Disclaimer: We don't own Harry Potter or anything else that belongs to JK Rowling. (Does anyone still do a disclaimer? Or do we all just agree that because we know it's fanfiction we obviously don't own it?)
Hello lovers! A surprisingly quick update from your notoriously long between chapters authors! Hopefully a good surprise, and not one that has you saying 'I wish these clowns would leave us alone!' As usual, you know the drill! If you enjoyed it, a little kudos or few words of kindness would not go amiss! And we do hope you enjoy! For now, read on, and see you at the bottom!
Rule 56: When composing a threatening letter, it is best to be short, concise, and incredibly threatening, otherwise you're missing the whole point. Don't concede threat level, for short and concise. Also, don't accidentally leave said threatening note out for any professor to find because you will have to explain why you're threatening your best friend's mum for embarrassing photos of them. Sorry Mrs. P.
Alexa's Point of View
"What do you think about this one?" Unfurling the scrap of parchment I was holding, I cleared my throat before reading the threatening letter I was quite proud of. "Damon, Meet in Astronomy Tower. 11 tonight. Come alone, or else." I paused for dramatic effect, looking around the small committee of Lyla and Lily who were each looking at me with a bewildered look on their faces.
Lily snatched the parchment from my hand, then shook her head. "There are even less words on here than what you read. Literally you put 'A' tower, not even the full word!" She passed the parchment to Lyla who immediately balled it up and tossed it into the growing pile in front of us. I let out a dejected sigh. At this rate, I was going to have to sneak into Hogsmeade to buy more parchment.
"It's dramatic. We're just trying to get him to meet us somewhere. We don't need to embellish." I argued, and Lyla tore another piece from my dwindling scroll.
"It needs to at least be readable," She paused before snatching the quill from my fingers as well, "And legible." I rolled my eyes, leaning back in my seat while Lyla squinted down at the parchment in front of her. Lily was leaning over her shoulder, quietly pointing out different words she could use, before they decided it was complete.
Lyla made a big show of dusting her hands off, while Lily handed the paper over. "We need to talk. Meet us in the Astronomy Tower tonight at 11 PM sharp. Come alone." I put the paper down in my lap and looked at my sister. "Do you want to write a sonnet as well? It's not menacing enough! We need to add some pizazz. He's definitely not going to feel threatened with this one."
"But if he feels threatened he won't even show. What we need is for him to not bring back up." Lyla snapped back. Before I could respond, or Lily could intervene in one of our classic sister squabbles, the door to the Room of Requirements opened, and four boys strolled through. I quickly hid the paper that I was still holding in my hands.
"Trying to start a bonfire?" James asked as he spotted the growing pile in the middle of our armchairs. Lily gave him a disarming smile while he leaned down to kiss her, before perching himself on the arm of her seat.
"Just working on a collaborative essay. Shouldn't take but a moment to finish up." Lyla said with barely concealed nervousness. Remus gave her a knowing look, before snatching a piece of parchment from the pile, faster than we could react.
Lyla dove for it, clearly giving herself away, while Remus held it aloft in her hand. "You really do need to work on your lying skills." She crossed her arms over her chest, glaring at her husband who tossed the ball to the outstretched palm of my waiting boyfriend.
I felt my stomach drop slightly as I thought about the impending argument we were sure to have. "From what I can read, and it's not much, I feel like we're going to need to have another chat with you all." Sirius said, his voice deepening as he looked directly at me. I felt myself bristle, knowing that I was responding both to his anger, and to being treated like I didn't have a say in this.
"That's not even the one we were going to use." I poked him in the side, hard enough for him to lose focus for a moment, before grabbing the old paper and tossing it back into the pile. Lily, graciously, vanished them away without giving the boys a chance to read anymore of our failed attempts.
"No, but I'm guessing this one was?" Peter piped up, holding the final draft of Lyla, Lily, and I's attempt at a threatening letter.
"E tu, Peter?" Lyla said with a shake of her head. Remus held his hand out for the note from Peter, who handed it over. James and Sirius took a similar stance next to him, while they peered over the note. "You don't get it. This is Blair we're talking about. Our best friend. If you thought we were just going to sit idly by and not do anything then you don't know us at all."
"And we specifically said that we would do this together." Sirius said, his voice slightly raised as he ran a hand over his face. "What don't you understand by the fact that Dumbledore threatened to expel you at the first sign of trouble? In my seven years here, none of us have been threatened with expulsion, I'll have you know."
"Keep your voice down." I said, standing to take Sirius's hands and lead him to the seat I had vacated. "Calm down for a second, please. Let's talk about this."
"There's not much to talk about." Remus said, balling the parchment into his hand. "You all were going to go behind our backs and get yourself in trouble, or worse, hurt, again. When would we have found out about it?" He looked from Lily, to me, and then to his wife. "After you'd gotten caught? Or when we had to visit you in the hospital wing too?"
"Rem, we were just going to try and get him to talk to us. We weren't going to just go in without a plan." Lyla said, her voice softening at the worry on Remus's face.
"It's Blair." Is all I could say while I looked around at the Marauder's, trying to get them to see the reason behind what we were trying to do.
James took his glasses off his face, rubbing at the bridge of his nose with pinched fingers. "We know that. Which is why we were coming to find you all."
"What do you mean?" Lily said, looking at her boyfriend with a skeptical face. I could remember their knock-down-drag-out fights back before James got together, so I knew the face she was making well. Just because they were now in love, Lily could still put this bespeckled git in his place faster than anyone I knew. "We're not backing down from this."
"We're not asking you to," Sirius said, startling me slightly when he pulled me by the hand to stand nearer to him. "We're asking you to do this together, as a team, with us."
"Really?" I asked, trying to keep the wavering quality out of my voice, "You're not going to let us help and then pull us out at the last second? We're a part of this, one-hundred percent?"
"You told me you wanted to be all in on this Order business, and I'm trying my best to respect that choice. But you've got to let me be all in on it with you." He said, looking at me more seriously than I had ever seen him be about something.
"It's the only way this is going to work." Remus said, and Lyla smiled at him, holding his hand tight before conjuring four more chairs.
"Then let's get down to brass tacks." She pulled the paper she must have stolen back from Remus out from behind her, and smoothed it down on a table that the Room had provided for us. "What is it you don't like about this note?"
"Where are they?" Blair's voice was small from next to me, and I gave her an encouraging one-armed hug as we sat in an empty classroom near the top of the castle, one floor down from the Astronomy tower.
The noise of Sirius's boots hitting the edge of the desk was loud in the relative silence of the dark night. He tilted back slightly in the chair he had taken behind the old Professor's desk, and twirled his wand between his fingers. "He'll be here." His voice was dark, and I studied him from my seat a few rows down. He looked determined, and I felt myself grow more nervous at the recklessness displayed in that determination.
"It's okay, Blair. We're all here with you now; nothing is going to happen." Lyla said, leaning up against the desk beside Blair. The clock tolled eleven, and James' pacing came to an end as the door to the classroom slowly slid open. Remus stood from his seat by Lyla, taking a slightly protective stance in front of us, as Sirius dropped from his casual arrangement to stand in solidarity next to James near the doorway.
Damon's bitter laugh went through me like someone had tipped me into the Black lake. Lily's grip on her wand tightened, her figure ramrod straight next to me. "I should have known you wouldn't be alone. Gryffindor courage must really be missing in the seven of you."
"Don't think we'll need any tonight," James said, his voice clear. Damon smirked, moving to come further into the classroom. It was then that I saw that he hadn't come alone, as our note suggested.
"As you can see, I didn't doubt you'd be bull-headed enough to not bring backup." I tried to keep myself steady, as Blair let out a soft whimper from between Lyla and I. Three others dressed in all black stepped into the room, and I clenched my teeth when I caught Theodore Nott's eye. Of course he'd come along.
"Well, we've always been smart enough to never trust a snake." Sirius said, his hands casually in his pocket while he leaned against a desk a few feet away from the Slytherin's. James smirked, feeling the same, and I was suddenly very glad we hadn't come alone, especially when Damon turned to look towards the girl standing between Lyla and I. "You've got a lot to explain about what happened the other day. You're disgusting, you know that? You'll have to pay for what you've done, but we've got some questions first."
Instead of addressing what Sirius was saying, Damon focussed in on a particular spot in the room. "Hi Blair. Feeling better?" He asked innocently, and she gasped, turning into Lyla who wrapped her arms around herself.
"Don't you dare speak to her," I bit out, my hands shaking in anger and nerves as I took a step in front of Blair. Lily did the same, and with Remus we blocked Blair from his slimy view.
"I'll not be spoken to by the likes of a half-breed like you," Damon said, his voice dripping with disdain. Sirius had Damon pinned with his wand in a matter of moments, and I felt my breath catch in my throat as wands were drawn and the tension sky-rocketed.
"You will not speak to her like that again." He said, his voice quiet and as sharp as a knife. Damon only laughed, pushing Sirius away from him before he crossed his arms.
"I'll do as I like. And soon you won't be able to do anything about it. You never did know when to leave well-enough alone, did you, Black? I heard that you were no longer welcome into your Mother's home; how your poor Father is dwindling away while his first born son pisses his life away surrounded by half-breeds, mudbloods, and blood traitors." Damon's voice rose, knowing he'd get a rise from Sirius, and James surged forward, preventing Sirius from ditching his wand and brawling the muggle way. "Toujours pur, isn't that how the saying goes?"
"Enough." A voice said from towards the back of the classroom, and I frowned as a slightly familiar face came more into the light. "We came to find out what they wanted."
"Reg," Sirius said, his voice leaving him in a rush, as he looked at his brother, who had cast his lots in with the absolute wrong type of crowd. I moved closer to Sirius, walking through the desks slowly so I didn't startle everyone into waving wands and casting spells. "What are you doing with them?"
Regulus didn't answer, and so James took the chance to get the answers we came here for, addressing Damon. "We know it was you, Rowle. You'll pay for what you've done, and so will those that helped you. Now give us the names."
Nott laughed loudly as did MacNair, the other boy in the room with them. Regulus shook his head, his eyes remaining on his brother, and Damon rolled his eyes at James. "You think I'll just turn tail and run, Potter? You have no idea what's coming. This won't be the last time we'll teach the mudblood scum of this school a lesson."
"A new age is coming, and we're just the beginning." Nott spoke up, and I grabbed for my wand, not realizing he was as close to me as he was. Lily stood behind him, her wand already in the air, unwavering in her anger at the boy now standing in front of me. "You all think you're safe here in the castle because Dumbledore is protecting you. But there's a man who knows the true ways of the wizarding world, who will purge the impure blood and make it pure again."
"What the fuck are you on?" I asked, feeling my blood boil as he spouted his purist agenda. "If you think someone we've never even heard of is going to scare us then you've got another thing coming."
"You'll be the first one that goes, Parker. When I get what's promised to me, you're going to be the first. The Dark Lord would just love to put a stop to that smart mouth of yours." Nott's voice rose, and as spells started to form in my mind, all hell started to break loose around me. Lyla was yelling obscenities at the boy in front of me, Remus at her side while Macnair closed in. Lily rushed to Blair's side where she was standing like a deer in the headlights, paralyzed with fear. Damon was fending off a fairly vicious attack from James, while Sirius manhandled his brother and they screamed at each other.
Amongst the chaos, a light switched on in the corridor, and the door opened once more. At once, everything went completely silent. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Peter appeared, shaky and out of breath. "Sinistra. She's," He paused, taking a deep breath, but no one stopped to hear what she said as we all went into fight or flight, where the only option was to stop our fighting and fly back to our Common Rooms at risk of detention, expulsion, and possibly much worse.
"This isn't over, remember that." Regulus said as he and the rest of his cronies slipped away.
"We have to get out of here." Remus said, looking around at everyone to make sure we were all okay. I grabbed Sirius' hand, trying to shake him out of whatever he was about to do, like go after his brother and make a massive scene, while looking to James, our fearless leader.
"Girls, take the map and go with Remus. Padfoot, Wormtail, I believe we need to run distraction plan 3." Lily gave James an incredulous look, but he was already stripping out of his robe and taking his glasses off. "Go! Before she catches you."
"What the hell is going on?" Lily muttered under her breath, but she took after Remus and Lyla, while Blair and I followed along. The corridors were quiet, the only sounds our footsteps, until we heard a shriek, closely rounded out by what sounded like a dog barking. Lyla glanced back at us, but Remus seemed satisfied with whatever he saw on the map, and made us hurry along.
By the time we were in the Common Room, my head was spinning. "What in the hell was Nott talking about? What kind of psycho is out there talking about purifying the wizard race? And who the fuck names themselves the Dark Lord?" My stream of consciousness was cut off as Lyla ushered us into her and Remus' private quarters, wisely remembering that not everyone was going to be awake past midnight on a Tuesday.
"We were right - if Dumbledore is recruiting at school, then who's to say that this Dark Lord character isn't doing the same. And now we have proof that he is. Anyone could be in on it, or any of us could be next." Lily paused, her body shaking with the threat that had just been leveled upon us and the school itself.
We took a moment to let the weight of what was happening outside of school, as well as within it, settle, when the private door opened and the rest of the Marauders walked in. Peter was limping slightly, but no one looked any worse for the wear. "Were you caught?" Remus asked quickly, and I hurried over to Sirius whose eyes were clouded with emotion.
"No," James answered, coming to fall onto the couch, exhaustion written on his face. "What the bloody hell just happened?"
"My brother was a part of it." Sirius said quietly, sitting heavily into the armchair, his face buried in his hands. Lyla and I shared a look, and I rested my hand comfortingly on his back.
"This isn't your fault." I said, kneeling down in front of him now, taking his hands away from his face. Anger, hurt, betrayal all featured prominently in his eyes. I laced his fingers with mine and held tight. "There is absolutely nothing you could have done to stop this."
"But he was there - not just tonight. He was there when those bastards were hurting Blair. I know he was because my parents would have told him to be; they're absolutely right in the thick of it." Sirius unlaced our fingers, wrapping his arms around me and I pulled him into me as he hid his face in my neck.
The silence in the room was overwhelming, and I closed my eyes, trying to not let any of the emotions that I was feeling take me under. Movement to my left had me turning, looking into the soft brown eyes of my best friend as she too wrapped her arms around Sirius. Blair's voice was soft but strong as she spoke into the top of his head.
"You are not to blame for this, Sirius." She took in a deep breath as Sirius shook slightly, and I felt my resolve crumbling. "I don't blame you for this."
We stayed like that for a few moments more, before the door opened once again. My nerves were shot, and by this point, Dumbledore could have thrown me bodily from the castle and I wouldn't have cared, but when I looked up at Professor McGonagall, I felt my stomach fall even further than it had.
"Professor?" Lyla asked, clearing her throat and moving to stand, trying to seem as if all of us sharing an emotional moment on a technically Wednesday morning before 3AM was a normal sight.
"I'm uninterested in whatever is happening here at present time. I need Ms. Parker and Mrs. Lupin to please follow me to the Headmaster's office." If possible, every last bit of air had been knocked from me, and I stood on shaky legs as Lyla and I were summoned to what was sure to be our final hours.
"Professor, I think we have a right to know what's going on before they leave." There was never a moment that I thanked Merlin more for having brought James Potter, Head Boy Extreme, into my life.
Professor McGonagall thought about it for a moment, and then with a shuddering breath she gave us a tight-lipped frown. "Very well. Scott Parker has been found."
My hands shook terribly, as I tried in vain to finish tying up the laces on my trainers. They had come undone halfway to Dumbledore's office, and I had bent over to fix them after nearly falling flat on my face for the third time. "I can't get these fucking shoes tied." I wanted to scream, tears clouding my vision as I tried to avoid the looks of my friends and sister who waited just down the hallway from me.
A pair of hands gently moved my trembling fingers aside, methodically tying the shoes with ease. I looked up into Sirius' eyes, and he gave me a gentle look that almost had me coming undone. "Hey, it's going to be okay."
"What if he's dead, Sirius? I don't know what I'll do." I thought of the meager information McGonagall had given us, the carefully guarded look in her eye, and the white palor Lyla's face had taken when she had told us that Scott had been found. My boisterous, outgoing, terribly kind uncle, who I wasn't sure I would ever see again. My heart lurched in my chest.
"We don't know that. Let's get to the meeting, but remember he could be fine." Sirius didn't sound like he believed it, but I appreciated his trying to make me feel better. I took his pro-offered hand, and we made our way towards Dumbledore's office. It was empty as we entered from the winding staircase, but the fire was roaring in a strange way, that I recognized meant the floo was open.
McGonagall stood in front of it, holding a bowl of green powder towards us. "Take a handful of this, and speak very clearly - Hog's Head Inn." She motioned us forward, and Lyla let go of Remus' hand to grab herself some powder. As she stepped into the roaring fire, the flames parted to gently lick around her ankles. She tossed the substance down on the ground, and spoke the words, before the flames roared once again, a violent green, and she whisked out of sight.
Not wanting her to be alone on the other side with news I was unsure I even wanted to hear, I stepped forward and did the same. Readying myself for the strange feeling of flying through nothingness and coming out the other side. A moment later, a large space appeared in front of me, and I flung myself forward towards the waiting room. When I stepped, or more stumbled, out of the fireplace, my heart felt as though it had stopped.
Lyla had her arms around a man that looked like a poor imitation of our Uncle Scott. He had a strange pallor to his skin, almost gray with sunken purple circles around his eyes. I could quite clearly see the wrists in his bones that were wrapped around Lyla's shoulders, and his short, cropped hair had turned shockingly white, long and scraggly around his chin. "Scott?" I asked in a breathless, broken voice, before joining Lyla in hugging my lost uncle.
He was rail thin, and swaying slightly on unsteady legs. I felt arms around me as my father stepped over and helped Scott into his waiting seat. His eyes glistened with tears, and it took me a moment to recognize that most of the Order was here, more members coming in from the main door in the corner, somber nods being exchanged around the room. Dumbledore sat at the head of what appeared to be the centralized table.
Monica and Brock, Scott's children, sat next to their father, and I took Sirius' hand as he came up next to me, joining the table that included my other Uncle Timothy, and his wife Zoe, as well as my aunt Linda and her husband Jim. There was room enough for the family, so Lily, James, and Blair joined the table behind us to stay close and Dumbledore called for everyone's attention.
I noticed that the room had become crowded, and wondered if Dumbledore had been gone this whole time recruiting others to the cause. I wanted to spew the information that we had learned tonight, but kept my mouth shut for fear of the consequences of meeting illicitly after curfew with people I had been expressly forbidden to interact with. I exchanged a glance with Lyla, but she was still staring at Scott, unable to fully process that he was alive and, although he looked like a wraith, was here.
"As you can all see, the news for tonight is both a mixture of good and bad. Scott Parker is back with us, alive and, in time, well. He has brought with him unforseen knowledge about what is happening and has agreed to share with us what he can." Dumbledore motioned for Scott, who stood with my father and Timothy's help, and hobbled to the front of the room. Standing next to his brothers, he looked even smaller and more fragile than he had when I first saw him.
Scott cleared his throat, and looked at his hands, his spirit broken along with his body. "I was taken to a house outside of Britain, from the accents of the maids I would guess somewhere in Romania, where the man they're calling the Dark Lord was hiding. He talked extensively with a few of his followers about a 'blood-cleansing' that they would carry out." He paused, shuddering and then took a deep breath before continuing. "They plan on taking over the ministry, entering into high positions to take matters into their own hands, and performing terrible things on anyone of a less favorable magical descent."
"Meaning anyone of non-magical or what they think to be tarnished magical blood. They're calling themselves Death Eaters." My father continued as Scott trailed off, his voice failing him. "And they could be anyone."
"Did you see any faces?" I looked at the voice coming from the otherside of the room. Kingsley Shacklebot, our own Ministry worker, looked irate. I wondered how he felt, knowing there were enemies around him every day, but not knowing who they were. As we discovered more names within the school, I wondered if it were better to treat everyone like an enemy rather than a friend.
"I was kept blinded most of the time. I only recently regained my sight." Scott's voice was a whisper, and I clenched Sirius' hand tighter, thinking of how it would be subjected to terrible things without being able to see. What had Scott been apart of that had led him into their capture?
"How did you escape?" A woman who bore a striking resemblance to Marlene McKinnon and could only be her mother asked, her voice soft and comforting. I noticed a few of the McKinnon's and wondered if the whole family could be here, and then realized that was exactly what had happened with the Parkers too. Looking around the room, I noticed that while we were few, we were mostly families, and the thought both comforted and chilled me. What if this Dark Lord grew to power? Would full families be wiped away without thought?
"Scott was let go. They brought him back to the place he was taken. Scott had been on a scouting mission for the Order, looking into whether or not these Death Eaters had been recruiting other magical creatures, and as he has had contacts in the vampire community for a short period of time, we thought him to be most prudent in checking in with them. The Death Eaters were indeed there, and he was found out. A woman within that community alerted us of his presence once they had let him free." Dumbledore relayed.
Hushed whispers started around the room. Vampire clans were not to be trifled with, and while they usually kept to themselves, they weren't usually ones to get behind human causes, whether magical or not. If they were being approached by the other side, this conflict could quickly become deadly and a full out war in no time.
Alastor Moody, one of the most famous auror's in the Ministry, and Kingsley's mentor, stood from his seat. He was a handsome man, or would have been, had he not lost one of his eyes to a rogue centaur (or so the story went) and replaced it with a magical eye, which spun and twisted constantly, a faint whirring sound accompanying the act. It gave him a creepy-air, like he was always watching and calculating everyone's next moves.
"We have a few leads on this 'Dark Lord' character, but it's like trying to catch a ghost who doesn't want to be found. We have to keep our ears to the ground." He paused for a moment, and I looked away thinking he was finished. In a loud voice that startled pretty much everyone at the meeting, he yelled "Constant vigilance," and resumed his seat. Despite the situation's seriousness, I had to bite down on my lip to keep the nervous, exhausted laughter from bubbling forth.
Lyla peeked at me out of the corner of her eye, and I shook my head, knowing if our eyes met the hysteria that was building would burst forth. Dumbledore nodded, and then motioned for Scott to sit back down. He was swaying on his feet, and had he not been accompanied by his brothers would have slid down to the floor a long time ago. "If anyone has any information, or believes there is a lead we should be following, please contact me. Minerva and I have had a bit of luck with a dear professor at the school, who has helped us develop a way to keep in contact, which we will be able to distribute and use as soon as they are ready. For now, please contact my brother Aberforth," He motioned to a man behind the bar who looked like a younger, perhaps less worried version of himself, "and he will be able to get into touch with me."
"This will conclude the meeting. Please stay for a drink to celebrate the safe return of Scott Parker." McGonagall said, before the meeting broke off into scattered groups of people. I noticed Blair going over to say hello to the Prewett brothers and Caradoc, who were shortly joined by Marlene and her older sister. James and Lily went to the bar, gathering up a round of drinks for the table, and then bringing them back to scootch around as we all looked to Scott.
Once I'd taken a few drinks of the butterbeer placed in front of me, and felt it warm my body, I leaned in so only Lyla could hear me. "Should we say something about tonight?" I hid my conversation in the rim of my large mug, taking a slow drink so no one realized what we were doing.
"I thought about it," Lyla looked up at Dumbledore, who seemed to be deep into conversation with Moody. "But I'm not sure how much we'll be able to prove to them short of having them take our memories and using a pensieve."
"If we say nothing, and something happens, then what can we do to make it right?" I asked, trying to weigh all the options in my head. By taking matters into our own hands earlier, we had done ourselves no favors. McGonagall had made it quite clear that they weren't taking us as seriously now. This time our meddling had turned our word into speculative at best. "They won't believe us; we've seen as much before what happened to Blair."
"We do what Moody said - keep our ears to the ground, and be vigilant, and once we get some solid proof, we'll go to them. They'll have to believe us." Lyla nodded to herself, pleased with her idea and I found myself nodding as well.
"Until then, we'll keep an eye out for any wrongdoings. If anything happens, we'll be there to stop it. We've got the head boy and girl on our side, I like to think we're smarter than those Slytherin boys, and we're taking advanced Defense; how hard could it be?" I took a drink of my butterbeer, finding the glass empty, and stood to get refills, happy with our plan, and with the fact that my uncle was home.
The next morning, exhausted and a little hungover from switching to something a little stronger than butterbeer the night before, I nursed a cup of tea and a piece of toast slathered with too much butter and jam to be considered healthy. Lyla sighed from across the table, using her wand to reach over and refill her coffee. "I feel like a garbage can," Blair moaned, abandoning her plate of food in order to smash her head down onto the wooden table.
"Seconded, but that's what alcohol and two hours of sleep will get you." James said, using his fork to push the food around on his plate. "The fact that we have to go to classes today feels like a personal offense."
"The fact that it's potions seems like it should be outlawed as well." I sighed and tried to make the hard wooden bench more comfortable but didn't get very far. "And where the hell are Remus and Sirius? How come they're not here suffering like we are?"
"Remus got up this morning and said something about having a pre-arranged appointment with Sirius, then left before I could ask more questions, though I wasn't in the right state of mind to be asking much if you get what I mean." Lyla drained the final dregs of her cup, and then nudged me with her knee before standing up.
I took one last bite of toast and wondered if it'd be possible to get a thermos of strong tea to go. "Who knows what that means. I swear that those two almost never have problems the day after drinking. If they have a secret stash I'll kill them."
James stood as well before grabbing three apples off the table and stuffing them into his robe. "If they have a stash, I'd have a stash, and we all know I'm here suffering with the rest of you." I couldn't argue with that, so together we walked towards the dungeons, cringing as the cool dampness stuck to our skin.
Lyla and I sat in our usual seats, our three carefully crafted potions simmering gently on the table in front of us. I blew the billowing smoke from the dreamless sleep potion out of my face, taking into stock that in a month and a half we'd be free of having to do this ever again. The bell rang to signal classes were starting, but still no Sirius and Remus, and I shook my head, knowing that they'd have some grand excuse when they did show up.
As Slughorn stood from his seat in the front of the classroom, he perused the students, lingering on a few and their potions. Some of the Ravenclaw's seemed to be a little more hesitant about what to make, and had opted for four potions rather than three, and we'd already had one explosion from a Hufflepuff pair that was now down to two potions and a third of the final grade being a Troll. When he stopped at our potion, he studied the three cauldrons and then nodded, tapping Lyla on the back in congratulations, and ignoring me entirely.
"How I won't miss being blatantly ignored by professors when we finish with this year." I leaned my head in my hand, watching as Slughorn finished his rounds, still looking over Remus and Sirius' potions despite the fact they weren't here.
"Instead you'll be ignored by your bosses and co-workers and won't that be fun?" Lyla laughed and I contemplated the future.
"I talked with Edgar Bones for a bit last night. He's working on some sort of calcified gemstone the goblins at Gringotts found on a centaur which they think is cursed with some dark magic. He made it seem a little more exciting than the pamphlets McGonagall gave me. I'm thinking of looking into the internship." I lowered my voice, choosing to ignore whatever Slughorn was talking about at the front of the classroom. By the jovial way he was rubbing his stomach, I could assume he was just telling a story that had nothing to do with any of our potions.
"Seriously?" Lyla looked at me, a proud tilt to her features. "My sister, the curse-breaker."
"A nice ring to it, I think, and McGonagall will be happy." I leaned forward, using my wand to add the first counter-clockwise stir to our Oculus Potion. Lyla tended to the dreamless sleep potion, turning the flame down so it wouldn't get too hot, and then together we stirred the thick wiggenweld potion we'd brewed to counter our sleeping potion.
"Have you given any thought to the other matter?" I sent her a curious glance, tying my hair back from my face as the steam caused me to start to sweat. The potion room was heating up, and I almost wished we could feel the cold chill of the air in the dungeon corridors. My headache wasn't clearing up either.
"I don't know what you mean?" I said, writing a few notes down that would make it easier for us to write the joint essay later when we'd turn our potions in.
"About Sirius asking you to live with him? You've only got a few months left to decide." She finished the last of her own notes, and then we sat down to take a break before the potions would need to be stirred again. We were nearing the point in the brewing that we'd need to come to the dungeons more frequently to stir, and I was dreading the thought of adding another task to our ever-growing list.
"He hasn't asked again. I'm hoping he will soon though. I know that everyone jokes that neither of us is into commitment but I really think I want to live with him. I mean, I love him, right? And I'm out here making commitments to things left and right now, so I've turned a new leaf." I winked at Lyla, who rolled her eyes, and reached over to squeeze my hand.
"He'll ask again." She assured me, and I sent her a small smile before resting my eyes for a moment as we waited for double-potions to come to an end.
Later during my free-period, I sat in my dorm in my bed trying to fill out the internship questionnaire that McGonagall had handed me earlier when I'd been in her office. It was much harder than I had thought it would be. While my grades had never been terrible, they weren't as stellar as they possibly could have been, and I knew that the entrance exam to the internship would be tougher than what I'd initially expected. I also was having trouble deciding how to put into words why I felt compelled towards the study of curse-breaking.
There was a part of me stuck on the idea that I would also have to travel for the internship. Four weeks in a country of the program's choosing, to experience different cursed items and cultures. Part of the reason I was hoping to follow this career path was to help the Order succeed in its fight against this supposed Dark Lord. If we were to be fighting dark wizards, an ability to fight dark magic would come in handy. But how was I meant to fight dark wizards if I wasn't even in the country. And what would it mean for my relationship with Sirius?
We wouldn't be at school with each other anymore, forced to see each other even when we didn't feel like it. Would he want to stay with me when there wasn't a guarantee? I had decided that I wanted to stay with him, and to give our relationship the chance to mature with us, but what if he didn't want to. Afterall, he hadn't asked about moving in together again.
I fell back into the pillows on the bed with a sigh, placing my arms over my face to block out the light and tried to think of other things. There were footsteps outside the door, and then it creaked open with a groan, and a small knock sounded. I removed my arms and sat up, looking at the intruder.
Remus smiled at me and motioned me forward. "Hi Alex. I need you to come down to Lyla's and my rooms please. Sirius and I have been working on something all morning and we need your opinion."
Looking for any excuse to not think about the future any longer, I tossed my application into my bedside table, and grabbed my wand from where it sat next to the robe I'd shed earlier. "Let's get to it." I said to my brother-in-law, following him down the stairs into the Common Room where the rest of the crew was waiting. I stood next to Sirius, reaching up to give him a kiss when he leaned down to me. He wrapped his arm around my waist and motioned to Remus.
"Now that you're all here, we can begin. Sirius and I decided that we've all had a little too much stress lately, so we've decided that we need to relax a little. Please follow me into our rooms and remember to duck when you get to the bottom of the stairs." He opened the door into the hallway, walking down the short flight of stairs to Lyla and he's rooms. At the bottom, a dark blanket covered the entrance.
"Don't forget to duck," Sirius said to me, before pushing me lightly forward. I ducked as far as I could, and went through the blanket. The effect on the other side was, without a better way to phrase it, magical. They had obviously spent the better part of the morning making the main living area of their private rooms into a magnificent blanket fort.
Fairy lights were strung across the low ceiling of the fort, propped up to look like a tent, blankets and cushions, and all matters of comfortable things were placed throughout, with a smorgasbord of treats and tea in the middle. I couldn't help the delighted laughter that spilled from my lips at the sight.
"This is amazing," Lyla said as she dropped onto a pillow near the middle of the room and rolled to her back, looking up at the magical lights that seemed to flow around us.
"How'd you do all of this?" Lily asked, taking her seat on a mound of blankets that looked like fur. "Is this what you recruited James for?"
"He's the best at charms of the three of us, so we needed his help with the lights." Sirius said, easing himself down next to me and dropping his arm around my shoulder. "What do you think? Should we hide out here for the rest of the day?"
I grinned up at him, leaning into his embrace as I faced my friends, "I'm always keen to relax and skive off."
We all settled in, ready to relax and spend time in the company of friends, leaving the outside world to its own business for a few hours while we could.