36

Ernie

Well it wasn't as if he hadn't warned him. Neville was a great chap, but he wasn't the brightest when it came to self-preservation. It didn't help that the damn cupids were more kamikaze than cutie-pies; the bloody things had been hunting down Slytherins and shooting them with their charmed arrows that stayed stuck to the student's clothes for hours, glowing and singing "My Funny Valentine" in shrill voices. McGonagall had been peeved, even though she'd admitted she was impressed to the seventh years, asking Neville if the cupids were from Fred and George. Neville grinned and admitted they were a Weasley invention, but refused to tell her that Ginny had been the one doing all the charming.

Ernie was currently on guard duty, which was proving rather hectic for a day that was supposed to be about love and snogging couples. He hadn't gotten any action from Susan, who refused to let him take her for a walk around the grounds, claiming she had homework, and he'd been unsticking cupids left and right from DA members who'd been accidentally hit instead of the real targets. Snape had been lethal: he'd been hit by twelve cupids before lunch, and had been seen stalking the halls like a wounded bear, shooting down every cupid he saw with blazes of orange that burned them up to ashes in seconds.

The Carrows were faring no better, it seemed. Ernie was enjoying watching the special Valentine's Day trolls, an idea copied from the Guilderoy Lockhart days, who had been popping up and stalking the Carrows from class to class, singing lurid love songs that all involved one or the other of them marrying Voldemort. Ernie wasn't quite sure which troll had been kinxed the most, and currently he was disillusioned outside Alecto's classroom, redirecting students away when the trolls came for her, since they could take her wrath and only Merlin knew who might get hit when she got angry. Ernie himself had been hit by a blasting hex and two burning hexes, though he healed each in a minute or two. An invisible beater's bat hung at his side, waiting to be used if any of the Slytherins tried to paint over or muddle the newest decorations outside Alecto's room.

All in all, Ernie thought Dean would have been proud. Colin and Justin had debuted their first of many murals to come with a depiction of Alecto marrying her own brother to preserve the bloodline, captioned with, "The Happy Newlyweds Prepare to Shag Like Rabbits". Alecto was drawn holding a black rose in her teeth and a black, slinky dress that showed off her rotund middle; Amycus was debonair in death eater robes two sizes too small, which made certain parts of his anatomy clearly absent. Ernie thought he looked like a middle-aged ballerina with boots.

While it was fun to torture the Slytherins who passed by charming the confetti Hannah and Susan had made to cover them in snowstorm fashion, and watching Filch snap at anything that moved was certainly amusing, Ernie was still withdrawn. He couldn't figure out why Susan was rebuffing him at every move, making excuses for not dating even though it was obvious she fancied him back. Even Hannah had apologized to him, telling him that he needed to be patient, because Susan was scared. Susan? SCARED? Ernie had never been more perplexed in his life. He'd brought her roses charmed to last a whole month and given them to her in front of half the DA that morning, while they were setting up the Valentine's day confetti and activating over eight hundred cupids. It had been monstrous to hear them all singing in the same room:

"His eyes are as green as a fresh pickled toad,

His hair is as dark as a blackboard.

I wish he were mine, he's really divine,

The hero who'll conquer the Dark Lord!"

Or, Ernie's personal favorite,

"Baby I'm amazed by all you do,

I'd give anything for you,

If you'd just join me in the fight,

To preserve all that is right.

You've put a spell on me,

As any witch or wizard can see,

And Moldy-Warts won't be here for long,

So baby keep me warm til he's gone!"

Seamus' choice had been the most popular, though admittedly the one that caused the teachers to get rid of cupids that entered their classrooms. It was usually accompanied by heart-shaped Weasley Fireworks, many of which morphed into silhouettes of x-rated couples if Snape or the Carrows tried to vanish or banish them. Seamus had been given the honor of making the final song, but Ernie was left wondering if Seamus knew that Valentines' Day was about wooing your bird, not banging her:

"Oh yeah, witches, give me a wink,

Frumpy-tits ain't watchin', so let's have a peek,

Death Eaters got hate, so let's bring the love,

I give your hair a tug and you give me a rub,

Moldy-Warts is angry 'cause he ain't got no game,

He can crucio and kill, but he can't land a dame!"

The echoes of words like "rub," "Frumpy-Tits," and "Fresh-Pickled Toad" could be heard even through classroom walls. Some, like Flitwick, merely chuckled and awarded points when students could list off possible charms that could be used to make the cupids. Sprout had handed out fresh cut flowers to any chap who could tell her what plants could be used to make the dyes used for the cupid's garish outfits- and Neville had walked out of Greenhouse 3 with a huge bouquet of magnificent amaryllis for Hannah. Ernie had gone to the trouble of ordering flowers from Diagon Alley, even having them spell-wrapped to protect them from the snow, and Susan had graciously accepted them only to turn him down! The chance to finally tell her how he felt, to maybe give those red lips a kiss- and especially, to tell her how fantastic he thought she was- had slipped through his fingers, and he's spent the rest of the day wondering what he was doing wrong.

Another group of Slytherins came tearing around the corner, being chased by two wickedly laughing cupids that were flying fast, shooting arrows at Crabbe and Pansy. Pansy had an entire entourage of cupids that were charmed to bond to her like Sticking Solution. The effect was spectacular, Ernie had to admit: she had been fleeing the twenty-five "Pansy-Poachers" as Neville had nicknamed them for hours, and her hair was currently frazzled beyond recognition from all the running.

Ernie set off more confetti with a flick of his wand, and soon Pansy was encased in a typhoon of little red and pink bits that swirled dangerously, lifting her off her feet with a shriek.

Ernie chuckled as she ran off, followed closely by her goons, and paced back and forth outside the door to Alecto's. It was almost time for his shift to end- dinner was over, and his stomach was growling. Half an hour of pacing passed, and Quentin showed up to finish the evening watch on Alecto. Ernie's greeting soured when he saw the lip gloss smudged all over Quentin's happy face. Honestly, was he the only bloke not having a grand day today? Was he going to be the only man left un-snogged by tonight?

Ernie trudged back to the Room, ready to report in to Neville or Ginny and get some grub from the kitchen. With some well-placed refilling charms on tins and boxes, they'd had an easier time getting food to feed those on watch-duty each afternoon and night, and there was a never-empty milk jug in the cooler that was always good for making hot chocolate after a long shift. Susan always made him one when he came back, and they'd discuss the healer class they were teaching to the first and second years in Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff who couldn't join the DA yet, but needed to know how to heal cuts and burns. She put whip cream on top once and Ernie got it all over his upper lip, and Susan had flicked it off with her thumb. That single touch had been burned into his mind for weeks, and he didn't think he'd ever get sick of hot chocolate after that.

For recreation, he'd perfected a spell to accelerate freezing the lake outside, and after it was established that six feet down was frozen, students had been ice skating for the past week during what little daylight there was after class. As Valentine's Day drew nearer, the skaters began to couple off bit by bit, until Ernie didn't feel like skating because Susan wouldn't go with him if it was "just the two of them". Honestly, did she think he was going to whisk her away to shag in four feet of snow? He had morals, you know.

Ernie walked into the Room and lifted his disillusion charm.

"Mike's on for me, what did you girls make for supper?" he asked Hannah, who was sitting on a very satisfied looking Neville's lap and playing with the hair beside his ears.

"There's beef tips with rice and broccoli in the kitchen under a warming charm, and Dobby brought sugar cookies for us," she replied, still staring deep into Neville's eyes. Ernie rolled his eyes at their antics and followed his nose into Luna's purple kitchen. It was too bad she wasn't here to see all this, he thought, as he loaded a plate and tucked in. The Room had been decorated too, sporting pink plates, deep red swatches of silk hanging from the ceiling, and heart-shaped ends to the silverware. Soft candlelight graced the tables, and at least six couples sat at private booths along the wall, sipping coffee or butterbeer. Or one another's saliva. Ernie sighed. It seemed like today, he couldn't escape. It was all well and good when it was just after Holidays, and everyone was coming back to the same depressing castle filled with rules and danger and anxious waiting for something to happen, but it seemed like everyone else was taking a vacation from fear and worry, and he was the only one left out.

He walked back out, surly and frustrated, to eat in the common room. Neville and Hannah were locked in a slow, heated kiss on the couch, and Ernie had to clear his throat four times before they surfaced.

"Oops, sorry, Ernie. We'll just go work on some homework upstairs," Neville offered, still looking at Hannah, who tinged pink and began to drag him up the stairs. Ernie sat down in his favorite broken-in leather armchair, squashing down the stuffing, and took a sip of his milk.

"It's been like that all day. I can't be around them all without wanting to hex some parts off," came a familiar voice from behind the armchair.

Ernie swallowed a huge gulp of milk and turned in the chair. Susan was sitting cross-legged behind him, gluing pictures into a scrapbook he'd seen her working on. There were photos from the original DA, where Harry stood surrounded by the sixth and seventh years and older, graduated students, all of them casting their patronuses with huge grins. Next to these were photos with Ginny and Neville and Luna teaching battle tactics, Ginny swift and fierce, Neville calculating and powerful, and Luna flicking her wand to demonstrate how a hover charm could be used to lift your opponent without aiming a curse at them, effectively skewing their aim. There were pictures of the new kitchen with Luna and her painters working on the ceiling, levitated by peers, who occasionally "dropped" them for fun, Seamus and Lavender on the couch, caught snogging during a meeting, Padma and Parvati doing their Durmstrang Shield, sweat beading on their foreheads as they grinned, Michael, Terry, and Anthony juggling quaffles while Hannah and Lavender laughed in the background, jinxing Tony to drop his, simulation room teams after their duels, bloody and bruised but with confident, blazing smiles, and groups of fourth and fifth years practicing wards by encasing themselves in tiny protective bubbles in the common room. In more pictures, Silvia, Audrey, and Romilda mixed paints in cauldrons, not knowing that they were splashing their shoes with permanent neon-green spots, Tonks glared at the camera as she was hexed from four different directions, Kingsley and Remus dueled, and in a sneaky shot near the back, Ernie could see his photo-self edging closer to Susan while Neville watched Susan inch away a bit and smiled at Hannah, raising his eyebrows, as the four of them sat on one of the couches and studied.

Ernie sighed, watching Susan finger the edges of the photo. He was always going to be one step away from her, no matter what he did.

"I know what I did was cruel, Ernie. I just can't do this right now," she said softly, breaking his contemplation of the rows of pictures spread before her. She'd been working on the scrapbook for weeks, though she hadn't admitted to Ginny or any of the others who asked the real reason why Ernier knew she needed to do it. Susan was a realist, and she knew, like Ernie, that they were likely all going to die or be tortured beyond recognition within the next two years if the war continued. Already Luna was gone, holed up in some cellar at the mercy of Bellatrix Lestrange, and six others hadn't come back for the term in January. It had been five weeks since they'd returned to a war-zone instead of a school, and even though Ernie knew that it would hurt worse if he and Susan were involved and then one of them died, he was more afraid of the prospect of not getting to love her at all.

"Susan, when is the timing going to be good for you? Does one of us have to be dead before we can admit how we feel?"

Susan was silent, looking at the last photo in her hands. It was a picture of the first DA, and Ginny was in the background, watching Harry with soft doe-eyes.

"How do you think she's going to feel if Harry gets killed? Ginny lives for him, we can all see it. She's not going to make it if he doesn't," she whispered, the unspoken connection hanging between them, thin as lace whisps of a spider's web. A single breath, and it would be gone.

Ernie felt the lump in his throat tighten. For once, he'd speak plainly and forget the elegant delicacies he habitually wooed her with.

"Susan . . ." he started hoarsely, hoping she wouldn't look up and yet dying to see her eyes, "I'd rather be dead than apart, wondering if we'll ever get a chance. For me, it's not a risk to be with you- it's a risk if I'm not."

He bent down, caressing her cheek, and waited. She stared down at the picture, and moments passed as millennia . . . She was quiet, oh so quiet, and her fingers rubbed over one another in a nervous gesture he'd never seen her do. The lump in his throat scratched deep, and he slowly straightened and walked away.

"Soon, Ernie, please. Just a bit longer. I can't . . . please, I don't want . . ."

"It's alright, Susan," he said, regretting the gentleman inside that forced him to wait, to respect her wishes, to not scoop her up and hold her close. His chest felt strung tight as a bow, and the pressure was growing, seizing in his heart and lungs.

Soft, cold fingers touched his own, tentatively rubbed his back. He sucked in a breath.

"Susan, please, don't tease," he said, feeling her arms wrap around his middle snuggly. Her head nestled against his shoulder, and she was flush against him, warm and supple.

"I'm not, Ernest."

Somehow, even though he would have jibed at anyone else who called him by his full name, her words were expected, soothing. She squeezed slightly, hugging his middle, and he turned slowly to face her. Her eyes were calm, more than he'd seen in the last six months.

"You're not?" he asked, quiet enough that he had to repeat himself for her. He stared down, begging with as much hope as he had that he was not about to be set two-inches to the side once more.

"I'm not," she confirmed.

Ernie's eyes drifted of their own accord to the red jewels that she'd just licked, nervous. He glanced back up and leaned in to claim them as his, and her hands were hugging him close.

"AMYCUS HAS QUENTIN AND ROMILDA! THEY'RE CALLING US ALL TO THE GREAT HALL TO WATCH THEM BE WHIPPED! WE'VE GOT TO SAVE THEM!" Screamed Lavender from the door, and within seconds, everything changed: fifty students were scrambling out of the training room and kitchen, pulling on masks and ripping off house ties, Neville, shirtless and furious, was racing down the steps, zipping up his jeans, while Hannah ran behind, buttoning her blouse, and Ernie was stuck as through petrified, his mouth two inches from Susan's red lips.

"Not now," he moaned softly, but Susan pecked him softly and shushed him. "If we make it through this fight, I'll make it up to you later," she said shyly, and Ernie grabbed his wand and donned his mask, handing her a blue one. "Tie up your hair, you don't want it in your face, love," he said, pulling it back from her ears.

Susan pulled up her wand and tapped the ponytail he'd formed, and a black thong slithered out of the tip, circling her locks. Ernie grabbed his medic bag and shrunk it, shoving it into his pocket, and stepped back to avoid being hit by Ginny, who came barreling down the stairs, followed closely by – Ernie's jaw hit the floor- a shirtless Michael Corner. Yelling filled the room and he doubted anyone else had noticed, but even in the bustle of getting out the door and listening to Neville bellow battle formations as he pulled on a black shirt, Ernie couldn't help but be intrigued. Was it coincidence? Shrugging off the possibility that Mike had finally worn down the most obstinate witch in the world, he pulled Susan with him to the portal and tapped his wand to her belt.

"If anything happens to you and I'm not there, tap the number of whichever floor you're on with the buckle. It's got a pulsing charm tied to me. I know you can protect yourself, I just want to know you're safe."

Ernie turned to leave and she pulled him back and kissed him, hard, and gasped for a breath before the crowd shoved them out the door.