AN: Thought I wasn't the cheesy type? Wait till you read the end of this :). Reviews are better than fondue!

Chapter Twenty-One
Of Astronomy and Sam and Lien's Choices In Best Friends

Jayna walked slowly over to the bottom of the stairs of the Astronomy tower for her first lesson in that subject. She stared up at them, struck suddenly by the words she'd tried so hard to forget. She had listened to someone sign her death warrant. Listened to them joke around about how her entire family had died. Listened to them laugh at the idea of her torture and how no-one would care if she died. She'd been thinking about that a lot actually; whether she was more worried over the people trying to kill her or the fact that they were right. Oh, of course Lydjah would miss her but she was well-connected and seemed to have found a friend in Sam at least, so she wouldn't be distraught. Not that Jayna wanted her to be exactly, but… It would be nice. And her sister- well, Jayna knew Cara would miss her, despite how much her sister had tried to convince herself she wouldn't, but she also knew her death would only fuel Cara's search for revenge.

But two people in a world of millions? Two people who would miss her? It seemed she really needed to branch out her social circle.

Professor Sinistra had apologised profusely to the both of them yesterday at dinner and Jayna had, of course, forgiven her, although she privately believed that it took a very weak person to completely succumb to the Imperius curse, unless it had been cast intermittently. Professor Sinistra hadn't even twitched away from her instructions. What was more worrying was that the person would have needed to be quite close to her, which meant, as the Aurors had worried, the opposition had some way of getting into the castle.

As she stared up into the twisting stairs her breaths started to come in short gasps, she rubbed her wrists feverishly and hugged her new robes (replaced by the school's insurance) closer to her. A hand on her shoulder sent her spinning round, her wand poking directly into the offending person's jugular.

James gulped, his Adam's apple struggling to follow the motion. She moved her wand instantly but didn't apologise as she continued to glare at him.

"I know." He said quietly. Finally her gaze lessened as she dropped it to the ground but he knew her mouth was still twisted into a scowl. "You sure you're alright to come back to school?"

"I'm fine." She snarled.

"Blackwood, what did they say-" She cut him off, not wanting to hear the rest of his question.

"Does your dad know why they wanted him?" James accepted the subject change easily.

"No." He said, looking troubled. "Or at least not that he's told me. Their plan wouldn't've worked anyway- dad made a rule when he became Head of the Auror office because of the battle of the Department of Mysteries," He waited to see if she understood which battle she was referring to. The story he'd grown up on, told by various family members until he'd got all points of view except his dad's, who had only given a vague overview of it, as he did with all the encounters where he had lost someone; Jayna had read as a biography. It was strange to him, when people got so excited over Harry or Ron or Hermione being on their chocolate Frog Cards, or when Harry got flocked by witches and wizards who were just so grateful, when to James he was just a dad, sometimes a bit of a git to be honest. James loved him of course, not that he said it much, and he was very close with his dad, but it seemed to James that no matter what he did, he'd still be known as 'Harry Potter's son' before anything else. Not that he wanted to go through what his dad had; everyone else glorified it when really Harry had lost every father figure in his life, had been orphaned at a young age and his entire teenage life had been haunted by the threat of Voldemort, but he didn't like the expectations that had been set on him because of it. He was constantly under scrutiny and people were constantly appalled by his pranking nature, as though he was supposed to be an upstanding student all of the time, even though his dad actually found his pranks quite funny.

He looked closer at Jayna, realising that she was under scrutiny too, but for the opposite reasons. He felt a pang of pity for her; she was terrifying in her own right, but he wished she didn't have to be. He later concluded that this was the only reason the next words came tumbling out of his mouth. "On the plus side though," he began brightening, and Jayna looked at him in utter confusion that he had found a way to put a positive spin on their kidnapping and her torture, "All these girls are flocking to me wanting to know how I escaped the 'awful Death-Eaters'." Jayna blinked in utter disbelief. He winked at her and went sauntering back over to Sam who stood a few feet away and had heard the entire conversation.

She stared at him, the word 'dumbass' repeating itself in her head.

"What?" He asked, offended.

"See this is the reason most girls aren't friends with guys."

"What?"

"Never mind James." Sam had never really had a problem with being friends with just James before, maybe because she had no interest in talking about girly-things which all other girls who were friends with guys seemed to do. She didn't want to talk about crushes, or test scores, or gossip, or what she was doing at the weekend. She wanted to talk about Quidditch, pranks and Quidditch. Which was why she didn't much care over Jayna's crestfallen face, other than that James really was an idiot and she was so glad she didn't have to deal with it. "Hey, we should pull a 'Welcome back James' prank." He frowned.

"What about Jayna?" She raised an eyebrow.

"Oh so now you're being considerate towards her." She muttered.

"Sorry what?"

"Nothing James. We can include Jayna too if you want."

"Nah I don't want to get her into trouble."

"Since when have we ever got caught?"

"True. Let's put some Ravenclaw colours in there somewhere then."

"Oh how nice of you." James didn't seem to catch the sarcasm and beamed.

Jayna, for her part, was not completely surprised at James' disinterest, but was rather hurt at his complete and utter 'rub-it-in-her-face' attitude. She didn't even know whether she liked him half the time, let alone if she had a crush on him, but really he didn't need to point out so obviously that she was hardly someone who attracted attention from the opposite gender. She liked to think it was because of her surname, but really she knew people who wouldn't have been put off by that. She just wasn't worth the effort of trying to fight her demons. Not that she thought she needed a man to do that for her, or that she even wanted one, but the effort might have been appreciated. And she believed herself to be worth more than a Dark name and a snobbish stereotypical Ravenclaw outer-shell. She just wished she knew how to show it more, without some prat basically telling her there was no point.

Lydjah clapped her on the shoulder but Jayna had memorised the weight of her footsteps and was expecting it.

"He doesn't deserve you, the prat; I mean you saved his life."

"I'm pretty sure that was the Aurors actually."

"He's just a boy Jay-Jay." Jayna grinned, shaking off her self-pitying mood.

"Since when have any of the boys I've ever liked been 'just a boy'?"

"So you admit you like him then?" Jayna glared.

"Bloody Hell Lydjah-" Lydjah's eyes widened.

"So you DO know what it is?!"

"Oh for Merlin's sake-" Lydjah ignored her and started to do a small jig-like dance, singing 'she does know what it is' happily. Jayna stood and watched her, laughing loudly at her classmates reactions, insanely glad that it was Lydjah who was her best friend and no-one else.

Scorpius reached for a scotch-pancake and was about to sink his teeth into it when it was smacked out of his hand by Albus. He was about to ask him what on earth had possessed him to send his pancake spiralling down the table, but forgot his question when he looked into the enraged eyes of Cara Blackwood, sitting across from him. She was staring into a spoon, looking absolutely livid as she ran her hand through her bright red hair. He glanced around the table and saw most of the Slytherins had matching red hair, with the occasional gold cropping up here and there. He watched as a group of five of them sneaked some food from the Ravenclaw table, only for their hair to turn a brilliant shade of blue or bronze. He turned back to Albus who looked torn between being distraught and laughing.

"James." He said in response to Scorpius' look. Sure enough, all the puddings on the Slytherin table were slowly arranging themselves to spell out 'Welcome back James- we've missed you so much!'. Scorpius snorted. James himself was stood up on one of the Gryffindor bench tables.

He pretended to blush fanning his cheeks. "Oh thank you!" He squealed in a seriously bad impression of a girl's voice according to Sam's eye-roll from where she was sat, dodging his wobbly attempt to balance using her head. "I think it's so nice of you to display all this house unity!" Suddenly his expression turned serious, "But I'm afraid that while it's touching, you're causing quite a disturbance so could you please desist." Several of the Slytherins stood up as if to attack him but Professor Vector had called for attention before they could.

She seemed to be laughing, as if she couldn't quite help herself, much to the disapproval of Professor Babbling, but she waved her wand nonetheless and the Slytherins' hair all turned back to normal. With another flick, a huge banner had been erected over the back of the Great Hall that read 'Welcome back James & Jayna'. James bowed from where he was sat and with a flourish sat back down on the bench.

Lunch continued without any more interruptions, except Lydjah and Jayna leaving quickly in the direction of the Hospital Wing, Jayna's usual long-strides hindered by the amount of weight she was transferring to Lydjah's helpful arm.

Molly and Lien had been quite enjoying the display and clapped along with the rest of the school as James took his seat.

Lien's first month as Hufflepuff had completely convinced her of the amazingness of being part of the magical community. She'd gained a best friend, a second home and the most gorgeous fluffy blanket you could ever wish for thanks to her Head of House who apparently very good at charming things to knit for him. All the Hufflepuffs had them and although Isabella in particular pretended that she didn't care for such a 'babyish' gift, that didn't stop her from using it as the summer gave way to a cold but clear autumn.

She got on well with the other girls in her dorm; Abigail, who was funny, especially with all her amazing impersonations that were further improved by her ability to turn into the person she was impersonating, Rosie, who for a reason the rest of them could not yet phantom was best friends with Abigail, despite her rather bland personality and Daisy, who no longer had Scrofunglus and turned out to be very out-spoken in sticking up for everyone she deemed worthy in class, even if it was a Ravenclaw, which often resulted in detention. Even Isabella, who'd bonded with her over a love for music, had become her friend. Isabella was very impressed when she'd stumbled in on Lien's guitar playing, asking if Lien could possibly teach her when she had the time, which is how Isabella and Lien ended up writing a song together after Lien learnt of her prowess on piano.

This then escalated even further because the only room they could find with a piano was the music classroom for the few who took the study of music or muggle music once they got to sixth year. This was frequented by the teacher of music at the school; Professor Casales, as she held all her lessons either there or in the Great Hall, and the teacher could not believe her eyes when she saw it was two eleven year olds. The two of them were quickly recruited into both the orchestra and the Frog choir despite their protests and they'd been asked to perform their song at the Halloween Feast. Lien had kept the information under wraps, not really wanting to know any of the group's feelings on it.

'The group'… She wasn't entirely sure what to call the eight of them.

James, she'd decided, was funny, even if he was an older boy she didn't know very well. She had the feeling that he'd be perfectly nice when she got to know him, and she had no doubt she would be getting to know him, because if there's one thing you can't go through without making future plans to meet up, it was helping to find your best friend's lost cousin and the older girl you met on the train, and seeing as he never went anywhere without Sam…

Sam herself Lien admired. Sam was witty, clever, funny and exceedingly brave. She didn't want to be her exactly, because Lien loved partaking in girly things as well as more rolling-in-the-mud based activities, and she privately thought that Sam's recklessness would throw her off a cliff if no-one stopped her, but her constant positivity was hard to ignore.

As for Lydjah… Well she hadn't quite decided her opinion on the Ravenclaw yet. It was clear she had a lot of things going on beneath the surface, her newly revealed Seer powers being only one of them, and she was impossibly wacky but it was the kind of crazy Lien needed to kick-start her life; like believing in magic crazy or performing in front of her entire school crazy... She really needed to stop thinking about that.

She quickly moved her mind onto her most unsure out of the group. Jayna was a bitch to her really. And Molly. And most of the school. But she seemed to be less bitchy the more you got to know her, and more sad. There was something broken in the swotty personality she tried to use but Lien wasn't sure if it was worth all the snappish remarks to find out what.

Scorpius was easier. The rumours surrounding him were all true; he was the son of Death Eaters and possibly inbreeding. He was also gorgeous and aware of it, but not in the cocky way James was, more the casual confidence he exuded as he went through life. He was facing difficulties in changing his mind-set but he was at least trying to change. He was good to talk to and Lien wished she had more lessons with the Slytherins so she'd get an opportunity.

Of course that wasn't the only reason she wished for more time with the Slytherins; Albus was another reason all by himself. He was good-looking, yes, but so were lots of people. It was more the gentle way he spoke, but his voice didn't speak of weakness; it spoke of kindness. He was dependable for a homework buddy (Molly, Lien, Albus, Scorpius, Rose and Roxanne had quickly made a habit of meeting in the library, although Roxanne was a rather infrequent member on account of often serving detention) and he made her laugh. He also played piano and the flute which just about did it for her.

Before she could finish that train of thought and feel guilty for it (because of course Brendan was still in Chester wondering why she'd suddenly decided to go to boarding school and why she no longer had access to the internet) she turned her mind to Molly. She'd had best friends in primary school, the kind that come and go depending on the day, but she could already tell with Molly that the possibilities of that happening were minimal. They were just so in synch, alike, but very different too. They always had something to talk about, mainly because of their vastly different childhoods, and they never got bored when they were with each other, even if all they were doing was reading.

The eight of them could be split so many ways; Houses (two of each), best friends (which was incidentally the same), blood status (five Purebloods, two Muggleborns and one Half-Blood), or just plain old gender split (five girls, three boys) but if there was one thing Lien was sure of, it was that the eight of them, whether they knew it or not, were going to make one Hell of a team.