The Seven Deadly Sins

The Seven Deadly Sins: Drabble

Harry Potter fanfic – Gen

JKR owns all the characters - I just want to play with them.

Ira (wrath, more commonly known as anger)

It was effortless, exhilaratingly easy, to let it thunder like wild magic through his veins, stronger than any potion; compelling him up stairs & along halls; directing the force of his spell through the door & unerringly into the victim fiercer than any lightning bolt.

The difficult thing, as always, was to call it back, to command it to heel, to compel that genie back into the bottle. But it would not do, thought Dumbledore, to allow his unrestrained anger deprive them of the answers & explanations this counterfeit Mad-Eye Moody owed them.

Note: this scene is from HP & the Goblet of Fire when Harry is dragged to the Dark Arts office by the fake Mad-Eye Moody (aka Barty Crouch jr), after he had returned to Hogwarts clutching Cedric's body. Dumbledore, Snape & McGonagall came bursting through the door to rescue Harry, & the Headmaster is revealed as a being far greater & more terrible than the amiable old codger with a daft sense of humour he appears to be...a Gandalf-revealed-in-his-true-majesty-type-moment!

Avaritia(greed)

She had to have him.

They belonged together; he was hers.

With death all around them & danger ahead, his foolish qualms & protests meant nothing. She would speak; she would sweep away all the barriers he placed in front of her, in front of them.

Lupin looked at Tonks in despair. What could he say to make her understand

He could never make her understand, he realized. And he liked her well enough. Her attention flattered him; her affection made him feel loved & cared for, & chased away the perpetual numbness of rejection & loneliness & isolation.

Note: The scene: HP & the Half-Blood Prince - at the hospital bed where Bill Weasley lies severely wounded & Dumbledore's death at Snape's hands is revealed, has always seemed a very peculiar time & place for Tonks to thrust her great-love-declaration at Lupin - it was either the spontaneous outpouring of emotion that could no longer be contained...or arch-manipulation. I'm open to either interpretation, really...but for the purposes of "Greed", I'm making her greedy & manipulative. I do like Tonks, though, & I think this is quite uncharacteristic.

Gula (gluttony)

There weren’t enough hours in the day (or the night) to devour the abundance before her. Even by gobbling up the savoury with the sweet, the salty & the sour, & stuffing it in indiscriminately, barely taking the time to chew, swallowing in great gulps, & shoving in more & more, no pause to savour, no delay to swallow – even by rushing as fast as she could, Hermione did not think she could read all the restricted books in the library before Madame Pince returned from her weekend away.

Superbia (pride)

There was a certain satisfaction in a job well done, he thought. And really, no-one could do it quite like him. He knew he was one-of-a-kind, & truly the results spoke for themselves…he waited for a few minutes, & sure enough, to his great satisfaction, the expected response came! “Peeves”, shrieked Professor McGonagall.

Acedia (sloth)

So many things to do, so many jobs that ought to be done. Hermione would be expecting him to check that Harry & Ron were doing their homework, …& then there were his patrol duties… So much to do, he thought, & I’m not going to do any of themCrookshanks purred loudly to himself, warm in the sunlight on the dormitory windowsill

Luxuria (extravagance, later lust)

There was his voice, that divine voice, silky & menacing, smoothing across his skin like velvet, & then that stare, dark, fathomless, meeting his eyes like an electric shock jolting him…must concentrate, concentrate, concentrate…have to ignore, ignore…Ignore those sensations, dripping like sweet warm honey through his blood, through his veins, straight to his groin. Ernie focused on the page of his potions book, & tried to pretend Snape wasn’t in the room.

Invidia (envy)

“It’s not right, not fair, not just” she muttered, throwing her mother’s newspaper across the room. “Minimal research, dubious writing skill, INEPT characterization & then there’s the whole misrepresentation of Snape”

Hermione knew she shouldn’t obsess so – after all, it should not really matter to her. She knew the worth of her own work, the care she took before publishing, the passion she expressed for improving the fates of those less fortunate than herself. It shouldn’t matter one bit, she thought, grinding her teeth at this latest news of the most recent accolades for the celebrated author, J..