Greetings fellow readers! Thank you for your patience with this chapter (college life is a hot goddamn mess, lemme tell ya). Anyways, I hope you enjoy!
Be sure to follow my tumblr related to this story: snapes-patronus
July
"Destination, Determination, Deliberation!" an auror barked, her voice booming off the stone walls of the Ministry.
Amelia, Regulus, and Severus had all been able to obtain a spot in the Ministry's July Apparition class. While constantly having to be in their disguises of Evelyn, Stephen, and Charlie was difficult at times, they were becoming better actors. They were also pleased to know they weren't the only ones in the class. Apparently, the Wizarding communities of Africa and Australia did not favor apparition. Therefore, many wizard immigrants to Europe and the United States were forced to learn the art.
The room in which they were taught had no windows, but it's limestone walls were still brightly lit. Regulus was, surprisingly, doing the best out of the three of them, best in the class actually. By the end of the second day, Regulus had already apparated clear across the room. By the end of the third day, Severus and Amelia had barely managed to apparate from one end of the room into the hoop halfway between the two walls.
They returned to the Black Cabin via floo at the end of each day. The fourth day had ended with Amelia and Severus both inconsistently making it to the other side of the room. The licensing exam would take place at the end of the next day.
"How are you so good at it?" Amelia complained, removing the charm on her hair.
Regulus watched as her straight black hair turned back into curly blonde.
"It comes naturally, I guess," he mumbled, "We can practice if you want."
"What do you think of?" she asked.
"Honestly? Trying to get away from my brother. Apparently, I am motivated by unresolved childhood trauma".
Severus snorted from behind him.
"Something funny?" Regulus asked.
"To think that out of all of us, you're the one with unresolved childhood trauma".
Amelia laughed at that, Regulus rolled his eyes.
"Really, I think you two will be fine. You just need to find whatever it is that motivates your body to want to move".
Unsurprisingly, Amelia and Severus both pictured their fathers.
The following day, they each performed well enough to pass their licensing exam. Admittedly, Amelia passed by the skin of her teeth, but after watching the man in front of her splinch himself in three places, she thought her anxiety was completely justified.
Golbeer and Calhoun had been intrigued by Lily's information, even more so after they tested the spell on a rabbit. They both concluded that it was obvious that Severus believed himself to be in danger.
"I don't blame the kid," Golbeer gruffed, "after almost being murdered by a werewolf, I'd probably try to find a spell like this".
Remus Lupin was able to stay at Hogwarts for his final year, but Golbeer and Calhoun had a hard time convincing Dumbledore that Sirius Black should remain off school grounds. Dumbledore claimed that because the target of Mr. Black's antics was no longer at the school, he didn't believe Mr. Black would pose any issue this coming school year. The aurors could only shake their heads.
August
Paris was as lovely as they had imagined. Regulus was the one who apparated them there, being the only one who had previously been to the city.
The entrance to Allée Deschamps, the French equivalent of Diagon Alley, was accessible by tapping a wand twice on the second brick of the second row of the base that held the La Piax statue on the Arc de Triomphe.
It reminded Amelia of the first time she had ever been to Diagon Alley. French wizards had very expensive taste in comparison to British, and the things available in various shops reflected that. She looked like an owl by the way she craned her neck to keep looking at a pair of purple dress robes.
It had started to rain, and Regulus took them down an obscure path in between two buildings. Their surroundings started to become quite a bit seedier. Amelia had only been to Knockturn Alley once, and this area gave her the same tingling sensation down her spine.
"Re...Stephen, where are we going?" Amelia asked, almost slipping on his name.
"Not too much further," Regulus responded.
They exited the path between the two buildings, and came across some sort of center square. Severus had insisted on stopping by the apothecary, so Amelia and Regulus had stopped by the bookstore across the way. Regulus had gotten sucked into a book on Shadow Magic on the first floor, so Amelia made her way up the stairs. There was a mixture of languages in the shop, mainly French and English, occasionally German. A lot of the titles would have had her first-year Hufflepuff self shitting her pants, but she began feeling drawn to the Elemental Magic section. There were only a few books, mostly on water and fire. However, there was one book, extremely tattered and without a price tag, that caught her attention. She felt her fingertips tingle as she touched the spine of the book.
"Manipulating the Energy Within," she murmured.
"Puis-je vous intéresser à quelque chose de spécial, mademoiselle?" someone suddenly asked from behind her.
Amelia nearly jumped out of her skin, "Uh," she looked around desperately, "I don't speak French".
"Oh, not worry," the man said in a thick accent, "I show you one very special. Come."
He began tugging her arm, guiding her towards a black door snug between two bookshelves.
"No, no, I really should get going. My friends…"
She began to reach for her wand when she heard footsteps approach behind them.
Regulus said something to the man in harsh French, resulting in a scoff and the release of Amelia's arm.
"You alright?"
"Yeah, yeah I'm fine."
They exited the store, and it was only then that Amelia realized that the old, tattered book was still tucked under her arm. Regulus had already paid for his prior to coming to her rescue.
They met up with Severus near the fountain in the center of the square. Regulus led the way to a rather dodgy looking tavern, though the inside was quite nicer than the outside. He said something to the barman, and was given a small scrap of parchment.
"Room number seven," he said, holding up the paper pinched between his thumb and index finger.
"Stephen," Amelia asked, "how exactly did you find this place?"
"The seemingly endless amount of family connections."
They walked up creaky, wooden stairs, the walls covered with a hideous red and white striped paper. Room 7 was a comfortable size, with a bed for each of them. Amelia claimed the bed by the window, while the boys took one on either side of the room.
And in that one moment, it seemed that everything was perfect. Well, almost.
Long after the sun had set, and the snores of the two boys filled her ears, Amelia found herself sitting on top of her blankets, staring out the window, watching the flickering lampposts down below. She was unable to comprehend how she had found herself in a vulnerable position once again. She had talked herself up for months about how she would curse the hell out of someone who ever manhandled her again, but when that moment came, she had found herself frozen in fear, unable to react. It irritated her to no end.
She cast a time charm in front of herself, 4:47am. She huffed, and dragged herself out of bed. Still wearing her clothes from the day before, she stealthily exited the room and began making her way downstairs. There were still a few people in the tavern, but the bartender had changed. It was an older woman now.
Amelia sat down at a small, round table near the stairs.
"Can't sleep, huh?"
She looked up to see a red-headed girl making her way out of the shadows, she sat down in the chair across from Amelia.
"I know what that's like. I'm Jen, by the way."
"Evelyn," Amelia smiled lightly.
"American are ya? What brings you to these parts?"
"Just traveling."
Jen snorted, "I told myself that about three years ago. Saw a lot, Moscow, Beijing, Prague. But Sabine's prices keep me comin' back," she said, pointing over her shoulder at the bartender.
"What do you do?" Amelia asked.
"Well, I've been hunting for the International Confederation of Wizards for about two years now. Vampires recently, real nasty pieces of work, vampires. Before that it was werewolves, which is why I was in Russia."
"So, why are you back here?"
"I've recently been trailing a man from Hungary, possible vampire suspected of killing three people in his village after he ran out of meat about halfway through the winter. He was in Rome for a while, but recent word says he's staying in a hostel not too far from here. He may be conspiring with Death Eaters. The mugwump asked me to keep an eye on him."
"Dumbledore?" Amelia asked.
Jen nodded.
"So...you're a bounty hunter...for Dumbledore?"
"Bounty Hunter?"
"It's a muggle word, it means you catch fugitives for money."
"I guess so. I'm not an auror, that's for damn sure."
"You have something against aurors?" Amelia asked.
"You hear about those kids that went missing from Hogwarts? Or that Muggle family killed in Glasgow? Aurors may act all high and mighty, but in reality, how much have they really done since Voldemort rose to power?"
Amelia went on to learn that Jen actually hated aurors because she had been expelled from Hogwarts for endangering human life with a jinx in her seventh year, but in reality, there had been no evidence. The aurors simply took the word of a pureblood Slytherin over hers. Jen was a half-blood Ravenclaw, with a knack for Defense Against the Dark Arts and Care of Magical Creatures.
Though she was born to magical mother, she was adopted by a muggle couple, as her biological mother had been very young. This resulted in years of blood-purity related bullying from Slytherin girls in her year, specifically Narcissa Black, who had gotten her expelled. Jen left Hogwarts, and too ashamed to return home, scoured most of the Eastern hemisphere for her biological mother, whose existence she'd learned of in her fourth year. She had found her in Australia. Her mother had been deemed a missing person in Wizarding Britain for nearly eighteen years, and it was upon hearing of Jen's locating of her mother that Dumbledore had reached out to her in regards to employment.
They talked until Severus, disguised as Charlie, made his way downstairs around nine. And as fast as she had come, Jen disappeared into the alley shadows.
September
Over the next several weeks, the trio made progress on their charm longevity. Initially, they had only been able to maintain their disguises for about an eight hour time frame before needing to do some touch ups, but now they were nearing the twenty-four hour mark. Jen had been back to the tavern several times, and offered Amelia lessons in dueling and muggle self-defense, which Jen claimed she had found very useful in the field.
Regulus and Severus began aiding her in dueling as well, and each of them were getting better at taking on multiple opponents (though Severus was far superior, for obvious reasons). When they weren't duelling, both of the boys could usually be found with their nose in a book in some corner of the tavern. Amelia spent a lot of time practicing spells in the weed-filled courtyard.
When the dated passed that marked the beginning of Hogwarts' newest term came and went, Amelia again found herself racked with insomnia. Evangelina had been sorted this year, and it was driving her absolutely mad that she didn't know what House her little sister had been sorted into. So, when Jen was preparing to leave for her next trip to Britain, Amelia asked that she find out, claiming Evangelina to be the sister of an old friend.
Amelia practically pounced on Jen when she returned on a rainy evening ten days later.
"How was your trip?"
"Fine, though it's never fun tracking purebloods. Their house elves aren't as quick to turn on them."
"Who did you end up tracking this time?" Regulus asked.
"The Dolohov's. Dumbledore thinks they're the family most likely to turn their back on You-Know-Who, something about a little shift in power within the Death Eaters. Snuck around their mansion for days, and the most interesting thing I learned was that You-Know-Who gave Bellatrix Lestrange some special cup. Antonin was a bit put out by it, claiming he didn't understand why the Dark Lord 'would entrust a part of his life to that crazy bitch' after he had been one of You-Know-Who's earliest supporters."
"Did you ever find out about my friend's sister?" Amelia asked.
"Yeah, Slytherin. Hatstall too, took the Sorting Hat six and a half minutes to place her."
With that, Jen excused herself to go unpack her belongings. Amelia, unable to ignore the feeling of dread that had overcome her, excused herself as well.
Severus and Regulus returned to their room about twenty minutes later, finding Amelia pacing a hole in the floor.
"This is so bad," she murmured to herself.
"Mil, it's not that bad," Regulus said, allowing a slip of her name.
"Maybe not for you!" she exploded, "You're a wealthy pureblood, the stereotypical Slytherin! Evangelina is a poor muggleborn, she'll never stand a chance," Amelia moaned, sitting on the edge of her bed, head in her hands.
"She's probably scared shitless," she continued, "I definitely played into the 'All Slytherins are evil' mantra whenever I was home."
Regulus scoffed.
"Well, all the Slytherins I knew burned my homework and spat mudblood at me! I didn't know you two yet! So pardon me!"
Amelia had been correct. Evangelina Fitzpatrick was indeed scared shitless. She'd noticed the whispers that began after the Sorting Hat had been on her head for about two minutes. The next four were absolutely agonizing.
"Hmm, difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of intelligence I see, not a bad work ethic either, and a thirst to prove yourself. Put where to put you…" the Sorting Hat whispered in her ear.
"No, not in Gryffindor," the Hat said as her eyes wandered to the gold and scarlet banners on her left.
"I don't really care where I am," Evangelina whispered meekly, "I just want to be where I belong."
"Your sister did quite well in Hufflepuff, but that's not the spot for you, no."
The Sorting Hat spent the next four minutes debating with itself. Ravenclaw or Slytherin. Evangelina could feel her cheeks starting to get red as the whispers of students (and staff) became increasingly anxious.
"A muggleborn in Slytherin would have Salazar tossing in his grave, no doubt about that. But you desire intelligence for an upper hand, not for knowledge's sake. Rowena would not be happy with that, Salazar would…" it paused, "Better be...Slytherin!" the Hat finally decided.
There had been a collective gasp throughout the Great Hall. Professor McGonagall removed the Hat from her head, and she was ushered over to the Slytherin table. She had received rather nasty looks from the older students, but the boy she sat next to, Calvin Warbeck, seemed nice enough.
Now, she was laying in her bed, her dormitory dark and silent. The other four girls had been rather neutral about her, engaging in simple small talk. Another girl, Cassandra Clearwater, seemed rather surprised that she had been sorted into Slytherin as well, as her whole family had been in Ravenclaw.
Evangelina desperately wished she could talk to her sister.
Lily Evans and Emily Vanity were among the many Hogwarts students who were taken aback by the sorting of Evangelina Fitzpatrick.
Lily had been fairly occupied for most of the evening with Head Girl duties. Remus had been appointed to Head Boy, much to his own dismay (and slight joy). But, the length of Evangelina Fitzpatrick's sorting had caused quite a stir, and she allowed herself to become invested.
"What's that girl's name?" Lily had asked Remus, finally paying attention.
"Evangelina…" he paused, "Fitzpatrick".
Lily fell silent, and watched in anxiety as the girl seemed to become increasingly distressed the longer the Hat was on her head.
Upon hearing the fate of the blonde, curly haired girl with big blue eyes, Lily's hand had immediately flown to her mouth. She couldn't believe it. Like others around her, she was astonished by the idea. A muggleborn in Slytherin?
Emily Vanity had felt quite the same way. The day had begun quite strangely with Regulus having never arrived, but this sorting made that seem like a grain of salt. A muggleborn in Slytherin? Emily had never heard of such a thing occurring, and apparently, neither had her housemates. The older male students around her had made comments of mudblood and put her in her place under their breath, and the girls simply had a disgusted look on their faces.
But one thing was certain to the both of them, things at Hogwarts would be strange this year, and the war occurring outside the castle's walls was causing it.
If you liked this chapter, be sure to drop by and leave a review! Don't forget to follow the tumblr dedicated to this story: snapes-patronus
