"Do you have any twos?"
Amanda, laying on her stomach, supporting her upper body with her arms, and repeatedly kicking herself in the butt with her own feet while trying her best not to giggle, peered at her godfather over the cards she held out in front of her. "No..." she said slowly, a wide grin stealing over her face; all her cards were twos.
Sirius took one look at her, then said, with the utmost combination of exasperation and amusement, "Okay, Amanda, one, you're supposed to say 'Go Fish', remember? And two, somehow, for some strange, ungodly reason, I don't believe you."
"Go Fish!" Amanda cried, scrambling to get into a sitting position, holding her cards to her chest protectively.
"Hand over your twos." Sirius said simply, laughing a laugh that sounded a lot like the bark of his animagus form.
"I don't have any twos!" Amanda insisted, shaking her head and scooting away from Sirius on the fine and expensive carpet-covered floor of her room, which had once been simply one guest room among many in Toschi Manor - a manor that was more along the size of a castle, and a manor that, even now, after having been there a week, she still became lost in all too often. There were too many wings and staircases and winding corridors for her to keep track of, and the fact that it all looked exactly the same in its moon blue color scheme certainly didn't make finding her way around any easier.
"Don't make me MAKE YOU give them to me." warned Sirius, setting his own cards down and fixing her with a look that was...still more playful than serious. "You know I'll do it."
"Maybe I want you to do it." Amanda replied, grinning even more. "You're really cute as a dog!"
"Well, I'm glad to see that that particular opinion of yours hasn't faded after all these years." Sirius said, a bit more seriously now. "You found Padfoot to be extraordinarly lovable as a baby. Too lovable, really; you used to pull my fur and drool on me." he added with a shudder, which had Amanda literally rolling on the floor in the throes of laughter. Sirius took the opportunity to pluck her cards from her hands (though, he made sure not to make any skin contact between his hand and hers, because he had, by now, learned the lesson not to touch her - as had everyone in the Order, whether directly or indirectly) and then he just sat back patiently to watch her until she regained control over herself (which took her quite a while; almost five minutes).
"Rematch!" Amanda declared, when she had calmed enough to do so, setting about gathering up all the cards in the deck.
"But we just HAD a rematch." Sirius protested.
"Rematch, rematch, rematch!" Amanda heedlessly chanted, ripping Sirius's cards - and the cards he had stolen from her - out of his hands to add to the deck she had reconstructed. However, just as they were about to start playing again, there was a sharp knock on her door.
"Come in!" Amanda called to her visitor. It was Severus Snape, looking just as anxious and self-concious as he always had seemed to be whenever he had been forced to be in Amanda's presence in the past week. Also, as he had been doing for the past week whenever he had to be around her, he maintained a steady gaze in any and all directions BESIDES a direction that would have meant setting his eyes on HER.
"Loath as I am to...disrupt this touching scene," Snape began, sounding as if he were choking in his attempts to maintain his usual mannerisms. "Amanda, you're to go- err, that is, you are WANTED in the ballroom by Mrs. Granger so that you can start your training. So, if you could...go...that would be...best for all of us..." Snape trailed off into incoherent mumbling, and he suddenly took a keen interest in his own, black boots.
"Oh, yeah, I'm sure you just couldn't STAND having an ironclad excuse to come and have a leer at my goddaughter." Sirius spoke up with heavy sarcasm. "It must be TORTURE for your poor, innocent little soul just to be in the same room as her."
"Ballroom. Try not to keep Mrs. Granger waiting."
Snape said shortly to Amanda, ignoring Black entirely, before turning on his heel very precisely and leaving the room at a fast walk. He really needn't have said that last part to her; Amanda was on her feet nearly half a second after he left the room,
following him out.
"Take me to the ballroom." she said, falling into step beside Snape. "I'll get lost if I try to find it on my own." she added, in a quiet, hesitant voice, at his very subdued glare (though a glare nonetheless). Snape's glare vanished on hearing her elaboration, however, and he gave her a nod.
"Very well." he said simply, and slowed his pace.
Amanda smiled to herself as they walked along the corridors. This past week had been full of surprises, perhaps the most of which being that she had discovered the ability to express herself, whether it be in anger, sadness, confusion, worry, or even affection, and not suffer any damages for her troubles. Yes, these people here, this Order, these...friends, maybe, they were not like her aunt and uncle, and nor were they like the people who had been keeping her prisoner in the hospital all those years. She would not receive a hand, a fist, a foot, a pan, or...worse things, for asking questions, for explaining herself, and for voicing what she wanted or even needed to voice at times.
And that was...nice.
It was nice, Amanda realized, as the full impact of it struck her then, to finally be free.
Freedom, Cho Chang was beginning to realize, as she appeared out of thin air in front of a very strange home on a hilltop, was not all she had thought that it would be.
It was true that she could go anywhere she wanted, go into any store and take whatever she wanted (mainly expensive outfits), and just DO whatever she wanted (anything from killing someone for looking at her funny, to grabbing any random woman off the street and forcing her to be, for lack of any nicer words, her sex slave), all because of the tattoo on her arm, but none of that was...what Cho really wanted.
She'd grown to feel more and more empty lately, more and more...lifeless, emotionless. These things she could do now, these places she could go now, it was all flickering, fleeting pleasures, there for an instant and gone the next.
Cho felt no...no SUBSTANCE to her life now, and she had to admit that, more and more, she was growing to miss her childhood, her time at Hogwarts, and even her time in the Order.
At least back then she had had real, intense...just REAL. She had felt, she had loved, she had lost, and though she had not been a fan of her chances of mortality (the reason she had left the Order to begin with), she thought now that she would have taken those chances again if it meant getting all of that intensity and emotion back.
She didn't even have friends now. She had left them all behind, destroyed anything they had once had, in switching sides. Ginny was not a woman of substance, a woman of depth. All she wanted in this world was sex, murder, and the total destruction of her family (she had the first two in spades, and was making slow progress towards that last one).
Draco Malfoy, Cho couldn't stand (he just got on her nerves for some reason; probably his arrogance), and he wasn't the kind of person she would have hung out with, anyway. As for Pansy Parkinson, she was made along the same lines as Ginny - only interested in sex, and killing a few people each day before the sun went down.
Katie Bell was definitely a woman of substance, and they had shared a shopping trip or two, but Katie was mainly interested in Quidditch, and Cho had lost all passion for that too many years ago.
Cho couldn't even remember HOW or WHY that passion had faded, now, something that positively alarmed her.
Not even battle, not even killing or torturing, had its thrill anymore. Three months ago, during the attack on Grimmauld Place, all Cho had wanted of it was for it to be over. To that end, when everyone had fled the building, taking the battle out onto the streets, Cho had opted to just up and leave; no hanging around to snipe off Order members, no helping her fellow Death Eaters.
Just leave, just go.
Although, afterwards, she HAD felt small little burstings of guilt and remorse for her, dare she even think it, cowardice, hence why she had gone to see Ginny in the hospital, and why Cho had ATTEMPTED to spend more time with the woman in these past few months since.
But, again, Ginny was not the type of woman one just "hung out with". Especially if your name was Cho Chang.
Cho was tired. So, so tired, she realized, sitting down on the steps of Luna Lovegood's vacant house, and staring down into her lap.
What was this freedom, if it took every good thing from her? Every emotion, every passion, every pleasure, every longtime friend she had had...even her girlfriend.
And what could Cho do to get all of that back?
Well, she thought, an idea suddenly popping into her head. She had already switched sides once...so who was to say she couldn't do it again?
She couldn't go back to the Order, she wasn't an idiot. She knew they would never accept her, even if they HAD accepted Peter Pettigrew (and then, only because he had proven himself to them beyond a doubt when he had attacked Voldemort himself in a battle gone wrong). But what if she didn't go to any preexisting sides?
What if...what if she made her OWN side? What if she had her very own, new friends with her? Her own base? Her own goals and rules?
Would that be enough to bring emotion, excitement, and substance back into Cho and into her life?
As she felt a sudden, powerful rush of energy, and long-forgotten feelings of anticipation, exhilaration, and elation, she thought that, yes, it would.
"All hail Cho." she smiled to herself, feeling lighter than she had in months.
"Where's Padma?" Amanda asked, as soon as she had set a foot into the ballroom and laid eyes on Hermione, who was standing amidst many different tables and chairs (not all of them standing upright).
"She's not going to have any part in your training." Hermione said at once, though looking puzzled at Amanda's question even as she answered it.
'Good.' thought Amanda, feeling very bouncy inside, and finding herself unable to repress a smile. "What do we do first?" she asked happily, drawing her phoenix feather wand (given to her by Dumbledore as a birthday present the day of her arrival) from her skirt's waistband.
Hermione smiled back, then cleared her throat. "Well, erm, I thought we could start you off with a simple summoning charm, just to get a general idea about how much of a hang on spellwork you'll likely have - so we'll know what to expect from future sessions - and then I thought, depending on how good you do with the summoning charm, we could move on to- Amanda, what are you doing?!"
"Kissing you." Amanda said coyly, unphased by Hermione's exclamation - and subsequent look of shock and step back - at the kiss she had darted forward to place on the bushy-haired, chocolate-eyed woman's cheek. Then, to further press the point of the kiss - and to exercise her newfound freedom of expression - she added, "I love chocolate."
Hermione stared at her in equal parts outrage, embarrassment, and patience and understanding, while rubbing the spot on her cheek where Amanda had kissed her. "I'm flattered, erm, nothing better than being on par with chocolate in someone's eyes, but you know very well that I'm married, so- please...never do that again, all right?"
"But...but I love you..." Amanda whispered, looking down at her feet, as tears started flowing down her face, unexpectedly and earnestly, and as a great, heavy lump formed in her throat to block her air. She felt so horrible it wasn't even funny. How could she have done that and gotten nothing? How could she have shown her love and...gotten nothing in return? Nothing but a rejection, but a...a SCOLDING, like her aunt or uncle would have done to her?
She had thought she was free here, safe here, allowed to think and do and say and...but no, that was obviously wrong, Amanda realized now, deep in her confusion and sadness. She couldn't love here, she couldn't feel or say here, not without punishment, not without rebukes, not without-
"Amanda, look at me." Amanda did, and Hermione went on, in a gentle voice, "I know you think that you love me, but you- you don't, okay? You don't love me, and you CAN'T love me. At least not now. Not while I'm with Padma, which isn't going to change any time soon."
"Go and be with Padma, then." Amanda said coldly, swiping at her tears with a shaking hand. Hermione recoiled at her tone, looking suddenly quite terrified. "I'll be in the kitchen if you need me for anything besides being your doll you think you can just hurt any time you want!" With that, Amanda turned and started for the ballroom's double doors.
"Amanda, wait!" Hermione cried, but Amanda was already out the doors and moving down the hall with quick, snapping steps.
Amanda would pay Hermione back for that hurt, for that rejection, later, she thought to herself, anger coursing through her. Just as she had payed back her aunt and uncle for all those years of hurt and rejection.
Balance would be achieved.
Though, Amanda had rather been hoping that any balancing acts she committed out here in the free world would NOT be against these people who she liked and loved. But balance was balance, and it had to be kept: no matter who it involved.
Hermione had hurt Amanda, and so she would be hurt in return.
That was the way of things. That was Amanda's DUTY as the balance itself, even if, as the balance itself, she now had a great deal of wiggle room when it came to the details of how and when, compared to when she had thought herself to be its servant. There was, however, no wiggle room for just NOT acting to restore balance. That was entirely out of the question, and not even a thought in Amanda's mind.
Amanda would have to be careful, though, not to hurt Hermione in such a way that would cause her to refuse to train her, because THAT would throw off - perhaps even PREVENT - the larger balance that was Amanda and Voldemort, and the war between them. Yes, this would have to be done...differently than she would have usually done, just as with that security guard who had leered at her butt, and when she had had to find an alternative method of achieving balance in that matter because of the more important, larger balance of the time between her cousin and herself that she could not have jeopardized.
Reaching the impossibly spacious kitchen that looked like the back of a restaurant, Amanda took a chocolate pudding from the fridge, and began to think out just those particulars in the matter of the balance between herself and Hermione Granger.
No broken bones, no blood, and certainly no killing the woman - because THAT would put as swift an end to Amanda's training, and create far too great an imbalance when it came to her and Voldemort, as nothing else would (not to mention that Amanda did not WANT to kill Hermione; she was certain she could get her love, in time).
As with the security guard, it would need to be something that came from Amanda's brain, from her smarts, rather than from her jabbing fingers and raging fists.
Something small but decisive, something...something to do with tonight's dinner, Amanda decided, gazing into the depths of her delicious pudding in even deeper thought.
After just a moment, it came to her. One, single, simple fact, one kernel of knowledge that would allow Amanda to restore balance.
Hermione loved buttered bread rolls, and she had never failed, in all the dinners Amanda had had with her this past week, to take two for herself.
"You want to start your Apparition training...now?" said Cedric Diggory, peering at Amanda Potter critically, as well as in confusion (though, to be fair, she elicited that reaction in EVERYONE). "What happened to charms and transfiguration being first? You should be in it right now, as a matter of fact. What's going on?"
Amanda's response, in Cedric's opinion, was not at all helpful in explaining this abrupt change in the schedule he and the others in charge of her training had come up with. She simply stood there, looking at him with a complete lack of expression on her face, like a human statue.
"Is it...something to do with Hermione?" Cedric pressed on, still hoping to get some kind of answer out of the red-haired woman. Well, he didn't get an ANSWER with his words, but he DID get a REACTION.
Amanda suddenly was full of life. Furious and upset life. Her eyes narrowed and shimmered, her hands became fists, and her lips trembled. She whirled on the spot and roundhouse kicked the full-length mirror in Cedric's room so hard it shattered, leaving hundreds of pieces of glass scattered across the carpet.
"All right then, time for your Apparition training." Cedric said hastily. "If you'll follow me outside; we'll need to be beyond the boundaries of the anti-apparition ward to do anything..."
As he led Amanda from the room (pausing to repair the mirror with a flick of his wand on the way out) he made a mental note not to mention Hermione's name around her again, as well as to find out from Hermione herself just what had gone wrong between the two women. If Amanda was unwilling to be trained by Hermione, or if Hermione was unwilling to train Amanda...well, the problem would be a very obvious, very serious one.
"Okay." said Cedric, stopping and turning to face Amanda, once they were outside - and a great distance away from - Toschi Manor. The chilly mountain air breezed around them, fluttering and shuffling snow in long streaks and swirls. "You ready?"
"Ready." Amanda nodded seriously, seemingly unaffected by the cold, despite that she was clad in a very thin, small T-shirt, and a similarly sheer, cotton skirt (the skirt, Cedric observed completely objectively, was highly transparent, like tissue paper).
"All right." Cedric returned her nod. "Apparition requires only two things: magic, and concentration. You need to have a great deal of focus to make it work properly. If not, you'll leave body parts behind when you depart for your destination, which is known as Splinching."
"Okay." said Amanda, nodding again.
"Right...guess I'll show you first, then we'll see if you can't manage it. I don't expect you to get it on your first try." Cedric added, in hopes of preventing her from throwing a...well, a TEMPER TANTRUM when nothing happened whatsoever on her first try (and the woman who was honestly more of a girl, a child, had thrown some SPECTACULAR ones in the past week - up to and including shattering Cedric's mirror with a flawless roundhouse kick - for her various and incomprehensible reasons). He pointed to a jagged boulder not ten feet away. "Watch that spot." he told Amanda. Then, without any further ado, Cedric turned on the spot and Apparated over to his chosen destination.
"Now, really, don't get upset when you don't get it right away." Cedric reiterated to Amanda as he walked back to her. "I've never heard of anyone doing even a Splinched Apparation on their first attempt. Now, all you have to do is focus on your destination. Picture it in your mind, if you've been there before, or else concentrate on the address, if you haven't. Focus on moving from here, to there. On slipping out of this space and into another, to reappear elsewhere."
Amanda was silent, taking in his every word. She was all business, it seemed, and Cedric was glad of it. Her eyebrows were narrowed, her face was screwed up in intense concentration, and pure determination shone in her emerald eyes...
'Oh, merlin.' Cedric resisted the urge to take a few steps back at this sight; despite his repeated warnings, Amanda was going to try and Apparate on first attempt anyway, he could see that. And when she failed...that temper tantrum was going to rear its head. And when THAT happened, Cedric didn't want to be anywhere near the woman when she started-
Cedric let out an audible, actual gasp as, with a resounding crack, Amanda spun around, and disappeared into thin air.
After a heartbeat of total silence, Cedric frantically began scanning his surroundings, but there was no sign of the woman, no loud noise that would signify her reappearance.
As Cedric wondered, in his shock, amazement, and panic, whether he should wait there for her to reappear, or go back into Toschi Manor and report to the whole Order that their greatest hope had just left them all to rot without hesitation, without even a second thought, a more important question came bubbling up in his mind.
That question was: where in the world did she go?
If Amanda Potter could have opened her mouth during the process of Apparition, she would have been yelling out a very joyous and gleeful, "Weeeeeeeeee!"
Admittedly, she had had too much going on for her when Dumbledore had taken her out of the hospital to actually take note of the experience itself at the time. But now, this time, with just her and herself along for the ride, she found the sensation of going through a toothpaste tube, that pressure and sense of SLIDING to be incredible - and incredibly fun.
But, she reminded herself as she reappeared at her destination, stumbling in the bright green grass and tripping over a lawn mower, she had not Apparated - had not wanted to LEARN to Apparate ever since learning about the power a week ago - for fun.
No, she had wanted to Apparate, and just HAD, now, finally, so that she could, at last, visit her daughter, her Rue, who had been stolen from Amanda practically the moment she had been born on a scorchingly hot August day precisely eleven years ago...to the day.
It was fitting, Amanda thought, getting to her feet and smiling at the very ordinary, suburban London home before her, that she should at last come to see - and take - her child on the very day Rue had been born: August the eighth.
With that realization came overpowering joy, for Amanda then realized that IT WAS HER DAUGHTER'S BIRTHDAY. That joy was quickly replaced by guilt and shame twice as powerful as that first emotion, however, because she hadn't gotten her Rue any birthday presents! Now Amanda actually regretted the Order having come to collect her when it had, because, had she been able to stay in the hospital, she could have further questioned Sapphire about Rue. Then Amanda felt even MORE guilt at the thought of Sapphire, out there in the country, alone, wondering why Amanda had just left her out of nowhere...
Well, Amanda would find Sapphire again someday, and explain to her why she had had to leave, and what she had had to do. Yes, someday, she would make things right with Sapphire.
But for right now, Amanda had to make things right with her daughter.
"Excuse me, are you looking for someone?"
Amanda's head snapped to the right, and her eyes fell on a woman several years older than Amanda herself who had come out the front door. She was a pretty woman, Amanda saw. Tall, slender, and tan, with long, curly brown hair and olive green eyes - which were looking at Amanda with a shrewdness that the red-haired woman couldn't help but find attractive, too, in its own way.
"I've just found someone." Amanda responded, stepping off the lawn and onto the path to the front door. "My daughter, Rue."
"No, I think you have the wrong house." the brown-haired woman said slowly, shaking her head. "No one by that name lives here, sorry."
Amanda walked up the path and came to a halt directly in front of the woman. She cast an admiring look up and down the woman's figure, then shook her head to clear it of THOSE feelings. THOSE FEELINGS were NOT why she was here, no matter that this woman had, admittedly, cared for Rue most wonderfully for all these years, according to Sapphire's report of a week ago in regards to Rue's life.
"Rue." Amanda said softly. "She turns eleven today. August eight. She has fair skin, blond hair, and my green eyes."
The woman uttered a soft, "Oh..." as she stared - REALLY stared - into Amanda's eyes. Her olive eyes widened, and Amanda saw the realization come to her face. "You're..."
"Rue's mother, yes." Amanda nodded.
"I...see." the woman drew out the words, looking suddenly uncomfortable. "Her name...it's not...it's not Rue." she went on, seeming to struggle to get out the words. "It's Emily."
"It's Rue." Amanda corrected patiently, instantly. She wouldn't hold it against this woman, knowing Amanda's Rue by a different name, but she WOULD expect the woman to get used to knowing Amanda's daughter by her real name, with time.
The woman's olive eyes slid up and down the street before returning to Amanda. "Let's talk inside." she said finally.
"Where's Rue?" Amanda asked, following the woman into the house.
"Out." the woman said shortly, taking Amanda into the sitting room and settling herself down on a sofa. "Emily - Rue, as you call her - is at the zoo with some friends, along with my husband, Todd."
Amanda lowered herself into an armchair, not taking her eyes off the woman in front of her. She found herself, as on the day when, a week ago, she had come face to face with her cousin, sitting forward in her seat - nearly off the edge of it, really - with her hands in her lap. Though, a difference between this meeting and that one was that this time, Amanda's hands were not clenched into fists, but were merely resting on her bare knees.
"Rue likes animals." Amanda stated. If the woman noticed that it wasn't a question, she didn't let on.
"Very much." the woman agreed. For a long time, the two women simply stared at each other. Then the brown-haired woman blanched, and looked down on her own, quivering hands. "Listen, miss-"
"Amanda." supplied Amanda promptly. "Who are you?"
The woman looked up very quickly, her expression something very close to fear. "Call me Kimberly. Listen, Amanda...Emily is-"
"Coming with me." interrupted Amanda, smiling at Kimberly. "I've been away from her for too long."
"We'll...talk about that later." Kimberly spoke, looking at Amanda in mild disbelief, and now even some irritation. "For right now, I think we should-"
"Do you know that I only saw her, held her in my arms, for less than five minutes?" Amanda, again, interrupted, her voice shaking with her rapidly rising anger. "She was born in a broom cupboard under a staircase, my BEDROOM for the first eleven years of my life, and then she was taken from my arms and that was the last I saw of her! I can't even remember what she looked like!" she added, slamming her fist down on her thigh. "But I know what she looks like now, and she's MY daughter, MY Rue, and she's coming with me."
"Look - Amanda, was it? I'm sorry for whatever you went through, for whatever circumstances there were to Emily's birth, but I don't care who you are to her, you can't just show up here out of nowhere - and on her birthday, no less - with plans of taking her." Kimberly was leaning forward now, too, and her voice was loud and firm. Her eyes were hard, cutting into Amanda like no eyes she had seen before. "If you want to see her, if you want to be in her life, you come here and you spend time with her HERE, but you aren't taking her anywhere."
"Please, don't make me kill you." Amanda whispered, shaking now for a very different reason than anger. This woman, this Kimberly, this adopted mother of her Rue, as near close to having Amanda herself in her life as Rue could get, was threatening the balance. In her refusal to even consider letting Rue go and be with Amanda, Kimberly was...THWARTING the balance. If this continued, if Amanda did not get Rue soon...an imbalance would be created, and that, Amanda could not have. But the thought of having to kill this woman...Amanda had never felt so much regret in her life, and certainly not at the prospect of setting the balance.
"Excuse me?" Kimberly said, as if she couldn't believe what she had heard.
"Please don't make me kill you." Amanda repeated, in not at all a whisper, locking eyes with Kimberly as she rose from the armchair. "Rue is mine, she's coming with me, and you're not going to stand in the way of that."
There was a silence, a silence in which a look of dawning comprehension came over Kimberly's face, as she realized that yes, Amanda was serious, and then she, too, stood. Amanda saw the woman's eyes dart left and right, then home in on the phone that was resting on the piano.
"Don't try it." Amanda choked, her eyes starting to sting with tears now. "Don't run, don't call the police. Don't make this harder than it has to be, because this is so HARD for me you- NO!"
Kimberly made a mad dash for the phone, and had just gotten her hands on it when Amanda barreled into her from behind, crushing Kimberly up against the piano and knocking the wind out of her. To the detriment of her own goal, Kimberly spun around and bashed Amanda in the side of the head with the butt of the phone.
Amanda retreated, as stars and dizziness overtook her vision entirely, blinding her with exploding, shifting and changing colors. In this second - maybe two - of blindness, Amanda felt a knee connect with her gut, and then, when her vision returned and she had straightened, it was just in time for her to watch Kimberly swing a book (stolen from a nearby bookshelf) for her head.
Amanda raised an arm and took the blow without much problem, because the phone that had connected with her temple mere moments ago had made her body feel all fuzzy, and because she just didn't want to be caught doubled over and blinded twice in a row. Amanda retaliated with a simple, high kick that connected with Kimberly's chest, and sent the olive-eyed woman stumbling backwards to sprawl over the sofa she had so recently vacated.
There was nothing in this fight. There were no vows, no taunts, no threats, no crowing and reveling in the wounding, or the felling, of the other. There was only the two of them, kicking, punching, striking with palms and with feet, whirling and throwing - and, once, by Amanda, biting; only this finally made Kimberly drop the phone - and scratching. There were no cries of rage or triumph, there were no snarls, there were no screams - but for the cries and the screams of PAIN, their fight was conducted in total silence.
The fight was eventually taken - by Kimberly - out of the sitting room, through a short hallway, and into the kitchen. Kimberly slid a cleaver from the knife block, and then Amanda was forced to admit something to herself, which was that she had not, thus far, actually been TRYING to kill Kimberly (if she had been, the woman would have been dead in a matter of seconds). Her feelings of regret, of admiration and appreciation, and yes, even attraction, had been holding Amanda back from just doing away with the woman in her typical, brutal and effecient fashion, and leaving her corpse for anyone to find.
But now...seeing that giant blade, and that look in Kimberly's eyes that Amanda imagined everyone else saw in HER eyes before she took their lives...Now, Amanda could not afford to let her feelings hold her back, or else she would be the one to die today, and she would never get to be with her wonderful, beautiful little Rue. Because where once Kimberly had been fighting to LIVE, faced now with no escape, she was clearly intent on fighting for the same reason as Amanda: to kill.
'Time to end this.' thought Amanda. And end it swiftly, decisively. There would be no suffering for Kimberly, Amanda would make sure of that. It was, after all, the least she could do for Kimberly in light of everything that KIMBERLY had done for RUE.
Kimberly lunged, swiped at Amanda savagely with the knife, and Amanda took that long (but thankfully shallow) cut across her ribs for the opportunity it gave her to trap Kimberly's arm to her side using her own. Amanda (still keeping Kimberly's weapon arm locked against her stinging ribs) swung Kimberly into a cabinet, then picked her up bodily and slammed her down on the table. Sprawled and dazed though Kimberly was, it wasn't for very long, and she fought and thrashed to get back on her feet, but Amanda had the woman trapped under her weight, pressed to the table. Pinned. They were almost nose to nose as Amanda straddled Kimberly, the former woman bent low over the latter. Amanda grabbed Kimberly's throat and started to choke her with both hands.
Why couldn't Kimberly just give UP? Just let Amanda do what she needed to do? Why couldn't she see that-
Amanda's back arched as she felt a hot, searing pain go across it, and she realized with some surprise that Kimberly had bent her trapped arm in order to cut her in the back. Amanda released Kimberly's knife arm, letting the woman bring it around to be used as she saw fit. Or, at least, that was what Amanda let Kimberly believe. The moment the blade flashed for Amanda's neck, she jerked her head to the side, let Kimberly's throat go, and instead snagged the woman's wrist - and then Amanda bit it. Bit down with all the power she could muster in her jaws.
A screaming, heavily bleeding (Amanda thought she might have opened up a vein or two, or possibly even a slightly major artery) Kimberly dropped the knife onto the table beside her, where it was just shy of clattering off the edge to the floor.
Amanda snatched it up before that could happen - or before Kimberly could make it happen on PURPOSE - and then she was holding it tight, bringing it up for the inevitable trip back down, down straight for Kimberly's heart...And yet she did not do it. Not quite...yet.
Amanda felt, in that moment, that moment before Kimberly's life ended, that Kimberly deserved something that Amanda had given to no one else before: her beliefs. So Amanda, blade in one hand, and Kimberly's wrists trapped in her other hand, began to speak to the woman below her who, too, was frozen, frozen now as she, too, knew that her death was only seconds away.
"I'm going to tell you why, before I kill you." Amanda said softly, staring down into Kimberly's face. "The reason for this, and for taking Rue, is to correct the balance. All those years ago, in being repeatedly raped as I was, in living the horrible life I lived...the world gave me something back for it all. It gave me Rue. I believe, Kimberly, in the balance of the universe. That everything is scaled and traded. Balanced. My Rue was taken from me, and I never saw her again. I had to get back to her, I had to find her, to fix the imbalance that was our being apart, I knew. But until that time, until I could find her, take her in, my DAUGHTER, I knew that to satisfy the balance, the world, to give Rue a good life, happiness, I had to...I suppose, OFFER IT things in exchange. I had to balance the scales. I killed people. Many people. All for Rue, all so that the balance could be maintained, and so that she would have happiness and peace in her life, until her mother could come for her, and set things right more permanently."
"That's why I have to do this, Kimberly. As much as this hurts me, as much as I'm going to regret this for the rest of my life...I have to do it. Because you - you - refusing to let Rue and I be together, finally...you're offsetting the balance. You're PREVENTING ME from achieving the balance I've wanted, NEEDED to achieve since that day eleven years ago when my own baby was taken from my arms."
Amanda curled her fingers tighter around the knife handle, and pulled it higher still, preparing for the final thrust that would require all of the strength she possessed.
"I just thought you deserved to know why you had to die." she whispered, tears spilling down to land on Kimberly's chest. "I thought you deserved to know that I'm grateful to you for everything you've done for Rue, and that I'll regret this forever."
Amanda bit the inside of her cheek, and then she brought the blade flashing down. But she was again stopped in the act - though not by herself; by Kimberly.
"If you kill me, a part of Rue dies with me!" Kimberly coughed and gagged her words out through her damaged throat, staring up at Amanda with fearful, but now strangely calm, olive eyes.
Amanda froze, the tip of the warm and covered-with-Amanda's-blood cleaver touching the skin directly between Kimberly's breasts.
"Explain!" Amanda demanded, panic gripping her heart. She would do nothing to hurt her Rue! Was not even going to take the CHANCE that something would hurt Rue!
"I believe that you're Rue's mother, I believe that you love her, and so I believe that you want what's best for her." Kimberly spoke quickly, but still so very calmly. Amanda found herself admiring the woman all the more for her composure. In this situation, everyone Amanda had ever...CORRECTED had been crying, blubbering masses. "If you kill me, how do you think she's going to take it? How do you think she'll FEEL? I raised her, I nursed her, clothed her, taught her. Do you think that she's going to be HAPPY when she finds out that you killed me? The woman who's been as good as a mother to her in your absence?" When the knife did not come down on her - due to Amanda doing some very heavy thinking - Kimberly continued on, in slower, even more calm tones. "Look at her life now, look around you, look at all of this. She's happy, she has friends, family, she has passion. You say you believe in balance? That everything you've done has been for Rue? Well, I don't believe that with all your kills, all your sacrifices to the balance, that you were...maintaining some kind of temporary balance until the time when you could come and take Rue, and achieve the more permanent balance of mother and daughter reunited. No, I believe that you already achieved balance in Rue's life long ago, and that with each kill, you were just...making it even better for her."
"This, here, is the true balance." Kimberly said quietly, and so calmly that it was almost starting to disturb Amanda. Who ACTED LIKE THIS when they were seconds away from being killed? "Rue has peace, safety, happiness, all of it, here. If you take her away from all of that, from all that you've ever wanted for her...you'll be the one endangering the balance. You'll be the one ruining her life, and undoing everything you did for her to begin with. If you love her, if you want what's best for her, you'll let me up, you'll go away, never come back, and you'll leave Rue right here where she is."
Amanda lowered the knife, released Kimberly's throat, and straightened up, allowing the latter woman to do the same, albeit much more cautiously. Then, before Kimberly could say or do anything, Amanda let the blade fall to the kitchen floor, turned on the spot, and Disapparated, her mind fixed on the snowy mental image of Toschi Manor. Because what was there for Amanda to say, to do, that had not already been by Kimberly?
Kimberly was right - in everything she had said. About the balance, and about mothers, and, most importantly, about Rue.
And there was another consideration Kimberly had not given, had not been capable of giving, which was that, where Rue was now, she was unknown to Voldemort and his Death Eaters. But if Amanda had taken her, she would have been taking her into the war, into the line of fire, and Voldemort would have, someday, learned of her. And that was something Amanda was not willing to do, could never do: put her daughter in danger - HURT her daughter.
'Take care of my Rue, Kimberly.' Amanda thought, as she was squeezed through the pressing darkness between space and time itself.
Cedric Diggory had been leaning against a frosty tree, passing the minutes by, and had JUST decided to go and tell his friends and comrades in arms (and Kendra, who, most of all, Cedric was NOT looking forward to telling) that their great savior had, by this point, DEFINITELY abandoned them, when the aforementioned savior herself returned with the typical crack of Apparition.
"You're back!" he exclaimed, approaching Amanda Potter with nothing but total relief. "Where did you go- Jesus!"
The savior, The Girl-Who-Lived, the Chosen One, was indeed back, however, she looked remarkably, horrifyingly different than she had on her departure. Amanda was bruised, scraped, cut (a particularly nasty looking one on her left side looked as if it had been inflicted on her by a bladed weapon of some sort), her clothes were practically torn apart (her skirt seemed to be barely even hanging in there, and only by the barest strip of fabric), and she was covered in no small amount of blood. Her lips were literally dripping with the stuff, and her teeth were coated and tinged with it.
"Where did you GO?" Cedric repeated, more urgently this time. Amanda acted as if he wasn't even there. She strode - limped - past him for the front doors of Toschi Manor with (most worryingly of all) a cheerful look on her face, her eyes bright and her lips stretched into a wide smile. Cedric had no choice but to follow her. "Amanda, you leave out of nowhere, then you come back looking like you've just stepped off the set of a muggle horror movie- or- or gotten yourself into a bar fight-"
Amanda stopped so suddenly that Cedric ran smack into her backside (a backside that he noted held another blade wound, this one looking a lot worse than the one on her flank), and turned around to face him. There was amusement on her face, in her bloody smile, and in her voice as she said, "Stop talking."
"You can't just go doing things like that, getting up to who knows what!" insisted Cedric, hurrying after Amanda as she continued on her way towards the Manor entrance. "You could end up-"
Again, Amanda stopped and turned to face him, but her expression was as far from cheerful as any face could get. "Am I or am I not a twenty-two-year-old woman?" she said icily. "I'll go where I want, when I want, and do what I want, and no one is going to be locking me up - under a broom cupboard, or elsewhere - ever again."
"That's not the issue I have with what you did!" Cedric called after her, as she set off at a much faster pace than she had previously been taking. "That isn't even AN issue, in fact. It's that you compromised the security of headquarters. You could have been captured and interrogated by Death Eater forces, or worse. You could have led them right back here, or they could have forced you to do so. If someone grabs you before you Apparate, you take them along with you."
"I'll keep that in mind." Amanda said, not stopping and not looking back as she climbed the wide steps into the Manor. "Now, are you going to follow me all the way into my bedroom? Because I want to change out of these clothes and take a shower, and if you're there while I'm doing that I'm going to gouge your eyes out."
Knowing full well (particularly in light of her new appearance, and all that it implied) that Amanda could, and WOULD make good on her threat, Cedric came to a stop in the entrance hall. He watched her retreating back for a few moments before letting out a breath he had not even been aware that he had been holding.
Then, coming to a decision, he headed off for Dumbledore's office.
"While all of your concerns are valid, I remind you all that they were most certainly to be expected." Albus Dumbledore spoke to his audience in his office (which once had been Alexander Toschi's magnificent study room), who had all just finished with telling him of their CONCERNS - complaints - about one Amanda Potter. And he, in turn, had just finished with reminding THEM about the meeting he had held the day of Amanda's twenty-second birthday, an hour prior to her arrival at the time, where he had explained to them of her situation - of where she came from; a mental hospital.
"We can't TRAIN HER, Dumbledore, not when she's so...so..." Cedric threw an apologetic look Sirius's way. "Unstable, to put it nicely. Yes, it was expected, but not the LEVEL of it. The details, the-"
"If I am not mistaken, you told me Amanda Potter achieved a flawless Apparition on her first attempt - a feat achieved by only perhaps one out of a million wizards and witches." Dumbledore interrupted kindly, but, as well, perhaps a tad bit triumphantly (and even proudly, though that, he had to stamp out, because he could not CARE for this damaged woman if his ultimate plan to defeat Voldemort was to work). "Yes, Amanda seems to have a habit of becoming, let us say, easily DISTRACTED," He nodded significantly to Hermione Granger, whose cheeks went pink, and she huffed and looked away. "and, yes, she also becomes easily frustrated, easily upset, even angered, but other than her volatile and unexpected nature...I fail to see any pressing problems when it comes to her."
"She's impossible to stick on a schedule." Cedric shook his head. "She blew off Hermione's training, decided to come straight to me and ask for MINE, and since she got back from wherever she went, doing whatever she did that made her look like hell, she's stayed holed up in her room for the last two hours and won't let anybody in."
"She let me in!" Sirius said loudly, proudly - and smugly.
"That's because you were Padfoot at the time!" Hermione snorted, exasperated. "Not all of us can turn into big, great, lovable canines though, so I don't see how WE'RE going to get through to her."
"Sirius DOES handle her best." Lupin said thoughtfully. "Or rather, Amanda seems to RESPOND to Sirius best. Maybe he should take over her training?"
"While Black may have talents in the area of wooing females," Snape started, with a particular look of enjoyment on his face. "including his own goddaughter," Sirius sent a very rude hand gesture Snape's way. "he has no PRACTICAL experience with, just for example, using the Dark Arts, nor does he possess even an inkling as to the workings of ancient magics." Snape finished, giving nods to Cedric and Hermione. "He could not oversee every aspect of her training, nor could any one of any of us - which was the very reason it was decided that she would have specialized instruction, and by specialized instructors."
"Shove it, Snivellus." Sirius shot off, glaring at the potions master. "You're just pissed that she skipped off on YOUR training session, too, so YOU didn't get a chance to woo her - not that I'm worried about that or anything, seeing as you have a terrible track record with women." he added quickly.
Real anger came to Snape's face now. "Lily would have been mine, but for her regrettable...preference for big-headed, arrogant, rule-breaking, Quidditch-playing stars!"
"Big-headed? Arrogant? Aren't they the same thing?" Sirius said innocently, though with a wide grin on his face that suggested that HE was now the one enjoying himself.
Snape's anger left him as quickly as it had come, and a grin to match Sirius's came over his features. "Truly miraculous of you, Black...knowing, not only the DEFINITION of such words, but also that they are, in fact, synonymous with one another."
Deciding that he had let them play long enough, Dumbledore cleared his throat and said, "Gentlemen." to regain their attention.
"Speaking of miracles," he continued, voice not short on amusement. "that we have all lived to see the miracle that is the two of you having reconciled your differences, suggests that we can yet live to see more miracles happen. I, for one, believe that, with patience, and with the right adjustments, we CAN successfully train Amanda Potter. Now, does anyone have any unorthodox suggestions as to how we would do that?"
"I suppose we can chuck the schedule, for starters." Cedric said slowly (Hermione winced at the proposal). "I mean, if I hadn't agreed to just give Amanda her Apparition instruction when she wanted to do it, she probably wouldn't have cooperated with ANY attempts at training her at all, and that would have been hours wasted."
"Well, you all can bend to her whim just to get her to do what you want, but I'm not going to be doing that." Hermione sniffed. "I'll give myself to Voldemort, gift-wrapped and signed 'Mudblood', before I LET any woman make untoward advances on me."
"No one is suggesting that." Dumbledore spoke firmly but quietly. "I'm sure that what Cedric meant was that, since Amanda is, on account of her erratic and unpredictable behavior, impossible to put on a schedule, that we should try to be a bit more flexible when it comes to the WHEN of her training."
"I did mean that, thanks." Cedric gratefully addressed Dumbledore. "You say everything better than I do."
"He says everything better than EVERYONE." Sirius pointed out.
"Flexibility...yes, I suppose that does make sense." Hermione murmured, seeming mollified.
"What about wherever she went?" Cedric spoke up. "And her coming back how she looked?"
"She did look terrible." Sirius confessed, in the understatement of the year, looking highly distressed by the memory. "When I went in to see her and healed her injuries...well, let's just say there were a few more that I managed to get her to show me than what Cedric saw initially."
"Now that she knows how to Apparate, we can do nothing to stop her - and nor should we." Dumbledore said calmly. "As she told Cedric, she is NOT, in fact, a child in body - even if she is one in mind - and neither is she a prisoner here."
"Given her track record, not to mention her physical state, it's highly likely that she killed someone." Snape said quietly, gazing at Dumbledore with something akin to disbelief. "You're willing to allow her to take sporadic vacations to go on killing sprees?"
If that was what it took to ensure the woman's cooperation, yes, Dumbledore was perfectly willing to allow it. What were the deaths of many nameless and faceless men and women? And if their deaths helped bring about the end of Lord Voldemort's long and terrible reign...
Dumbledore could not, however, voice this opinion of his to anyone. Could not voice his great and ambitious plan to end Voldemort. To use AMANDA to bring an end to Voldemort...
"She is not a prisoner here." Dumbledore repeated, an idea - a regrettable LIE - coming to his mind. "She may leave as she sees fit. What she chooses to do during her time away, however, is also her choice, and when this war comes to an end, she will be held accountable for her actions. She will go right back into the hospital from which I collected her, so that she may, hopefully someday, be healed, and become of sound mind enough to be released properly."
As Dumbledore expected, this seemed to appease everyone - even Sirius, though he looked just as wounded as he did relieved and accepting. Their acceptance of his words only served to increase Dumbledore's sense of guilt, however, because only he knew of his own, true plans. And only he, Albus Dumbledore, knew that Amanda Potter was not going to go back to the hospital after they won this war.
In fact, the woman was not going to even survive war's end.
All through the afternoon, Hermione Granger had been more anxious than she could ever remember (including the weeks prior to her NEWTS results!). All through the afternoon, she had been waiting for Amanda Potter to strike at her, just as Hermione had heard - from the hospital staff she had gone to speak with in the past week to get a much better picture of Amanda's life (and of Amanda herself) than Dumbledore had decidedly NOT painted for the Order - that Amanda did.
And Hermione had been flat out terrified in the ballroom, in that moment when Amanda had gone from upset and confused to just...cold. Cold and furious.
But nothing had happened THEN either, and Hermione was left wondering just what was going on.
Why had this woman, why WAS this woman, who, by all horrifying reports, crippled or killed (more often the latter) anyone who seemed to strike her fancy, on any day, at any given time...why had she NOT killed Hermione right then and there in the ballroom? And WHY was she NOT killing Hermione now? Or at least rupturing an eyeball or breaking a leg?
Hermione knew this was different from Amanda's usual behavior. For one thing, because, after a kill, Amanda would, reportedly, act as if nothing at all had happened, and continue doing whatever she wanted to do. But that was not the case here, now, Hermione could see that much.
Amanda was sitting two seats down to Hermione's left at the dining room table, with Sirius and Parvati between them, and she was stealing glances at Hermione - had been all throughout dinner! Glances that were most definitely, very decidedly NOT NICE.
Which just did not add up with what Hermione knew about the woman. Amanda had NOT killed or maimed her on the spot, and she was NOT acting as if nothing at all had happened between them. So what was it? What was Amanda Potter THINKING? What was going on in that alien head of hers? What did she have in store for Hermione?
And could she just hurry up and DO whatever it was she was planning to do to Hermione, because Hermione could not STAND this dread, this cruel waiting? Why DID Amanda have to be so cruel? So horrible? Why did she have to kill and hurt? What drove her to do what she did, what reasons, what logic, if any, did she have in her head?
Amanda was not unintelligent, was not incapable of compromise, as Hermione had gleaned from the hospital. Seemingly, anyway, because, the one and only recorded instance of Amanda Potter NOT acting in accordance with everything anyone knew about her - when she (just a week ago, in fact), rather than murdering a security guard for eyeing her up, had instead turned to local squib and doctor, Edward Rayli, to put an end to the guard's rudeness - she had been on the way to see her cousin, who had lived with her during her childhood of horrendous abuse, and it had been at this family reunion that Amanda had, after growing more and more agitated, thrown herself at her cousin in what seemed to be her typical berserk rage.
Hermione could only conclude from this that Amanda Potter was capable of holding herself in check if, and only if, it meant she would reach a greater target for her murderous ways. Or rather, that she was intelligent enough to NOT put at risk a chance to take care of something more important.
Which meant that Amanda Potter could, in fact, prioritize things; she had decided that killing her cousin was more meaningful to her than taking the life of an offensive man.
All of which, while being of great interest to Hermione, brought her no closer to understanding her current, particular situation.
Refusing to kill Hermione could not possibly have been for the reason of, for the intelligence of, realizing that to kill Hermione would be to forfeit a chance to kill someone ELSE - someone who Amanda saw as a much more important and meaningful objective than Hermione herself was.
Hermione had not been standing in the way of anything - anyone - Amanda might have wanted, KILLING Hermione would not have prevented Amanda from reaching someone else, so there should have been no turning around, no stalking out of the ballroom as Amanda had done. There should have just been Amanda, face full of rage, throwing herself at Hermione in a bid to strike her dead on the spot.
Unless Hermione HAD been in the way like that. Unless killing Hermione WOULD HAVE, by consequences only Amanda could see, stopped her from killing someone else.
But if THAT was the case...
Hermione gazed up and down the magically extended dining table, biting her lip in both anxiety and thought.
If that was the case, then who was it here, among the Order, among people who had only ever been nice and kind to Amanda Potter - a fact that Amanda had, herself, admitted several surprising times over the past week - that the woman wanted to kill?
Or was Hermione just overthinking it? Was it simply because she was a fellow woman that Amanda had refused to kill her?
No, that could not possibly be it; although Amanda did, clearly, harbor a particular and intense hate for men, she had killed other women before. Her aunt, for a start, and then, in the hospital, female patients, nurses, and guards. And it had all been done without hesitation.
Then did the answer lie in how Amanda chose her victims? No one had ever been able to make even a wild guess about that, about why she killed who she killed. It seemed random, her killings. But they couldn't be random, because to be random would mean she would not have PURPOSELY spared that guard in order to get to her cousin! No, there was a pattern, there was a reason, a logic, just...just no one but Amanda herself could understand it.
People often thought that insanity equated to an automatic LACK of intelligence, of complexity, but, ironically, that was the exact opposite of how it was; the insane were some of the most complex people on the face of the Earth, as well as, in some ways, some of the smartest.
But Hermione was ALSO an incredibly intelligent woman. So SURELY she should be capable of figuring Amanda Potter out! Of figuring out just WHY the woman had not killed her four hours ago on the ballroom floor, and just WHY Amanda was looking at Hermione the way she was NOW - a way that suggested she had NOT forgotten whatever Hermione had done to her, whether Hermione herself knew what that was or not.
Then a thought struck Hermione. Was it, in actuality, something so simple?
So...NORMAL? Was it Hermione's refusal of Amanda's kiss, of the woman's thinking, and admittance, that she loved Hermione, that had caused Amanda to stalk off as she had done? Was THAT what was now causing her to look at Hermione sideways with so much anger?
But that presented the same problem as anything ELSE Amanda did - and what she was NOT doing now. Amanda was NOT killing Hermione, had NOT killed her dead in the ballroom for her transgression. Oh, Hermione knew she HAD, in fact, hurt Amanda by rebuking her, she had seen it in the woman's emerald green, tear-filled eyes, but...
But then why, why, WHY was Hermione NOT already dead?
Putting her frustrations in trying to understand the insane woman aside - though not her worries as to just WHEN Amanda would be jumping out at her from a dark closet - Hermione cast her eyes about for the platter of rolls she had spied earlier on in the mealtime that was more feast than anything. The rolls, she found, were in front of Amanda (who was the only one at the table NOT seated properly - or doing ANYTHING properly; her legs were up on the table, and she was balancing three separate plates of food on her stomach, and picking at it all with her bare hands and fingers).
'Of course.' Hermione thought dryly. Swallowing her fear and gathering her courage, she turned in her chair and said to Amanda, across Parvati and Sirius, "Amanda, could you please pass me the rolls?"
"No." Amanda answered - through a mouthful of chicken, pudding (chocolate, of course), and what looked to be the drippings of ranch dressing - without even looking at Hermione.
Complete lack of understanding of her or not, you really should have seen that one coming, Hermione berated herself, pulling out her wand, so as to float the rolls over to herself.
Suddenly Amanda sat bolt upright in her chair, legs dropping off the table, her plates sliding off her belly and onto the floor, and...
"Here!" Amanda cried, voice filled with panic, and an intense, genuine fear, as she stood up, snatched up the plate of rolls, and then came hurrying right over to set them down in front of Hermione.
Everyone was staring at Amanda, though Hermione most of all.
Sirius had risen from his chair, as well, his concerned eyes on his goddaughter. "What's wrong, Amanda?" he said quickly, his gaze sliding to Hermione, then back again to Amanda.
Amanda stood, for a long moment, stock still, and Hermione recognized a thinking mind when she saw one, then, to Hermione's further bewilderment, a smile appeared on Amanda's face, as the woman's whole being relaxed. NOW Amanda looked how she SHOULD HAVE LOOKED after she SHOULD HAVE KILLED Hermione some four hours ago: as if nothing had happened between them whatsoever, including their exchange and actions of this very dinner.
"Nothing." Amanda addressed Sirius, in a voice of assurance, her green eyes bright with sincerity and even delight. "Nothing at all, I promise." she added, and then, of all things, she LAUGHED.
"Amanda, what-" Hermione began, feeling so confused now that she almost felt like crying. This woman was THE most impossible puzzle in the HISTORY of puzzles - and Hermione had solved some of the greatest puzzles of her time!
"Enjoy your rolls!" Amanda cut across her in earnest, as she resumed her seat and set about pulling whole platters of food to herself, and then started eating (to Hermione's utter HORROR) STRAIGHT FROM THE PLATTERS! "I have the butter, too, if you want it." she added, in tones Hermione recognized as PLAYFUL, indicating the nearby butter boat with a nod of her sharp, narrow head.
"Hermione, what just happened?" Sirius inquired, still standing, and still looking between the two women.
"I have no idea." Hermione said, in a murmur that was more to herself than to Sirius.
"Why, exactly, did you call us here?" posed Alicia Spinnet, her eyes riveted to Cho Chang, who sat upon a sink in the womens' bathroom inside King's Cross station at night as if it were a throne.
Cho, legs crossed, hands in her lap, grinned around at the ones who had answered her call. They were enough for the start of what would be her modest little following. Alicia Spinnet, Katie Bell, Anthony Goldstein, Lavender Brown, Terry Boot, Romilda Vane, Demelza Robins, Jimmy Peakes, and, last but not least, Hannah Abbott, who, after miraculously surviving having Grimmauld Place collapse on top of her three months ago, as well as having endured, all this time since, Death Eater torture and interrogation methods during her time at St. Mungo's (something of an irony, Cho thought), Cho had spirited the woman out of the hospital and healed her injuries, which had had the very fortunate effect of securing both Hannah's loyalty AND her undying gratitude/love.
The latter two things being just the sort of deep, intense feelings that Cho had needed so badly to feed upon for so long now, and was as glad to have it as she would have been water after weeks in a desert.
"Why, I'm so glad you asked, Alicia." Cho smirked at the woman, toying with her magnificently blue fingernails, and uncrossing her legs for the purpose of kicking them back and forth in the air, the better to highlight the matching blue heels and clingy, shoulderless dress (which happened to have a thigh-high leg slit along the left side) she wore, along with the sapphire-studded ankle bracelets. "You're here because I, humble, honorable, and kind as I am, have an offer for you. For too long there's been a war going on, fought between the members of the Death Eaters," she held up her arm, showing the Dark Mark - just below a sapphire bracelet - to all assembled. "and the members of the misguided and hopelessly outnumbered Order of the Phoenix." Cho gave a nod to Hannah, who was watching her with sparkling-eyed, rapt attention, her chest heaving with each breath that passed through her pale, parted lips. "How many years, I ask you, have we WASTED under, either the old, wrinkled heel of Albus Dumbledore, or the younger, yet more ECCENTRIC heel of Lord Voldemort? How many years have we spent being nothing but their little pawns, pitted against one another mercilessly and uncaringly, like pieces on a chess board?"
Cho nodded, more to herself than to her audience, who were, admittedly to her satisfaction, looking very interested in what she was saying. "Yes, my friends, our lives mean nothing to either of them, our traumas and our sorrows nothing compared to what one side hopes to achieve over the other - total domination." she continued to lament. "That is the reason, I hope you've all noticed, why I didn't invite either Ginny Weasley or Pansy Parkinson." Cho nearly gritted in her disdain. "They're perfect representations of the thing we're all here hoping to escape from! They want death, destruction, and none of us matter to them! We have no feelings, no thoughts, no dreams or hopes! Why, they'd see us all CRUSHED in their pursuit of their desires - and not bat even an eyelash at our passing!"
"I say...I say we deserve far better than what either side has offered any of us over all these years." she said softly, looking pointedly to Hannah. "I say that we-"
"Are we going to hold future meetings in this ladies' room, or are we going to get our own headquarters?" spoke short, but broad-shouldered, blond Jimmy Peakes suddenly, looking uncomfortably around himself.
Cho strangled back a nasty retort, sounding as if she were growling in her efforts to restrain her irritation. Still, she wasn't entirely successful in that endeavor. "Don't interrupt, you miserable- ah, I mean...yes, yes, I do have a place in mind. A perfectly secure, perfectly splendid place." she hastily caught herself, losing her snarl and forcing a reassuring smile at Jimmy. He was one who had been nearly the reverse of Cho: forced to be a Death Eater, then escaped and joined the Order, and now...now he was neither.
She would have entertained thoughts of romancing him, had it not been for his tendency to ask stupid questions, something that grinded on her nerves like no other. After all, CEDRIC had never asked stupid questions. LUNA had never asked stupid questions. And Cho didn't want some-
"What's this place, then?" Anthony said, in his quiet, intelligent voice. HE was just the sort of person Cho liked: quiet, smart, and good to look at on top of it all. Better still, she knew he found her attractive (after all, who DIDN'T?).
Cho tossed her shiny, dark ponytail over her shoulder and gave Anthony a long, admiring look. "Somewhere neither of the warring sides, so pathetic as they are in it, will find us." she purred. "Deep in the bowels of New York city, in America."
"Brilliant." Anthony complimented, giving her a nod, a smile, and a returning, long look at her figure. "Their war is for THIS country, they won't even think to look in OTHER countries for our base - and even if they do, they can't afford to waste time and effort in that manner." he added, a tinge of excitement entering into his voice.
"And that's not to mention that if any known Death Eaters entered wizarding American territory, they'd be captured and detained on sight." spoke Katie Bell, running a hand through her blond hair (which she kept to one side).
"Exactly." Cho said smugly. "Now, those of you who want to join me in freeing yourselves of the shackles that have binded you for so long...sign here please." From out the top of her dress she procured a sheet of lined paper, where at the top it read: Freedom Be Mine. "Those of you who don't, well, unfortunately I can't have you running off and telling either side about this, so I'll have to kill you." she said casually, drawing her wand from out of her bosom and holding it daintily between two fingers. "I'm sure you all understand."
"Like any of us would be stupid enough to say no in the face of THAT..." Demelza muttered, eyeing Cho's wand warily.
"Precisely." Cho stated. "Now! Make your choice!" she commanded, holding up both wand and paper, side by side.
"It's cursed, isn't it?" Romilda Vane said softly, her eyes riveted to the sheet of paper. Romilda was a strange one. She hadn't been either a member of the Death Eaters or the Order, and she was only here because she didn't want to be recruited someday by either group. "Cursed to kill us if we say or do anything to betray either you, the group, or the location of the base?"
"There might be a slight possibility of that." Cho conceded with a chuckle, and a grin that said: what could you REALLY have expected from me? "So, be sure you really want this before making your choice, because once you're in you're in, and if you ever decide you want out...well, you'll be OUT, if you get my meaning."
Hannah Abbott, Cho was pleased to see, was the very first person to sign her name on the paper - and after, Cho was pleased to FEEL the kiss that Hannah planted on her lips.
"So, what exactly are we going to be doing?" Katie questioned anxiously, after she (and everyone else) had signed their names. Katie's reason for being here was a secret, and a secret known only to Cho: Katie had twin children, twin boys (both squibs, as far as Katie could tell) - along with a muggle husband - in the muggle world. Naturally, if Voldemort were to expand his reign to the muggle world, Katie's family would be discovered and targeted, and that was something Katie did not want to happen.
"We're going to be paying Voldemort a surprise visit." Cho spoke with only hatred and disgust (deep, intense feelings that Cho reveled in), her voice quivering. She had realized during her many hours of pondering that it had not been the FREEDOM that had turned her into a husk of a woman and gotten her girlfriend killed, but VOLDEMORT, the one who had GIVEN Cho that freedom, and, as such, she felt a certain companionship with, a certain sympathy for, Katie. "Unlike the Order, we know perfectly well where our lord and leader is, and we have more than sufficient means with which to reach him...and destroy him."
