She had to tell Ted. That idea kept repeating in Andromeda's mind. It was there as she pulled herself back together and calmed Sirius, there as they went back into the wedding – smiling and joking about how unseasonable warm it was for British springtime, and still there, still repeating, at the end of the day as she helped her mother and Narcissa to pack the wedding gifts up for safe journey back to the Lestranges.
She had to tell Ted.
What she expected Ted to do about it once told, she wasn't entirely sure. Quit magic entirely perhaps – though that would be a shame. He could at least be more careful – his usual flippant attitude wouldn't help him if the pure-blood families were turning to this. If Bella were turning to this… she shivered. Loving her sister didn't make Andromeda blind to just how dangerous she could be if she really wanted to be. There was plenty of power there if Bellatrix chose to use it.
But not to hurt anyone – she wouldn't hurt anyone, not badly, not really.
Again she remembered last Christmas, remembered that awful moment when Sirius had fallen. Who knew what Bella could do, if she were provoked enough? If she would do that to her cousin, what could she do to someone she had no connection to?
It worried at her, made her distracted and clumsy. A glass slipped from her grip as she reached to pack it with the gifts, tumbling towards the floor.
"Hey!" Her mother's quick reflexes saved the glass. A quick movement and it stopped mid-fall, hovering an inch from the ground. "Let Bella at least get the breakables home before anyone starts throwing them about."
"Sorry," Andromeda scooped it up, taking a firmer grip on it this time. "Got it now."
"Good girl," Druella peered at her daughter more closely. "You look quite pale. Not been drinking too much of that champagne? I know it fizzes like lemonade, but it does tend to be stronger than you think…"
She shook her head. "Just tired, I think."
That seemed to be an acceptable enough explanation. "Weddings will do that to you. Only thing worse than helping at a wedding for exhaustion, is your own. The number of couples too tired to enjoy their own wedding night," she clicked her tongue giving a quick shake of her head. "Still Bella and Rodolphus looked awake enough, don't you think?"
Discussing her sister's potential sex-life wasn't something Andromeda had ever anticipated having to do with her mother. "They looked fine," she said hastily, cheeks pinking a little.
"I hope he didn't drink too much of the champagne. It can seem such a good idea faced with wedding nerves, but then you get to the night, and oh dear me…"
"Mother," Andromeda spoke hastily, wanting to interrupt before Druella could get any further into uncomfortable discussion and the realms of too much information. "What did you think of Bella's speech?"
"The speech?" Druella considered it placidly, carefully wrapping objects in tissue-paper as she packed them away. "I thought it was a very nice speech, dear. A little attention-hungry, but that's Bella all over. She came out of the womb screaming that people were to listen to her, and she's not stopped since."
"The bit about … about people who are Muggle-born? And the Dark Lord?" Andromeda asked hesitantly.
"Well, your sister always was politically minded." Druella answered. "That's never been a surprise to anyone. Heaven knows, all of the politics bore me rigid, but it pleases your father and your aunt, so I don't see the harm."
"I knew she was political but…" Andromeda swallowed, tightening her grip on the toast-rack in her hand. "They were talking of driving out anyone without wizard parents, weren't they?"
"Yes, dear," Still, Druella's tone was calm, most of her attention on inspecting the gifts. "I expect that's probably for the best. It's not really kind to them bringing them into a world where they can't hope to keep up, is it?"
Andromeda thought of Ted, and the symbols she had seen in the library – Arithmancy far beyond her own understanding. "What if they could keep up?"
Druella laughed, as though the very idea were an amusing one. "Even considering one of them should manage to be freakishly strong - which I very much doubt could happen – you have to think of the child in these matters. Think of having magic among no-one who understood you – almost as bad as being a Squib among us. It's why we send Squibs away to nice, comfortable families without magic. It's much better for people to be among their own kind."
"But if they have magic aren't wizards their own kind? If we send them our Squibs, shouldn't we take their children in return?" It was a thought she would never have dared voice to Aunt Walburga, Father, Bellatrix – even to Narcissa! Mother was different though. She might frown a little, but she never really got angry.
"And how would they know they had magic, if that school of yours didn't go sending them the silly letters?" Druella asked in return. "Silly idea in the first place. Much better for them to lead happy, peaceful lives without having to know about it at all." She smiled at her daughter. "Of course, it's probably more complex than that – your father understands all the ins and outs of it, I'm sure. But that's the way it always seemed to me."
No letter, no magic, and Ted could have gone to that grammar school he'd talked about. It certainly seemed like a solution which would have made everybody concerned happy. Andromeda nodded, and then hesitated. "What about Muggle-borns who are already wizards though? I mean…they already know they have magic – you can't just make them forget. Or if they just do magic – we all did before we went to school."
"Oh, I don't know, Andromeda," Druella said comfortably. "This is all too many questions for me. Ask your father if you're so concerned – I'm sure he'll be happy to find another of you girls taking an interest in these things."
Perhaps he would, yet somehow Cygnus seemed a far less approachable person to ask these sorts of questions. "Maybe I will," Andromeda agreed, a little doubtfully.
"Good girl," Druella smiled at her. "I can finish packing the rest of these. Why don't you go and find your cousins, and make sure they're not eating the rest of the wedding cake or discovering champagne or something? You know what those two are like if someone's not watching them."
It was permission to escape. Narcissa had already slipped away from the packing sometime earlier – probably, Andromeda suspected, to say goodbye to Lucius Malfoy, having noted that young man and his parents amongst the wedding guests. She nodded, rising to her feet, and going to see just what Regulus and Sirius had got up to. Hopefully it wouldn't be something too destructive this time.
"When I grow up," Sirius' voice was contemplative. "I'll be able to have a drink whenever I want, and eat cake and ice-cream whenever I want, and no-one'll be able to say "No," then." He kicked viciously at a clump of grass.
"Yeah, they'll just say you're a drunken old sot the way they do with Uncle Alphard instead," Regulus was scornful. "And then no-one'll ever listen to you and you'll smell funny all the time."
"Shows what you know, Regulus Black. They'll have to listen to me, because I won't be the Heir then, will I? I'll be the one in charge then."
"Yeah, just like Dad's the one in charge now?" Regulus asked. "Oh, they say you'll be in charge, but I bet it'll be someone like Mother who'll be in charge really. Or Bellatrix. You ought to be really glad she got married, because if she hadn't, I'd bet they'd have made you marry her." His face lit up with mischievous glee as this new thought occurred to him. "Of course, now you'll probably have to marry Narcissa or Andromeda or something!"
"I will not!" It was not something Sirius had previously had to consider, and he grimaced in horror at his younger brother's suggestion.
"Bet you will though!" Delighted at having managed to strike home, Regulus bounced up and down a little. "Mother's Dad's cousin because they wanted to make sure we were just as Black as we could be, and you'll have to be the one to father the next Heir so…"
"Shut up!" Sirius grabbed at him, but Regulus was already darting away, well-used to keeping out of his brother's reach.
"Andromeda!" Spying the older girl, Regulus made a beeline, racing to hide behind her. "Sirius is picking on me again!"
"Don't bully your little brother, Sirius." The rebuke was automatic, too often needed around these two.
Sirius came to an abrupt halt in front of her, face a tragic mask of betrayal. "But he said I had to marry you!"
"I'm not sure whether I should be worried that he suggested it, or offended about your clear lack of enthusiasm," Andromeda said dryly. "Regulus, I swear you ask for half the thumps your brother gives you."
Regulus peered out from behind her, secure that – despite her words – Andromeda would keep him safe. "I only said that cousins have to marry sometimes, 'specially when it's the Heir!" he protested. "And that's true – and you're our cousin, and Bella's married now."
"I'm not marrying you or Narcissa!" Sirius insisted. "It'd just be weird!"
"Mother and Dad did…"
"Hush – Sirius, stop that!" Andromeda scolded as the boy tried to lunge at Regulus again. "No-one's marrying either of you two imps for a long time – especially not until you've dropped some of your more interesting habits like picking your noses – so you really don't have to make it a concern right now."
"I shan't marry anyone until I want to!" Sirius declared imperiously. "I shall be the Heir, and if I marry, it will be someone I want, not some awful girl like Narcissa. And if I can't… well then, I won't marry anyone at all."
Regulus snickered. "Mother's never going to let you get away with that, you know."
"Regulus!" This time it was his turn to be scolded. "Stop taunting your brother."
"It's true though, isn't it Andromeda?" Wide brown eyes could look so guileless when their owner wished it. "He'll have to marry and have a son, won't he, whether he wants to or not?"
"Uncle Alphard never!"
"Hush," Andromeda shushed them again. "It is possible to discuss something without shouting at the tops of your voices. A little quieter please." She took a boy in each hand, gripping their shoulders to stop them scuffling, crouching a little to look at them. "It is true that you – both of you, Regulus, so you can stop that silly smirking – will eventually be expected to marry into good families, and have children, yes. But that's a long way away, and nothing either of you really have to worry about now. And it's very unlikely either of you will be marrying either Cissy or I. I know your parents did, but that was a lot of years ago, and people almost never do that now. By the time you two are thinking about getting married, the chances are we'll already have babies of our own to take care of." She looked from one young face to the other, and couldn't resist a grin. "Besides, after so long living with you two, if you think either of us would sign up to live with you permanently, you have another think coming."
"I still can't see why we have to if Uncle Alphard didn't." Sirius said sulkily.
"Well, Uncle Alphard was never meant to inherit the Black family fortunes, dear," Andromeda said patiently. "And even then, I believe there was a good deal of fuss made about it at the time." She ruffled his hair, straightening up. "Besides, you wouldn't really want to end up hanging about other people's families forever as he does, would you? You want your own family."
"I guess. I don't know," Sirius looked mulish still. "I don't think I want to inherit all this stuff if it means everyone gets to make me do things. I'd rather not get anything, and do what I want."
"Everyone has to do things a little bit the way the other people want them to, Sirius, whether they inherit anything or not," Andromeda patted his shoulder. "It would be an awfully selfish way to live otherwise, not making anyone happy but yourself."
"I don't mind doing some things the way other people want. I just want to be able to choose which ones," Sirius protested. "Ones I don't mind doing." He looked up at Andromeda, and for a moment the boyish face showed the clear shadow of the man Sirius would grow into. Looking down at him, Andromeda knew without doubt that if there was one thing this youngster would never have to worry about, it was finding someone to marry him.
He stared up at her, features dark and sullen as he studied her for a moment before asking. "Don't you mind?"
Andromeda opened her mouth to say that no, of course she didn't, that she was quite happy to do what was expected of her. Unexpectedly though, Ted was there in her mind again, the image of his blonde hair and sunny smile too clear for her to answer.
She was privately grateful when Regulus took advantage of his brother's distraction to start a shoving match, and the conversation came to an abrupt end.
-
Slytherins were good at getting what they wanted, and what Andromeda wanted right now was to know that her sister's speech had been harmless. A few days had allowed her to calm herself down on the subject, reassure herself that her sudden rush of emotions had been an over-reaction. Clearly, as Mother had said, all Bella and the others really intended to do was to keep children from Hogwarts who didn't even really need invites in the first place. It wouldn't hurt anybody. She'd just… heard it wrong, and panicked.
Such private reassurances somehow didn't seem to work entirely. A small sharp spike of worry remained, poking at her constantly, stopping her from allowing herself to forget it. She might have asked Bella what the real plans were, but her sister spent all of her time with her new husband now. She would have asked Father, despite her doubts about how he might view such questions, but he seemed to spend most of his waking hours of late locked up in the study with Aunt Walburga. Even when they did come out, both of them seemed tired and busy, too rushed to talk. It wasn't a good time to approach them with questions.
That busyness fed Andromeda's worry however, as did the increasing amounts of people coming to the house. The house seemed frantic with visitors at present, with one pure-blood after another appearing at the door, each one hurried into the study without much time to talk.
The last days of the Easter holidays were already speeding away. All too soon it would be time to return to school, and then any chance of finding out what was really going on would be gone for another whole term. Of course, it was unlikely to be anything much – but if it was, might that term be too long to wait?
It was that thought that led to her standing outside the door of her sister's old room, disabling the wards and guarding curses which Bellatrix had left with quick words and wand movements. Bellatrix hadn't taken everything with her yet, that much Andromeda knew for certain. It took time to pack everything in boxes and get it moved on, and with the hurry to arrange the wedding that time simply hadn't been available. Clothes had been packed up and sent on, and Bellatrix had taken her new broomstick and a few books, but mostly the room should still be in a similar state to what it had been when she had left.
And surely Bellatrix hadn't done all her wedding preparations and readied herself for her speech without leaving something behind which would spell out her true intent?
Andromeda gave one last glance around to check the coast was clear and nobody was coming up the hallway before she reached to push the bedroom door open.
She stepped quickly through the door. Only when it was firmly shut behind her did she allow herself to glance around, and then she froze. Perhaps if she had looked before coming in she would have seen her mother already standing in there.
Druella was staring at her with a look of such horror and disappointment that Andromeda couldn't even seem to find it in her to stammer out an excuse for her invasion. She stood like a startled rabbit, staring back, frozen to the spot.
"Oh, Andromeda," The tone was enough to make Andromeda's stomach turn over with sudden guilt. She had never heard her mother sound so hurt before. "First the Mudblood boy, and now this? How could you?"
Andromeda swallowed, trying to quell her sudden sick feeling. "I'm not – I only came to borrow a book!" she protested, taking a step back. "I just – I thought Bella might have a copy of one I needed for school, and she's not here and…"
"Stop," Druella was shaking her head, looking almost ready to cry. "Oh Merlin, please stop. Oh, Andromeda, when will you stop lying?"
"I'm not!" But Andromeda's voice had retreated to a squeak.
"We know about the Mudblood," Druella took a step towards her. "We know about the sneaking around – just like you're sneaking around now. We used to be so proud of you. What happened to my little girl?"
It made it worse somehow, that it was her mother saying this. Bellatrix shouted, but everyone knew Bella had a temper. Narcissa cried, but Cissy's world ultimately centred around Cissy – it was nothing to take too seriously. Father and Aunt Walburga could scold – but they would scold about anything from bad school marks to being untidy at dinner.
Mother almost never did any of that though. Druella had always been the one that Andromeda had gone to, secure in the knowledge that it was very rare she would get angry or upset about anything.
To have her looking at her like that… it made Andromeda's heart hurt.
"I'm sorry," The lies weren't working, and she gave them up, hearing her voice crack. "I was only looking – I didn't think it would cause harm to look! I – Ted's a friend is all."
"A friend who means so much to you that you'd break into your sister's room?" Druella asked astutely. "A friend you'd betray your family for? A friend you'd lie for – oh, Andromeda." And now it was her voice that cracked, and she sank down on the bed covering her face with her hands.
"Oh, Mother, please don't cry!" Horrified, Andromeda rushed to her, only to be pushed away. "I won't see him anymore, I'll behave – oh, Mother, don't!"
"You said that before, and here you are, at it again." Druella's voice was choked. "How do you expect me to trust you after that?"
"I didn't mean to!" Such an insubstantial excuse when you were caught and in trouble. Again, she tried to comfort her mother, trying again to slide an arm around her.
This time, Druella didn't just pull away but raised her hand, slapping Andromeda sharply across her face. "And yet you did," she snapped tearfully. "I'm so disappointed in you, Andromeda. No-one from this family will ever be able to trust you again. You've let everybody down."
Andromeda stared at her, speechless, feeling her cheek sting and tears pricking at her eyes. Mother never hit!
"How can you stand there and call yourself a Black when you're standing there, plotting yet again to meet up with a Mudblood – to steal things from your sister for him even?" Druella demanded. "I don't know how I could ever have given birth to such an ungrateful child. Bella and Cissy never did anything like this!"
"I thought you said anything was fixable," Andromeda said quietly, trying hard not to cry.
"Apparently I under-estimated what you were capable of," Druella's face was tear-stained still, but her voice was fierce. "Pack your bags."
For a moment, Andromeda could only gape at her. "What?"
"I said, pack your bags," Druella repeated. "I don't want you in here, in this house. You're a bad influence on Cissy and the boys, and I can't trust you. Pack your bags, and get out."
Andromeda stared at her, mouth suddenly dry. A few hours ago she had been teasing Regulus, putting off packing to go back to school, and now apparently she had to pack for good. And not because of Aunt Walburga, someone known to have fits of temper and say such things, but because of her mother, her mother who loved her, her mother who she would never believe such things of.
No. Her mother who she would never believe this of.
An old conversation with Bellatrix came to mind, and she scrabbled at her belt suddenly, pulling out her wand.
"What are you doing, Andromeda?" Druella's voice went high with fear and warning. "Put that away, dear, you'll only make things worse for yourself."
But Andromeda was already pointing it, keeping her hand steady with an effort.
"Riddikulus!" Her voice was shaky, but the spell worked its magic. Druella shrank down instantly, turning from an angry tearful woman into an angry tearful four-year old girl, dressed in clothes which were far too large for her. Andromeda laughed weakly, as much out of relief as genuine humour and the child glared at her and scurried away, tripping over her over-large skirt as she ran to hide in Bellatrix's wardrobe.
Andromeda sat down heavily on the bed, trying to fight the sensation that the laughter could turn to tears if she weren't careful. "It was only a Boggart," she said out loud, as much to reassure herself as anything. Only a Boggart – but people underestimated how terrifying they could be.
Trust Bellatrix to leave one to guard her room.
It was a few minutes before she gathered herself enough to get on with the job she had come to do. It was harder than she had expected with her own fear, her own terror of letting the family down so vividly shown to her and when she did get up, her movements were slow, reluctant, as she started to carefully open drawers.
There seemed to be so much to sort through, and most of it not even closely related to what Andromeda was looking for. Quotes and bills from the caterers who had worked at the wedding, and the same from the people who had done the flowers, the dresses, the marquee - all of these had to be taken and put to one side, kept in order lest Bellatrix should notice they had been interfered with. Next came the lists - a whole bundle of them, most of them with each item neatly ticked off in black ink. Lists of things that needed to be packed, lists of things that needed to be organised - half of them were in Druella's handwriting rather than Bellatrix's. Their mother had clearly taken a careful interest in making sure the girl did not forget anything in all the chaos of planning everything.
It was only right at the bottom of a drawer that Andromeda came across anything remotely interesting. Her fingers closed over the bundle of letters, most still bearing the imprint of an owl's claws - and pulled them out gently.
For a moment, she sat just looking at them. This felt wrong. It felt like something Sirius would do even - someone too young and mischievous to have learnt better. Andromeda was old enough to know better than to go rifling through her sister's possessions, whatever the reason, and reading private letters wasn't something she would even think of doing normally.
If, as she hoped, Bellatrix's speech meant nothing serious at all, then Andromeda would still have done that. And even if Bellatrix never found out, she would know.
She had almost decided to put them away unread when a noise behind her made her turn guiltily, fearing that now she really had been caught.
She stared. Facing the door was an old woman, her grey hair tangled and dirty, straggling to a point halfway down her back. Her dress was worn to tatters, and the acrid smell drifting from it made Andromeda wrinkle her nose in disgust. Most awful of all though, the woman's right arm was missing up to her elbow, and from the stump dripped a horrid mixture of blood and yellow pus.
Clearly it was the boggart again, and after a moment's shock Andromeda could see Sirius in front of her, the boy's face pale as he cringed back. But what on earth was the fear?
The old woman opened her mouth, revealing yellow, rotting teeth, and spoke in a singsong voice;
"Shame on ye who intrude here,
Showing no caution, showing no fear,
Shame on ye who come to cause harm,
Ye shall replace my missing arm!"
A high-pitched cackle seemed to come, not from the woman but from the stump itself as she gave an awful grin, and stepped forward to grab at Sirius. Until then, the youngster had seemed glued to the spot with pure terror, but now he roused himself, bellowing and struggling against what seemed to be an iron grip.
Hastily, Andromeda pulled out her wand, pointing it at the old woman. "Riddikulus!"
It wasn't hard to change the old woman's image - not compared to the difficulty she had had working on what seemed to be her mother. The grey hair puffed into a white dandelion cloud around the woman's head, the faded blue dress turned to a pastel blue frock, and the pus and blood vanished away. The image wavered, and shrank, colours shifting and brightening.
It didn't change much, but just enough. Just enough to switch the old woman away from the stuff of nightmares to what she should be.
Andromeda;s laughter wasn't feigned as she held her arms out to her young cousin. "Sirius, really? Babbitty Rabbitty?"
The boggart fled back to its wardrobe, and Sirius ran to her, clinging to Andromeda in a way that he hadn't since he was much smaller. She relented a little when she felt just how tightly he was clinging, and the shivering he was trying very hard to hide.
"Shush then," she soothed, stroking his back. "Calm down. It's gone now, and it was only a boggart - only fears and fancy and imagination. And from that thing, you've got quite the imagination, kiddo."
"You mustn't tell Regulus," Sirius blurted. "Or anyone, but especially not Regulus!"
He seemed to be on the edge of tears, and Andromeda pulled him over to sit on the edge of the bed. It was so easy sometimes to forget that the sometimes annoying fearless boy was still only a little boy, no matter how much bravado he managed to give off, or how many scrapes he managed to get into. Just a vulnerable little boy, with a little boy's fears still.
"I won't tell anyone," she promised. "Calm down now. You're upsetting yourself. Deep breath, come on."
Obediently, Sirius breathed deeply, and dragged his sleeve across his nose, wiping it. For once, Andromeda didn't scold him about the silvery streak left behind. He sniffed hard, and tried to smile shakily. "Regulus would laugh so much."
"Maybe," Andromeda admitted, knowing too well the mocking abilities of younger siblings. "But he doesn't have to know."
"Right," Sirius sniffed again. "I know it's only a story," he said defensively, "but it is a scary story, isn't it?"
"I can see how it could be," Andromeda agreed carefully, not wanting to hurt the boy's feelings any further. "Especially now I've seen how you've seen her."
Ten years old - just young enough to still be afraid of fairytale monsters, just old enough to be embarrassed about it. Still, in a way it was a blessing that Sirius was still young enough and innocent enough not to fear bigger things - things that actually could hurt him.
Sirius shuddered. "Father used to read to us, and do the voices. And I liked that most of the time, but Babbitty Rabbitty… I used to have nightmares about that poor woodcutter who chopped off her arm by mistake, and how she hunted him down and took his arm…"
"It's meant to teach you about consequences for being careless and thoughtless, dear," Andromeda reminded him, turning just a touch sterner. "A lesson which it wouldn't do you any harm to take on board now and then. You know you shouldn't have been in here."
"The door was open!" Sirius protested guiltily.
"No, it wasn't." Andromeda corrected. "What you mean is that you saw the curses were off the door and thought you might be able to sneak in without anyone knowing."
"Well, maybe." Naughty, Sirius might be, but he didn't even attempt to cling onto a lie once he knew he was caught out. He eyed the letters on the bed, noticing them for the first time. "Anyway, I bet you oughtn't to be here either. I bet you're not meant to have those!"
It was Andromeda's turn to look guilty, flushing as she reached for the letters. "Shush. I was just looking."
"Without asking?" The fears of only a few minutes go seemed to have vanished away. Sirius' face lit up wicked glee.
Andromeda could almost hear his mind calculating the blackmail potential. "Don't you even think of telling anyone," she warned hastily. "Remember, I know about Babbitty Rabbitty!"
It was enough warning to take Sirius quickly reconsider any plans he might have to that end. "I won't," he assured her quickly. "I'm not a stupid tattletale like Regulus anyway. Tell me what you're looking for, though. Have you found any dirty bits?"
The question was so unexpected that Andromeda just blinked at him for a moment. "What?"
"You know," Sirius said impatiently. "Dirty bits. In the letters. From Rodolphus."
"You are ten years old, and shouldn't even know about such things, much less be seeking them out," Andromeda said severely. "And no, I haven't. I haven't even read the letters, and if I was I wouldn't be looking for that."
Sirius pouted. "You're no fun," he complained. "What were you looking for then, if it weren't for that?"
Andromeda hesitated. Sometimes the only way to get rid of Sirius and actually be allowed to get on with things was to tell him the truth. Could he be trusted though? "Do you remember Bella's speech at the wedding?"
"Yes," Sirius' voice went flat at its mention, the boy's usual brightness disappearing.
"Well, I'm just looking to see if there's any… details or anything. I mean, I would ask her," Andromeda said, a touch of defensiveness in her voice, "but she's not here to ask. I'm sure it's nothing much really – I mean, I know she likes to sound dramatic but she wouldn't really do anything, but…"
Something in the look Sirius was giving her made her break off. "What?"
"You're nuts if you think she wouldn't do anything," Sirius said scornfully. "She'd have got rid of you, you know, over that guy there was a row about at Christmas."
Andromeda hoped that her face didn't show anything of the sudden sick plunge her stomach had taken. That came a little too close to the boggart's manifestation for comfort. With an effort, she kept her voice composed. "Don't be silly, dear. She wouldn't do anything to me. I'm her sister!"
"Yeah, and I'm her cousin, and she still knocked me off her broom." The Christmas incident was clearly something Sirius had neither forgiven or forgotten.
"You had been awfully naughty, dear," Andromeda reminded him.
He shook his head stubbornly. "Drive people who don't behave properly out of our families, she said. She was talking about you, and you never even realised it? It was obvious!"
"She was talking about people who did other things," Andromeda insisted weakly. "Bad things. Not just little things like that."
Sirius stared pointedly at the bundle of letters she was still holding. "I bet they say otherwise."
"You're over-reacting," Andromeda said firmly, and stood up. "And so was I. We really shouldn't be in here. I'll just put these away, and then we'll go, and I don't think we need to say anything more about the matter."
"Read one," Sirius also stood up, his gaze intense. "Just one. You'll see I'm right."
Andromeda looked at him for a long moment before she sat back down, and unfolded the top letter with a sigh. "I cannot believe I am taking advice from a badly behaved ten year old boy. That's never a good start to anything."
"Read it aloud!" Sirius demanded, shifting impatiently from foot to foot.
Reluctantly, Andromeda began "Bellatrix. I cannot put into words how happy I am that your father has approved my marriage proposal. I understand that this will be a marriage of convenience for both of us, but I believe it is an alliance which will benefit both us and the Dark Lord greatly. I understand your initial hesitation on the matter, but believe me, the way we can best serve the Dark Lord is…" she broke off, her cheeks colouring. "We really shouldn't be reading this. It's private."
"What's a marriage of convenience?" Sirius seemed unaffected by her discomfort.
"It means…" Andromeda hesitated, trying to put it into words a ten year old would understand. "It means they weren't marrying because they loved each other. They were marrying for other reasons."
"For the Dark Lord?"
"It would seem so," Andromeda skimmed the rest of the letter, reading quickly "It doesn't seem as though she were very keen on it either. I wonder if Father knew that."
"Silly reason to marry someone," Sirius decided. "If she liked him so much as to do things for him she ought to have married him not some random guy who said it'd make him happy. Stupid girly thinking."
"Hush," Andromeda was reading still, her face settling into a frown as she read further.
"What?" Sirius climbed onto the bed behind her, trying to read over her shoulder. "Did you find the dirty bits?"
"No. Be quiet," Andromeda pushed him away, her attention on the letter. She finished it, and set it on down on the bed for a moment before biting her lip and reaching for the next on the pile.
"Don't. I want to see!" Wisely, Sirius didn't try to look over her shoulder again though, again going straight to the source and rooting through the letters still in the pile.
"Sirius! I was keeping them in order!"
"Well, you're not going to find anything interesting if they're only just even talking about getting married, are you? That was ages ago." Sirius had had years of practise avoiding annoyed relatives, and easily evaded Andromeda's attempts to snatch the letters back. "That was ages ago. You need one that happened after that."
"Yes, well, there's a way to do these things, and it doesn't involve deliberately making just as big a mess as you possibly can!" Andromeda grabbed at his collar. "Give me those!"
Sirius tried to jerk away. There was an ominous ripping sound from his shirt, and Andromeda was left holding the collar as he stumbled forward, dropping the letters.
"Sirius!"
"It's okay. Mother'll get a house-elf to fix it. She's used to it," Sirius said calmly, unconcerned about his ruined shirt. He bundled the letters up from the floor, shoving them higgledy piggledy at Andromeda. "Here."
"You are spoilt, and far too used to having other people to clear up your messes for you," Andromeda said severely, gazing with some dismay at the now crumpled papers. "How are we ever going to get these back in order?"
"I guess you'll just have to read all of them." The suggestion was given with a smug smirk – Sirius didn't feel the need to hide his triumph over using such an underhand trick to get his own way. "The interesting ones should be nearer the top now at least."
"One day, you'll get the spanking you deserve, and no-one will have any sympathy for you," Andromeda said crossly. Amusing as her cousin could be from time to time, it was difficult not to feel annoyed when presented with such a large task – especially when she wasn't even meant to be in the room in the first place.
Still, there was no other way to deal with the matter than actually dealing with it. With a sigh she sat back down on the bed, trying to sort the letters back into date order, applying a small Smoothing Charm to each one as she worked through them. With a little luck, when Bellatrix did come to collect the rest of her things there would be too much to do for her to notice anything had been interfered with.
Despite Sirius' aims, it was actually easier to sort without really reading any of the letters. She settled into a routine of skimming each page, looking for the date and any sign there should be more pages, quickly building a new pile. She had already worked through a good fifth of the scattered letters when Sirius spoke up behind her, the boy's voice suddenly subdued.
"Uh, Andromeda? Maybe you ought to look at this one."
Andromeda glanced at him curiously, but reached for the letter, glancing over it quickly. It was one she had already looked at once, and dismissed, adding oit to the pile. "What about it? It's just dry political stuff – very du-"
She cut herself off, mid-word as the paragraph Sirius had indicated caught her eye. Now she read it properly.
"Obviously it is of benefit to all of those concerned to eliminate any corruptive influences invading the wizarding world as quickly and tidily as possible. In some situations, persuasion may be sufficient to achieve our ends, however in other cases coercion may be necessary, and in the worst cases it will be desirable to remove those elements completely.
The method of dealing with such issues must be tailored to the problem at hand. Clearly, it is preferable that as little pure blood be spilt as possible, however it must be clear that being hesitant in the short-term over such things may cause more damage in the long term. Sometimes the Muggle infection must be removed completely in order to prevent the disease being allowed to spread."
"He's talking about killing people, isn't he?" The chirpiness had gone out of Sirius' voice completely now.
Andromeda fought to keep her own voice calm, not wanting to alarm the boy further. "Yes, Sirius, I'm afraid he might be," she said as matter-of-factly as she could, "but I'm sure it's all just theoretical. It can't really mean what it seems to mean. Let me see if I can find the letter after that."
She dug through the pile, looking hopefully for something that would contradict the letter in her hand. There were different names on the letters - not all from the Lestrange boy. It seemed Bellatrix had been engaging in a good deal of correspondence of late.
All of them however seemed to have the same basic tone.
"…while of course we accept there will be danger, we are all of course willing to dedicate ourselves to the cleansing of the wizarding world."
"I must applaud your work. It is unusual for one so young to be able to take such a serious interest in such a matter, and I am glad that you too realise how strongly it impacts upon us all. I must warn you however, that it is likely to be a bloody business…"
"We must not be mistaken – this is a war that we are fighting – a war that we dare not lose if we do not wish our world to be changed beyond all recognition."
She kept reading, a cold fear beginning to grow inside her, keeping the letters away from Sirius now, not wanting the youngster to see how deeply this went – not wanting him to know.
Better if the largest thing he had to be afraid of remained a fairytale character.
The final straw came in a letter from Bellatrix's then husband-to-be, sent just after Christmas.
"It is a fortunate thing if, as you say, your mother has managed to talk sense into your sister. Girls can get such silly notions into their heads – the Prewitt girl is a case in point. Watch carefully though, and be certain that her behaviour is only a phase, a passing whimsical silliness, and not some deeper sign of inner imperfection. Such imperfections can spring up unexpectedly – the Prewitt girl was from an excellent background, and no-one could have expected her to elope as she did. Keep me informed, as if the situation develops further, as you say, it may indeed need to be dealt with."
For a moment, Andromeda thought she might throw up. Dealt with? What did that even mean anyway? She stared at the letter, eyes running over and over the words as though rereading them might change them somehow. Bella wouldn't… Bella couldn't… could she?
"Andromeda?" She had almost forgotten that Sirius was still there, watching her. "What have you found?"
Startled, she folded the letter up quickly, before he could try looking over her shoulder again. "Nothing. Just as I thought – a mountain out of a molehill."
Sirius wasn't fooled for a moment. "Then why did you go all pale?"
"Because I just realised how long we'd been in here for," she replied firmly. It took an effort to make her voice brisk, but she stood up quickly, straightening the quilt they had been sitting on. "Come on. We need to tidy this lot up and get it put away.
After a moment's hesitation, she slid the letter into her pocket – surely Bellatrix wouldn't notice that only one was missing – before she started to gather the rest up.
"Aren't you even going to read the rest?" Sirius asked, reluctantly getting up.
Andromeda shook her head. "Nothing else I need to know."
Not the truth, not at all the truth, but it had to be the truth as far as Sirius was concerned. Whatever was going on here, it wasn't anything a ten year old needed to be involved in.
-
"Father?" Andromeda tapped at the study door gently.
It had taken another day before she had talked herself into this. Much as she loved her father, he could hold such strong views on things sometimes. Political discussions at dinner had been known to result in arguments that stopped people speaking to each other for days. It was easier, mostly, to talk about something else.
But if Father didn't know about what the Lestrange boy was leading Bella into, then shouldn't he? And really, some of it had to be the Lestrange boy. Bellatrix might already have been interested in politics, but she wouldn't ever think of something like that unless someone pushed her, would she? Not of killing people, not in the awful matter-of-fact way all the letters had seemed to mention it.
Her sister wouldn't let anyone talk like that about Andromeda, not unless something was wrong. It had to be something wrong. To think otherwise hurt too much.
"Father?"
"What is it?" The study door was jerked out, and Cygnus looked down at his daughter, face tired and exasperated. "I'm very busy, Andromeda."
"I know," Andromeda admitted, and held out the mug she was carrying as though it were a peace offering. "I thought a cup of tea might help. You've been in here hours."
He glanced at it, seeming surprised by that statement, and reached to take the mug. "Thank you."
"Mother says to tell you that if you're hungry, she saved dinner for you and she can soon heat it up again when you're ready." It helped to have a genuine message to give her father, and Andromeda rattled it off quickly.
"Tell her I'll be a while yet," he replied flatly. Cupping his hands around the mug, he looked quite ready to return to his work, and shut the door on her.
It left little time to hesitate, and Andromeda spoke quickly out of necessity. "Father? What is it you're working on exactly? People are all so busy."
It was at least enough to make Cygnet pause in the door. "Political stuff, dear. You wouldn't be interested." He shook his head at her, taking a quick gulp of his tea. "It's busy now, but things are going to be a lot better for everyone once we have things sorted out."
It was a phrase that might have been a lot more reassuring had Andromeda not seen similar wording used over and over again in the letters to Bellatrix. She swallowed, feeling her heart beat just a little faster. "Father? What do you think of Bella's husband?"
This time Cygnus' look was exasperated, and he sighed impatiently. "Andromeda, sweetheart, I think he's a very nice man, but I really don't have time to discuss that right now."
"No – listen, it's important, Father!" Seeing her chance to talk fast disappearing, Andromeda almost gabbled the words out. "I don't think Bella liked him – I don't think she wanted to marry him!"
"Why can you girls never bring this kind of crisis to your mother? She's better at this kind of thing." The question seemed more addressed to the world in general than to Andromeda herself. "Andromeda, I assure you, your mother and I would never have let your sister marry into a situation where she was unhappy. I spoke to her myself about the matter. It was her who pushed to be married so quickly for Merlin's sake."
Andromeda bit her lip, not wanting to believe that. It made it easier if this were something Bella had been unwilling to do. "I think he made her somehow," she said stubbornly.
"I have a whole stack of letters to reply to, and now you feel is the appropriate time to bring this up?" Cygnus rubbed his forehead tiredly. "What brought this all on, anyhow?"
Andromeda hesitated, unable to tell the truth about the letter currently burning a hold in her pocket. "Just something Bella said."
"Don't tell me – they've had their first argument and she's written to say she thinks the world's coming to an end?" Cygnus guessed incorrectly. "Andromeda, all young couples argue. It doesn't mean they shouldn't have married, or that there's something wrong. It's just something they have to work through – on their own, mostly."
"It's not that – I just really think he's bad for her!" Andromeda insisted. "He'll make her to things she doesn't want to," she said, and hesitated again before adding. "and he doesn't like me."
Her father's expression was baffled. "Dearest, other than at the wedding, he's barely met you."
"I know. But he doesn't!" It sounded silly, Andromeda knew, but she couldn't think how better to put it without revealing that she'd been where she shouldn't have.
"I'm sure once he's had more time to get acquainted with the family he'll love you just as much as the rest of us," Cygnus said firmly. "I really have to get back to work now, Andromeda. If you're concerned, talk to your mother."
"But Father…"
"No," he said firmly, and reached to give her shoulder a quick light pat. "Things will be fine, dear, you'll see. But you're old enough now to understand that sometimes I have to work rather than talk, and this is one of those times."
He gulped down the rest of the tea before handing Andromeda the now-empty mug. "Ask your mother if she could bring me dinner on a tray in an hour or so."
Defeated, Andromeda's shoulder's sagged. "Yes father," she agreed meekly, and turned to go, no closer to what she had wanted to know. She couldn't make him talk to her after all.