But Raven's laughter died in her throat as she looked up. There was a bird swooping towards her, a gigantic great horned owl with a green band around its neck, obviously a ministry bird, and it had an official looking letter tied to its leg. Gradually the others noticed it too and the table quieted. Raven paled as it landed imperiously in front of her. With trembling hands she reached to untie the letter from the extended claw of the enormous owl. All the seventh year Gryffindors were staring at her, dinner forgotten. A spectacular and highly unusual silence cascaded throughout the hall. The seventh year Gryffindors were silent because they knew, first hand what it meant when a ministry bird flew in with an official looking letter for a student. The rest of the Gryffindors were silent because it was so highly unusual for the seventh years to be silent, and the other houses were silent because it was so absurd for the Gryffindors to be silent. The owl took off importantly and soared out of the hall, but few watched it go, every eye in the hall seemed to be trained on the girl holding the envelope it had left behind. Raven's hands were shaking so badly as she struggled to open the paper that she knocked over her goblet with an audible clang, spilling pumpkin juice everywhere. James could hear it dripping onto the stone floor through the unnatural quiet. He looked past the shaking Raven to Sirius, who was sitting next to her. He was pale too, and was looking fearfully from the letter to the girl who had received it. Finally she managed to pull the letter from its envelope. James wouldn't have believed that she could go any paler than she already was but she did. Her eyes widened in horror as she read the letter her hands shaking more uncontrollably. A single tear fell from her eyelash onto the parchment in her trembling hands.

No one dared ask her what was in the letter. James almost didn't want to know, but he could guess how awful it must've been from the expression on his friend's face. He didn't think it was fair for someone to be in that much pain, especially since he knew the pain all too well himself. He wondered if that's how he had looked when he received the news of his parent's death. Finally, Raven dropped her hands and looked up at the ceiling.

"It's Caela," she whispered. Sophia let out an audible gasp in the comparative silence, and James felt Lily grab his hand under the table. Leaning forward, Iris Lewiget whispered.

"Oh my God! Raven – is she?"

"Dead" Raven answered, barely above a whisper. She looked down at her plate, but James had the impression that she wasn't really seeing it.

"I'm not very hungry," she said quietly and got up from the table. The rest of the Gryffindors looked down at their plates after what had just transpired, no one had much of an appetite and there was a sudden scraping of chairs as students got up to leave. James and Lily exchanged looks as the commotion of voices in the hall slowly resumed.

"How awful," she said. "First her parents now her sister. That just isn't fair."

They all walked out into the great hall and stopped when they saw Raven, standing stock still in the center of it. Younger students were giving her a wide berth and hurrying up the far side of the stairs towards their own dormitories. Suddenly Raven gave a cry that must've been wrenched from the deepest part of her broken heart, and she bolted right out through the front doors, letting them slam shut, thunderously, behind her. Before anyone could stop him Sirius had gone right after her.

James would've followed but Lily put a hand on his arm and stopped him.

"Just let them go, James. She doesn't need a lot of people right now." Still looking at the doors, he hesitated, then turned to Lily. She was right of course, it was a lesson he had learned the hard way, but when it came to these sorts of things, Lily was nearly always right. He took a very deep breath and hugged her tight.

*          *          *

Sirius pelted out into the darkness. Lightning flashed across the sky and he caught a glimpse of Raven running across the lawns. He followed, skidding in the fresh mud. Normally Sirius would rejoice in the opportunity to get his robes filthy, but there was much more at steak here. He ran, blindly in the direction he had seen her going, calling her name. But the wind threw his voice right back in his face. He didn't stop running. Another flash of lightning ripped through the sky and he saw her, lying face down in the mud. His heart stopped, though his feet didn't – was she all right? Another peal of thunder and it started to rain in a torrent of fat, heavy droplets. April showers my foot! This is a bloody monsoon! He thought slipping even more in the thickening mud as he fought to get to his friend. If anything had happened to her - if she had hurt herself – he didn't know what he would do.

"Raven!" he shouted again as he reached her, falling hurriedly to his knees beside her. She didn't move. "Raven, don't do this to me!" he cried pulling her up. Her face came free of the mud with a sickening squelch. She coughed and sputtered for a moment then began twisting to get away from him screaming.

"No. Get away! Leave me alone," she cried. Sirius held firm, there was nothing in the world that could've made him let her go. At that moment he knew he would've held fast had Voldemort himself arrived with an army of Death Eaters behind him. Taking the corner of his cloak, he wiped the mud from her face. It was already streaming off in the pouring rain. With a shudder she stopped struggling and went horribly limp. Sirius feared she had fainted until he felt her body convulsing with sobs of grief. He held her close, sheltering her from the rain as much as he could. Her hands were like ice.

"They're all gone! My parents my sister…they all left me!" Raven moaned. His mind groped madly for some comforting word he could offer, something he could do to make it all better. But there was nothing. He wished he could ease her pain somehow, but he couldn't bring her family back. No one could, so he held her closer, and each sob that racked her body felt as though it were torn from his own heart.

"Raven I'm sorry," he found himself shouting through the noise of the storm. "I can't bring them back. I wish I could but I can't. No one can."

What am I saying? He thought to himself.

"Look," he shouted. "We're all still here, Lilly, Remus, James, Iris, Peter, Stella…" he paused "Me."

Raven didn't answer.

"You're family still owns you at least. What's left of it. Stella still considers you her little sister."

Still no answer.

"I'm not helping am I?"

Raven managed to shake her head in what had to have been no.

"Look, no matter how many people Voldemort takes from you, there will still be some of us left. And we will stay with you… and even if no one else does…" Sirius faltered, Raven had opened her eyes and was blinking at him through the rain.

"I'll stay with you," he finished.

"Promise?"

"Promise."

** This story has kind of a crap ending. Which is why I need your help to fix it. How can I do it better? Let me know.