It was that particular revelation, that he might have to serve time in Azkaban, that made Hagrid finally relent on the issue of the baby dragon. The question became what to do with Norbert now, and it had been Harry who'd come up with the brilliant idea of sending for Charlie Weasley. With that resolved, all the four Gryffindors had to do was wait for Charlie's friends to pass through Hogwarts and hand the dragon over, where he could live a long and fulfilling life in Romania.
On top of everything else, Reva was still searching for information on her father. She felt a little guilty, lying to her friends about what she was doing when Harry had Quidditch practice and Hermione was studying and Ron was engaging half of Gryffindor Tower in highly competitive chess games, but telling them she was serving multiple detentions for Snape was the best way to make sure she wouldn't be questioned. It was true about a fourth of the time, anyway.
She'd told Fred and George half the truth, just as promised: she wanted to find out about a number of people who'd been in school with her mother. She said this group of people were a sensitive subject for Anjali, and Revati didn't want to upset her by asking any nosy questions. She made it sound ambiguous, so it could be interpreted as Reva checking up on her mum's old school mates and seeing how they fared during the war. Fred and George were clever, so she knew they probably considered the possibility that she was looking for her father, but since they didn't know Reva had leads on his identity, she felt reasonably confident that they weren't yet close to figuring her out.
The twins had not wasted any time—two weekends following their conversation, Fred caused a distraction on the fourth floor by charming water balloons to drop on the heads of unsuspecting students, and George and Reva snuck into Filch's office near the Entrance Hall while the caretaker and his cat hurried upstairs to take care of the commotion. Once inside, Reva pulled out her list and turned towards the filing cabinets in the corner. One was labeled, Confiscated and Highly Dangerous, and the other seven or eight were marked, Student Records.
George and Fred had told her that they'd first been sent here in their first year, after an incident with Dungbombs. They, of course, were more interested in the confiscated items cabinet, but the fact remained that Reva had guessed right—the Weasley twins knew where she needed to go. Every student had a file that was updated to the point of their graduation, and Reva had already calculated the years the eleven men would have finished their last year.
She walked around the cabinets, which seemed to be dated approximately by century. She found the one labeled 1901 - ? (2000); presumably, it would continue to store records for the next eight years, until the spring semester of the 1999-2000 school year. "Alohomora!" She said, unlocking the latch. She ignored George as he came up behind her, and instead began rifling through the files.
"How many are you taking, then?" He asked curiously.
"None of them," Reva replied. She found Bartemius Crouch's file and pulled out her wand. "Geminio!" She said. The file seemed to ripple, but it went back to normal almost immediately. "Worth a shot," she shrugged. It was a third year spell that Hermione had read about—her friend had managed to do it, but Reva, though smart, was no genius.
She turned to George and gave him a sheepish look. "Mind helping me out?" She gestured vaguely at the files.
George snorted, but moved over anyway. "Geminio," he said, and a duplicate of Bartemius Crouch's file popped into existence.
Reva and George worked swiftly together as Reva located the files and George copied them. About ten minutes passed, until finally George duplicated Deimos Burke's file—he'd graduated in 1975, three years before Anjali.
"Okay, we're done," Revati told him, stuffing the files in the bag. George gave her an amused look.
"Are you going to tell me why we just duplicated and took a dozen files from Filch's cabinet?"
"It's only eleven, actually, not twelve—and I'm afraid that's the half I'm not sharing unless this proves useful." Reva replied.
George chuckled but backed off, closing the filing cabinet and twisting the lock. Then, quick as a flash, he turned to the cabinet with confiscated items, unlocked it, and grabbed eight or nine different things out of it, including what looked like a live salamander. Whistling, he backed away, locking it again, and turning back around to head out of Filch's office with Reva. He cocked his head at the look of bemusement on Reva's face.
"What?" He asked. "Didn't expect Fred and I to get nothing out of this, did you?" He grinned, tossing what looked like an unexploded dungbomb cavalierly in his left hand. "Half of this was ours, anyway—Filch confiscated them."
"And the other half?"
George grinned and winked.
Reva just rolled her eyes as she snorted. "Clearly my impression of you is too high," she said.
"On the contrary, Kumar," George shook his head. "Your expectations of us are too low." He jerked his head to the door. "Shall we? I reckon we only have about two minutes to get out of here and bail Fred out."
"Lead the way," Reva said, shaking her head.
They met up with Fred easily enough—it turned out that Peeves was wreaking havoc in another part of the castle, so Filch was held up with that—and the three Gryffindors slipped away behind a tapestry, trying hard to outrun the stench of Dungbomb behind them.
They'd made it out of the corridor and up a flight of stairs when a certain thought struck Reva.
"Er… George?" She asked hesitantly. "Fred?"
"Hm?" Fred asked distractedly, brown eyes scanning around for Filch.
"Do you—do you two mind not, er, telling anyone about this?"
That caught their attention. Curiosity burned in Fred's gaze as he and George looked down at her, identical brows furrowed. She shifted slightly, aware of how suspicious she looked.
"Are you in trouble, Kumar?" George asked quietly. He looked uncharacteristically serious. "Real trouble, I mean, not the good kind."
"No, no!" Reva said, voice. "It's nothing like that. Promise," she added firmly, seeing the disbelieving expression on George's face.
"Are you—" Fred began.
"I'm sure." She said, and that was that.
Reva couldn't help but feel as if she'd gotten away with something big as she slipped into the common room ten minutes later, her friends none the wiser to the duplicated files stuffed into her bag. Ron and Hermione were still playing chess, and Hermione was still losing. Harry had just come back from Quidditch practice. Reva slipped upstairs for a short minute, making up an excuse of wanting to bring Mango down for a bit, and put her files at the very bottom of her trunk for perusing when she had free time. Picking up her toad, she clambered back down to begin her homework, refusing to meet Fred and George's eyes as they stared at her curiously from the corner of the common room.
Two days before they dropped off Norbert with Charlie, the dragon bit Ron, who had to go to the Hospital Wing to treat his infected hand. This meant that instead of all four first years, only Harry, Hermione, and Reva were going under the Invisibility Cloak to the North Tower to exchange the dragon. And to make matters more complicated, Ron had suddenly realized that Malfoy had access to Charlie's letter, detailing a time and place.
"He borrowed my Astronomy textbook!" Ron groaned, putting his head into his heavily bandaged hands. "I was using Charlie's letter as a bloody bookmark!"
"What do we do?" Hermione hissed.
"There's not much we can do," Harry said helplessly. "It's too late to send another owl, isn't it?"
"You're right," Reva sighed. "At least we've got your Cloak, Harry. Even if Malfoy spills, it's not as if the professors would be able to catch us."
At least, that was what they had thought that night, as Harry, Reva, and Hermione awkwardly lugged Norbert's fireproof cage between them up the stairs to the castle and past the Great Hall. It was a difficult task, especially under the Invisibility Cloak, but Reva was quite grateful for it as they turned into the second floor corridor and saw two figures engaged in some sort of conflict in front of them.
"Detention!" Came a stern voice the three Gryffindors knew only too well. "And I'll be taking twenty points from Slytherin, Mr. Malfoy!"
"But Professor!" Whined Draco Malfoy pathetically, "It's Potter and Kumar! They've got an illegal dragon and they're smuggling it—"
"What nonsense! I will be speaking with your Head of House, Mr. Malfoy, about telling such ridiculous lies. Two first years, illegally smuggling a dragon—what utter rubbish!"
And the footsteps of the two faded away, with the sounds of McGonagall berating a complaining Malfoy echoing down the corridor.
Reva, Harry, and Hermione didn't dare talk as they lugged the crate up the spiral staircase to the tallest tower in the castle. However unwieldy it was, balancing the dragon under the Cloak, it beat getting caught by McGonagall and proving Malfoy right. It took ten minutes to properly pull the crate up to the tallest tower, but once they did, Harry pulled the cloak off of the three of them in unrestrained relief.
"We did it!" Hermione whispered, not quite able to believe it. She did this odd sort of jig, which brought a smile to Reva's face. "I can't believe it! And Malfoy got caught!"
"Serves him right, the little sneak," said Reva scathingly. She nudged Harry, who blinked at her and grinned, before squinting off into the distance.
"Are those Charlie's friends?" He asked, peering at four figures who were approaching on broomsticks.
"Must be," said Reva, glancing up at them.
Sure enough, the four people landed smoothly on the top of the tower, with Harry, Hermione, and Reva. None of them looked older than twenty, though to eleven year olds, that was still plenty grown up and intimidating. Still, they wore bright, mischievous looks on their faces, that put the trio at ease.
"Merlin's pants!" Said one, who looked about nineteen. In the darkness, Reva could make out a pair of big eyes that glowed purple and widened when they landed on the trio, and choppy electric blue hair. "When Charlie said it was his little brother and his friends waitin' for us, I assumed it was those troublemaking twins. I didn't think he meant a bunch of firsties!"
Reva wanted desperately to laugh.
"You'll have to excuse Tonks," said another voice in exasperation, this one belonging to a twenty year old Black man. "They still have to learn to behave themself."
"Oi, shut it, Kev," said Tonks indignantly, shoving 'Kev' boisterously, "You're starting to sound like old Mad-Eye!"
Kev rolled his eyes, and began making introductions. "This is Callista—nope, hang on, Katerina, sorry, they're identical—Callista's on the other side there. I'm Kevin, and this loudmouth is Tonks."
"Oi!" said Tonks again.
"Pleasure to meet you," said Hermione politely. "I'm Hermione, and this is Revati and Harry."
In the darkness, none of them seemed to notice Harry's scar, or take note of his name. Instead, they seemed more interested in which one of them was related to their friend.
Katerina peered around curiously. "Where's this baby Weasley, anyway?"
"Got bitten by Norbert a couple of days ago," Reva answered. "He's in the Hospital Wing."
All four young wizards winced sympathetically.
"Well, send him our best, anyway," said Callista, glancing about. "You lot ought to be getting back to bed, shouldn't you?"
"Ah, let them have their fun, Cal," said Tonks, their purple eyes glinting with humor. Reva could have sworn she saw the edges of them flash a bright, happy yellow. "Don't you miss running around the hallways at night, trying not to get caught?"
"Stop reminiscing, Tonks, we're barely a year out," Kev rolled his eyes again, though he was grinning teasingly. "Anyway, thanks a bunch, you three—I assume this is the dragon?" He nodded to the crate.
"That's Norbert, all right," Reva said, listening wryly to the sounds of the baby dragon tearing up one of the seven teddy bears Hagrid had placed inside his crate for him.
"We'll grab it," said Callista as she and her twin reached around the crate and began securing it on the sidecar of one of their brooms. "Kat and I are the ones headed to Romania, anyway—Kev and Tonks are just here to keep an eye out on things."
Tonks grinned. "Who would have thought that we'd break school rules even after graduating?" They sounded pleased with themself. They walked over to Cal and Kat to help them secure the dragon in the sidecar. Kev checked his watch.
"Well, we ought to get going. Tonks and I have to be back in London by morning, and these two should reach Romania by nightfall tomorrow if they don't want an angry Ridgeback on their hands." He shook his head in amused disbelief. "Of all the dragons to try to raise as a pet…"
"If anyone could have managed it, it's Hagrid," said Tonks fairly. "It's just that…"
"He lives in a wooden house?" Harry pointed out wryly.
Everyone laughed. "Precisely," said Cal. She mounted her broom. Her companions did the same, with Kat on the broom with Norbert's sidecar attached. "Well, we'll be off now. Nice meeting you, firsties!"
"You too!" The first years echoed.
Charlie's friends took off, and Harry, Hermione, and Reva watched as they shrunk into the distance. Then, elated by their success, they quietly snuck down the spiral staircase and made their way down the corridor. They were just about to start on the staircase that would take them to Gryffindor Tower, when—
"Well, well, well," said Filch's voice as a lantern suddenly shone on their faces. "Looks like we are in trouble now."
Reva could see realization dawning on Harry's and Hermione's faces just as it hit her: they'd forgotten the Invisibility Cloak back at the tallest tower.
i'm back after a long time! dang it's been a while!
hoping y'all are safe and healthy and happy! we're gonna get through this!
sending love to everyone who's not in the best place right now! 3
as always, constructive criticism appreciated and welcomed!