Chapter Two
It took a lot of convincing for her mother to allow her to stay at Grimmauld place, the headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix, and the home of falsely accused mass murder Sirius Black. In the end, it was her father that had come through for her.
Her mother was in the backroom, fiddling with a new idea she had for a cleaning potion that was now in the works within a simmering cauldron, and Aletta found herself shyly standing behind her in the small alcove that worked as their back work room. When Aletta was little she called this the Magic Room because it was where mother spent her time with her potions when there was nothing left to be tidied in the household. The only other person Aletta knew that enjoyed potions so much was Snape, her greasy potions professor at Hogwarts whom was nothing at all like her prim mother.
Aletta never argued with her mother but her skin was beginning to prickle with heat as she was becoming upset at the idea of all she would miss this summer if she didn't spend it at Grimmauld place just as Hermoine and Weasleys already were. She knew surely it would take all of her school year for them to catch her up if she did not send off for the headquarters at once.
"—Shouldn't have told you a thing," her mother was saying shrilly when Aletta heard her father shut the front door behind him, having just come home from his work at the ministry. And of course he, who was always able to help find a resolution between her a Rolf even when they were young and argued over their toy broom, came immediately towards the back room to find the pair.
"This is still about the Headquarters matter I suppose?" He spoke with a small sigh and loosed his tie generously. "I think, if Aletta wishes, there is no real danger in her staying with her friends for the remainder of the summer."
And so that is how Aletta found herself on a dingy London street, here stomach rolling from just having apparated alongside her father. He gave her a steadying hand and at once handed her a piece of crumpled parchment. "Read it quickly," he whispered, "Memorize it." She did as she was told running the sentence over in her head again and again: Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix are located at No. 12 Grimmauld Place, London.
Aletta looked around at the houses as she repeated the phrase in her head and sure enough between numbers eleven and thirteen and shabby old door appeared where she had not seen it before. "Alright then," her father said, burning up the parchment with the tip of his want, "right along you know where you're going now."
Aletta stepped over the ashes that had once held the location to the headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix and shuffled towards the twelfth door with her heavy trunk. The door was black but seemed to have been painted an incredibly long time ago, scratches and scuffs marred it, and no-one seemed bother to put a fresh coat of paint over them. Aletta thought someone ought to perhaps in a cheerier color, something like the yellow on the door of number eleven, or the purple on the door to her own home. The door knocker was just as dull, a silver serpent in need of polishing, and that was all the adorned the door, which had no letter slot or even a keyhole. Aletta reached up to the knocker and let it thwap against the door. She was nearly sure it hissed at her as she did so.
Molly Weasley answered the door and ushered her and her father in with a kind smile. "The kids will be so glad to know you're here, Aletta, we've all missed you terribly. They're right upstairs. Second landing."
In the hall gas lamps sputtered, giving a dim glow, and down all the way at the end was a door cracked open. The room at the end of the hall seemed crowded and she could hear a group talking and rearranging what sounded like seats around a table. Molly then turned to her father saying, "The meetings just about to start."
Aletta mounted the steps of the staircase, struggling with her trunk and gave a last wave to her father as Molly ushered him down the hall and into the room. The door shut with a snap and Aletta was left alone. She didn't know what it was about the house but it made her feel the need to be as quiet as she possibly could. She made her way past a pair of moth eaten curtains and seemed to be moving as if by a draft, but she felt none, and shuddered at the site of terribly wrinkled elf heads all mounted on plaques hung on the wall. Her parents had warned her that the home was a strange one but she was not expecting something so dark. She wondered at once why they would be planning a fight against Voldemort in a home that seemed clearly to be owned by evil wizards.
Aletta finally reached the dingy second landing and was immediately greeting by her best friend, Hermoine. "Oh Aletta!" She embraced her so tight Aletta couldn't help the squeak that escaped her. She pulled her immediately into the second door that lined the landing, "This is my room. We'll be sharing it now. Once you're all unpacked I'm sure you've so much to ask."
"My Mum and Dad said some…" Aletta trailed as she dropped her trunk on the bed that Hermoine hadn't occupied and sat down beside it, reaching down to undo the laces of her shoes. "They were vague though it was a right hassle to even convince them I'd be okay to come here."
Hermoine nodded understandingly at this. "Well the Order you see they've had a few meetings since we all arrived but this was only last week. Lots of people have been coming and going—
"Like who? What do they say in the meetings? What are they doing?" Arabella asked interestedly. She'd be day dreaming of the Order since before she was allowed to stay.
"Well the Weasley's of course. Bill's moved back to join. And some professors like McGonagall and Snape even."
Aletta sat up so quick her trunk was knocked to the floor, "Snape?"
"Dumbledoor trusts him," Hermoine said loyally, "anyways you'll meet a few at dinner this evening I suppose."
Dinner was a giddy affair. Aletta met Tonks who she liked immediately. The older girl was clumsy but kind and spent much of the meal entertaining her Ginny, and Hermoine with her metamorphagi abilities, changing her nose for them and even growing cat ears at Aletta's request. She also met a man named Mundungus who smelled a bit odd a wore a very large trench coat for his stature. Something told Aletta that he was hiding something in there and her suspicions were confirmed when Molly started swatting at him with an old broom hand yelling about stolen goods. Tonks personally found this even so funny that it brought tears to her eyes. Remus and Sirius were there as well whom she had met before and they all greeted one another kindly. Of course the Weasley's all joined as well save for two.
"How's Charlie?" She asked to Ron and the other Weasley's in general. She remembered him from when they all snuck Norbert, the baby dragon Hagrid had gambled for, all the way up to the top of the astronomy tower for Charlie to take back to Romania with him on the dragon reserve. At the time, she had a small silly crush on him but that was long since past.
"He loves it in Romania, which is good," Ron noted through a mouthful of bread and stew, "Dumbledoor wants as many foreign wizards as he can get to help with, well, you know."
This made sense to Aletta. She gathered from everything she'd been told, by Harry at the end of last year, and her parents this summer, that Dumbledoor was trying to recruit as many wizards as possible. He contacted her parents because they were apart of the first war, which had come as an incredible shock to her. She could barely imagine her quiet and gentle parents being involved in something so deadly as a war. Aletta was the only Gryffindor in a family of Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs after-all.
"And Percy?" She asked about next.
Across the table a glass shattered and everyone turned to see Mister Weasley looking just as surprised as the rest of them that he had shattered the water glass in his hand. Next to him, Mrs. Weasley let out a faint sniffle before she altogether burst into tears, leaping from her seat to leave the cramped dining room. Bill looked grim and to Aletta's left, the twins shook their heads solemnly.
"I'll explain later," Ron sighed.
For the rest of the meal Aletta kept her mouth shut, feeling incredibly awkward at having been the cause of such a scene. She didn't know what happened to Percy but she was itching in her seat to find out and confronted Ron outside their rooms as soon as she was done helping the others with the dishes. The twins were there too and offered small consultations.
"Don't feel so bad, Letty, just bad timing," George said.
"It's Percy's own damn fault anyways," Fred continued for his brother.
Ron seemed to agree. "Dad a Percy got into a terrible row at the beginning of Holiday. You see, Percy came back home from work one evening a told us all he'd been promoted—Junior Assistant to the Minister."
"No way," Aletta gasped, thinking of the mishap with Crouch last year.
"That's what we all said but you know Percy. He came home expecting dad to be impressed with him of course… and well he wasn't."
"Why not?" asked Aletta.
"No one in the family is real happy with the Ministry these days. Apparently Fudge has been going around trying to see that nobody has any contact with Dumbledoor. Fudge gates him now, thinks he's going to try a steal the job of Minister right out from under him."
"But Dumbledoor wouldn't. He loves Hogwarts too much!" Aletta said.
Ron nodded in agreement. "But that doesn't matter the Fudge. He thinks Dumbledoors just trying to make trouble saying that You-Know-Who is back and all."
"I think he's controlling the prophet now, having them write all those nasty things about him and Harry," Hermoine cut in.
By now Ron had lost most of his wind and simply shrugged. "Well Percy moved out after the whole argument anyways. The whole family hasn't heard from him since."
Aletta wasn't very close with Percy but he was kind to her once when she had lost her way to Charms class in her first year and she never expected him to sack his whole family like that simply over a job. It sounded like a very Slytherin thing to do and it made her stomach turn. She couldn't imagine losing Rolf or her parents for some silly reason like that.
Over the next few weeks Molly had all of them on cleaning duty. Aletta wouldn't have minded so much had the house not been so wretched. Her second day there she met Kreacher the house elf of the residence who seemed to at least have partially lost his mind. Hermoine saw him as another one of her S.P.E.W elves a scolded anyone that spoke poorly of him near her. Aletta just thought him to be dirty in rude. Whenever he happened into the same room as her he talked down to her shoes calling her a nasty blood traitor. The first time he'd insulted her she'd been shocked but after a few times of him interrupting her cleaning to snatch old things she'd sacked from her garbage bag she ignored him. Unlike Sirius, whom never let Kreacher leave with the things her collected from the bin in his loin cloth, Aletta just let him go on his way. If Kreacher wanted to clutter up his already minimal living quarters then let him she thought.
On her third day Aletta met Sirius mother, or rather or portrait. Someone rang the doorbell of the front entry and Mrs. Weasley immediately shot up from her seat in the same moment a terrible screeching emitted from the moth eaten curtains Aletta had passed on the stairs upon her arrival to the home. The curtains swung open and the gnarled portrait of a woman appeared. Her skin and teeth were yellowing and her dark matted hair was partially covered by a black cap. The woman was drooling and spitting as her eyes lulled around in her skull. "SCUM," She scream, "BLOODTRAITORS. MUTTS. IN MY HOME?!" Molly battled with the curtains and Remus ran down the hallway to aide her while the rest of them stared agape at the scene. Tonks, who had apparently been the one to ring the bell came into the house upon hearing the screaming and apologized as she attempted to help the two of them shut the curtains. As the woman's screaming continued other portraits began to wake and holler as well. Aletta was half frightened the stuffed heads of the house elves would also wake and add to the clamor. By the time the two of them had shut the curtains she had clapped her hands over her ears, too enthralled by the scene to actually leave. When the curtains held shut a quit their rustling Remus turned towards the kids with a grimace. "Sorry about that you all. Sirius mother," he whispered in explanation. "She put a permanent sticking charm on her portrait."
As they all kept on with their cleaning of Grimmauld place Aletta found more things to be half surprised half disgusted by. Sirius wouldn't let Hermoine in the library for fear of the blood charms on the books but noted that the rest of them should be fine because of their pureblood. They all avoided that room anyways and the door to it was always kept firmly shut. In the evenings, the Order would conduct their meetings and they would all gather at the edge of the first landing to use one of Fred and George's new inventions, the extendable ear. The extendable ears only ever worked when someone would forget to put an Imperturbable charm on the door of the meeting, which wasn't often. The only useful information the group was able to find out from their eavesdropping was that the Order had Harry on a constant watch, which members were often switching on and off to take care off.
After the meetings Molly would serve them dinner. Sometimes people from the Order would stay, always Bill and most often Tonks or Mundungus but every now and again Kingsley, the auror who was supposed to be leading the hunt on Sirius, would stay as well. Aletta always got a laugh off of him telling her where he was saying he'd tracked Sirius too last and her favorite location by far was all the way in states on a beach in Florida. The idea of Sirius in some swim trunks and drinking out of a coconut never failed to give her a giggle.
One evening Aletta was feeling especially happy as the Order had forgotten to charm the door for that nights meeting but on his way out the door Dumbledoor halted her. He didn't often come to meetings and if he did he scarcely stayed for the whole event. "I know that Harry Potter is a dear friend of yours, Aletta, but I must implore of you that you halt your letting writing to him for the safety of him and the rest of the Order." He immediately swept out the door after that, all in a purple and glittering cloak. Aletta was shaken and barely ate that evening. Dumbledoor often made forbidding warnings but had never made one to her directly until then.