Disclaimer: I own nothing familiar from the HP Universe.

Chapter Two

They arrived at 12 Grimmauld Place and Severus told her or more precisely he ordered her to behave and to not call him Sevie again unless she wished to spend time in St. Mungos. Cece stuck her tongue out at him as he turned to open the door after giving her a paper with the address written upon it. The sudden appearance of the house might have surprised her more if Cece's nerves hadn't already been so frazzled. She followed him into the house and walked carefully, suddenly aware of the clicking sound that the heels that she wore made on the floor.

"Snivellus." A voice announced lowly as they moved into the kitchen. Cece's eyes went straight to the speaker. Her direct gaze caused him to blink. "What's this, a female version? God couldn't be so cruel."

"And you really shouldn't be such a jerk." Cece replied as she pulled her hand through the hair that was currently the bane of her existence. She put her bag onto the table next to a redheaded male, who she knew to be Bill Weasley from his description in the books. Although she had to say that the books had never mentioned how he was incredibly sexy with an angel's face. She thought of what happened to him and hid a frown behind her hair as she turned back to her bag. She opened it and suddenly looked up in shock. "My bag has eaten my things, Sev."

Severus let out an impatient noise and shook his head at her. "With all that you put in that thing, it's probably buried."

Cece rolled her eyes. "Odious man." She muttered causing Bill to turn a laugh into a sudden cough. "You can go away now. You're absolutely no help, what so ever. I'd much rather flounder about on my own." She announced giving a wave of her hand as if dismissing him from her presence. "You've got me where I need to be, now go away."

"As you wish, Iliana." He gave a mock bow and stormed away as she knew he would.

"I've died and been sent to hell because of all my misdeeds." Cece sunk down onto the seat next to Bill and pushed her bag forwards. She put her elbows on the table, thinking of how her mother would have had something to say if she did such a thing before her and put her face in her hands. "I don't even believe in hell. I'm pagan." Another thing her mother would have had a word or two about.

Bill laughed out loud this time. "Hello, there. I'm Bill Weasley and you are?"

"Iliana Prince, at the moment." She said peeking out of her fingers at him. He held out his hand to her, so she did as she had been taught, she sat up and took it in her own for a brief moment. "It's nice to meet you, Bill." She smiled. How could she not help but smile at the dreamy redhead and think that Fleur was indeed lucky. "My cousin has little manners and didn't see fit to introduce me. I'm visiting from the US or at least I was. Now, I'm not sure what I'm doing." She frowned darkly. "I sound like some little girl."

"Not at all." He assured her. "You just sound a little lost."

Cece turned to look at Sirius Black for a moment. "And you are?" She questioned haughtily before giving a laugh and grinning at his look of confusion. "I know who you are, Mr. Black. I can read." She rolled her eyes and went back to looking into her bag. She knew she had tossed a couple hairties within the bag. She could see them clearly in her mind. She reached into the bag and pulled out...the hairties. "Well, call me a lamb and lead me to the

slaughter." She murmured as she looked into the bag that appeared to be empty.

"Excuse me?" A rather harried looking gentleman questioned. Cece met his golden eyes and realised what she said as from behind her she heard Black's chuckle. She flushed and bit her bottom lip.

"Don't tease her, Moony. I rather like her."

She turned to met Black's dark gaze again. "Oh, please, you don't even know me."

"I have a feeling that you're nothing like your cousin."

"I would suppose that I'm not." She replied then grinned. "After all, I'm much prettier." He was laughing when four rather rumbled redheads and one brunette came into the room with a woman who exuded a motherly feeling, the kind of feeling that Cece's mother let off on her good days. They looked at Sirius, at Cece then at Sirius again.

The woman frowned. "Sirius, what have you done?"

"You're in trouble." Cece grinned largely at the man who was a bit more scruffy looking than the movies did justice to, but his eyes were rather captivating or at least Cece thought they could be if he wasn't such an ass. "And I haven't a clue what you've done."

"I don't either."

Bill simply smiled. "Mum, this is..."

"I know exactly who it is, Bill." She announced. "Oh, Sirius."

Cece came out of her seat and moved so that Sirius was between her and the woman, when she turned and pointed her wand at her. "Suddenly, I'm scared. Should I be?" She questioned as she quickly braided her hair and fixed a hairtie on the end. "I know that my cousin isn't the easiest fellow to get along with but...this is really… something."

"Molly, calm down. This is Snape's cousin from America." He glanced at Cece for conformation.

"That's the story, we're going with." She announced and moved out from behind Sirius. "Hello, ma'am. I'm Iliana." She stuck out her hand was relieved to be given the woman's hand, which was no longer holding a wand with intentions of using it.

"I'm sorry, dear. I thought…" She trailed off giving Cece a warm smile. "I'm Molly Weasley. These are my children, Fred, George, Ron, and Ginny. I believe you've already met Bill. And this is Hermione Granger."

Cece gave them a nod. "It's a pleasure to meet you."

"Will you be staying for a while?"

"I'm not sure exactly how long I'll be here." She answered truthfully.

"Well, you'll need a room. I'm sure there's one we can clean out rather quickly."

"I'll help." Cece volunteered.

"No, dear. You're a guest." The five let out a groan.

"I'm much rather help then just sit around. It would keep me from getting antsy."

"If you insist."

"Absolutely." Cece smiled and saw that except Mrs. Weasley, everyone was looking at her as if she had lost her mind. "But I need to go and do something first." She announced as she walked out of the kitchen and out of the hall. Once Cece was out of the house, she paused on the sidewalk unsure of which way to go.

"Took you a bit longer this time, Miss Cresswell."

"You shouldn't be calling me that, Professor Snape." She replied heatedly as she turned to study the man. "I wanted to say that I'm sorry. Other than Dumbledore, you're the only one that I can talk to."

"I haven't a clue why he brought me into this." He replied darkly.

"Because he trusts you." He simply stared at him. "And maybe he finds you sexy." He looked stricken. "Oh, for goddess's sake, Sevie, lighten up. Joking occasionally won't kill you."

"You've changed."

"You don't know me." Cece sighed and started down the sidewalk, forcing Severus to move with her. "I'm not sure I even know myself. Sure, I joke around but half the time I'm so unsure of myself." She shrugged as if to say it wasn't important. "Anyway, who did you bring me to the Order's Headquarter's for?"

"Can't you figure it out?"

"Do you feel a silly Hufflepuff like me could?"

"Absolutely."

"There's a lot of choices." She said after a moment of silence between them. "What if I make a mistake? How would I even know if it was a mistake? Would that send me back home or would I be stuck here?"

He was quiet as they continued to walk. "I don't know, Iliana. All I can say is to think your choices through."

"I suppose I'll have to."

"You do realise that Iliana Prince can not be twenty-six years of age. She could be no older than twenty."

Cece looked up at him in question. "What? Why not?"

"My cousin and his wife died years ago, so there's no one but myself to question your story, except that everyone knows that Helena was pregnant when she visited England a little over twenty years ago. She lost the child but as I said, only I know enough to question your story."

"I can't be six years younger than what I am."

"Actually, at this moment in time, you would be six years older."

"No one would believe that I am twenty."

"Actually, you could pass for younger but twenty fits the story so much better."

Cece shook her head. "I really don't know what I'm supposed to do and changing my age doesn't change that, any more than changing my identity."

"Nor does it change you." Severus said cryptically. "You know where to find me and Dumbledore."

"Bye. And, Severus?" He turned and looked at her. "Thanks." He gave a brief nod before disappearing with a slight pop.

Cece was humming a tune when she re-entered the house. It was then that she ran right into one of the Weasley twins. To be exact she crashed into him and if not for him having rather quick reflexes the two of them would have crashed to the floor. She was certain that she had to be a rather bright shade of red when he let out a laugh as he let her go after steadying her on her feet.

"Are you okay?"

"Yes. I'm so sorry. I'm a horrible klutz and I wasn't watching where I was going and…"

"It's okay. No one's hurt."

"I know. It's just…." She trailed off and let out a sigh. "I'm sorry."

"You said that."

"So, I did." She gave him a light smiled. "Bye then."

"Bye, Iliana." He gave her a grin. "I'm Fred by the way. In case, you were wondering."

"I was." She grinned before disappearing down the hall, leaving him watching after her.

Cece entered the kitchen to find that Bill was gone but Sirius and the man she believed to be Remus Lupin, due to the fact that Sirius had called him Moony gave it away, sitting at the table. She stood in the doorway for a moment unsure of what she should be doing. Truth be told, Cece was scared out of her wits. She was in a crazy situation and even if she believed what she had been told about her being a witch; there were still too many unanswered questions that she didn't know how to even begin to answer. So far, she was in a house with three dead males or at least they would be in time.

She could change that. She had read the books, seen the movies, read countless fics on the internet, and spent more than a little bit of time trying to figure out how certain things could have been changed. She would have liked it even better if she had showed up a year before where she was now, but at the same time, she wondered about the idea that had been in her mind since Dumbledore had told her of the woman who had held the record before her. Was it possible that she was here simply for one person and if so, who and then how did

she fix whatever was wrong? Due to the time that she had come back to, Cece knew the obvious choice would be Sirius but while she could admit that he was rather handsome in a way. There was something about the way he had greeted her that rubbed her wrong and she wondered what it was. Then there was the whole age difference. It might not matter at the moment but he was really quite a bit older than what she was.

"Are you okay?" A voice asked from the room she stood halfway in.

Cece shook herself out of her stupor and found that both males were looking concerned. "I'm sorry. I was just lost in my thoughts."

"Must be something important." Remus said softly.

"I'd say." She let out a sigh. "Do you know where Molly is? I promised that I'd help her clean and cleaning always helps me to sort my thoughts." She let out a self-depreciative laugh. "Sounds strange, but I've been called that a time or two."

"Molly's upstairs. I'll show you." Sirius stood up. "Have fun, outside." He seemed to put a little more feeling in the last word and Cece remembered reading about how he hated being stuck in the house. "Remus has to meet some contacts about something. I'm sure you'll hear about it if you're here for the meeting tonight."

"I really haven't any other place to be." The words were so true that Cece tried not to frown. At the moment, this was the only place where she could be.

"No need to sound like that. It could be worse."

"I'm sure it could be." Cece replied.

They both fell silent until they reached a room on the second floor. Sirius smiled at the group assembled within it. "Molly, I brought you another helper. Have fun, Iliana." He disappeared from behind her and Cece smiled at the group.

It wasn't long before the room was rather clean. Her thoughts weren't much clearer than what they had been before she started helping. If only she knew what she should be doing or who she was there to help. Letting out a sigh, Cece turned and found herself once more almost knocking someone over.

"I told you, George. Our lovely new friend can't get enough of me."

"Oh, Fred. I'm…"

He put a finger over her lips stilling her words. "Now, you're not going to start that again are you, Iliana?"

She pulled away from him. "No, heaven forbid that I apologise for my own clumsiness. What's the world coming to that a person would actually take credit for doing something someone else might see as an accident?" The twins looked blankly at her. "Listen, this has been lovely, but I need to think."

"About me?"

"About something that has nothing to do with you." Cece returned, leaving him speechless, while George laughed like a hyena.