside as she looked directly at him from her corner and her piercing green eyes for a second imprisoned weak light from fire.

"I am Morana" she introduced herself, suddenly her voice without a single emotion. Just that dark, husky voice, which gave Morana even more charisma than she alredy had. Such a paradoy, but she loved to use it. "And you are?" she asked curiously as she stepped out from her shadow.

"I'm Adonis. You're down here a lot to be able to see without my sort of trouble," he remarked. He could feel her coming closer, rather than see her. It was akin to the tingling down your spine when you know someone's watching you, but less... foreboding. Or perhaps moreso. Adonis really wasn't sure.

"So how am I like you?" he asked, once he was somewhat sure she wasn't going to keep moving closer.

"Let's just say I grew up in shadow," she said darkly. It was true. Little insane twin, younger sister always in the shadow of impulsive Marvolo. And alergic to sunlight. She never complained. She never really found it to be a bad thing. She never really thought of it that way. But it was truth. Maybe not bad in Morana's eyes, but truth.

"You are dark. And you have even darker secret," she told him as she stopped moving and just continued looking at him curiously.

"Oh?" Adonis asked. He planted a foolish challenge in his question, one he knew would come back to bite him in the butt no doubt. "What might my secret be?"

Adonis found that he was actually doing a relatively good job at keeping the nervousness he was experiencing out of his voice. It would be downright uncomfortable if she actually did know what his 'deep dark secret' was, as he'd kept it from everyone but one student, and that person didn't even understand what he was saying.

"You tell me," said Morana with smirk. "I don't read minds. I can just sense darkness when it is around," she added. She enjoyed this. He was nervous, she could tell, but he also managed to keep it as hidden as possible. And she didn't want him to run away. He was too much fun for that.

"Uh-huh." Adonis's reply was skeptical and sarcastic beyond reasonable doubt. "What if I told you I eat people? Would that appeal to your idea of my darkness?"

Adonis really didn't know what he was doing, telling a complete stranger about that. She seemed like one of the last people to freak out over it, he supposed. If anything, he felt like it would increase their compatibility rather than rip it to shreds, like it did in most cases. There were very few people that could take cannibalism in stride and not scream about how freaky he was. He was under the impression that Morana fell under the first category, so he decided to see if he was right...

Morana looked at the boy even more curiously. She bowed her head to her right shoulder as her eyes were scanning the boy. She wanted to be sure he was not joking and than she saw the resemblance with the groundkeeper. She knew about the guy from her uncle. And from what she knew about his habbits, cannibalism was one of them. "Are you related to Armen Salander by any chance?" she asked honestly.

Adonis considered her question thoughtfully, before replying, "Uh, no I don't think so. I don't even know who that is. Why?"

He figured he must bear some resemblance to this Armen Salander fellow, otherwise the question would never have been posed. He'd been asked that on occasion before, but it wasn't a common thing. The bizarre thing in this case was the timing of the question. Morana hadn't asked it until after Adonis had professed cannibalism as a habit of his, which led him to mentally question whether or not this was the resemblance Morana had implied.

"Just a resemblance," Morana replied casualy. "He is our groundkeeper, maybe you two should have a talk," she added just matter-of-factly and than smirked as she looked at the boy again. "So little cannibal, interresting," she said and walked around him in circle, before she looked him in the eyes again, with all insanity and curiosity she had. "What's it like?" she asked him finally.

"What's what like? Eating people?" Adonis thought for a minute. No one had ever asked him to describe what most called his 'condition' before. It was... It was... "Yummy?" he offered, aware of how weak it sounded, before elaborating, "It's like eating regular meat but more satisfactory, I suppose."

Morana couldn't help but laugh. He really made her smile. Truly. Not like most of the people, who think how nice person she is. And how she is interrested in their words. This little boy was really interresting person to her. "I made cannibal nervous," she said happily. "Don't worry, boy. Your secret is safe with me," she added in next second, so she didn't scare him off. He was too much fun for that. And mainly, the fact he told her the truth meant he knew she is not who she is pretending to be most of the time. "In fact, we both have now secrets to keep, right?" she said suddenly serious again. This wasn't exactly the right time for people in school to find out true and scary nature of Morana Arachne Gaunt.

Adonis thought for a minute, but couldn't recollect Morana telling him any specific secret. He wondered if he'd simply missed her say or imply it, but he called it into question nevertheless. "It's no secret if I don't know what it is. Then it's just nonexistent, aye?" He hoped that she would tell him, because he liked having someone to trust with his peculiarities, and wanted them to trust him as well. Also, this was only the second person that he didn't feel compelled to eat, and the first for which that wasn't the initial consideration.

"Good, because you see, just like you don't want others to know about your eating habbits, I don't want anyone else except for snakes and now you to know, that Morana Gaunt is not as sweet and innocent dreamer, as she is considered to be," said Morana, her voice deadly cold. She liked to attack from behind and if Dumbledore discovered both Gaunt twins being troublemakers, it would mean too much attention. And they couldn't afford such a thing.

"Oh. I should have known that," Adonis chuckled. Truth was, he didn't know that people considered Morana to be a sweet girl. He didn't know anything about her at all, really. He had a feeling that she was nice, as she seemed good enough to him, but it made sense for her to be more than what meets the eye. In fact, it seemed wrong for her not to be.

"Did your eyes get used to dark yet?" she asked suddenly, leaving previous topic behind like it never existed. There was nothing else to talk about anyway. They settled this and Morana believed, he will keep his word. After all, this boy seemed to know how this works. And he also seemed to be okay with that.

Adonis sighed miserably. "Ah, not really. I can see your outline easily, and I can differentiate between light tones versus dark tones in color, but that's about it. I'm an outdoor person, honestly. I don't do so well in dark, inside places." He wanted to ask how she could stand it, but that could easily come across as judgmental, so he shut his mouth when he knew he was done saying what needed to be said.