Chapter Twenty-Eight | Pixie Dust
Fingers drumming over the tabletop, Catherine held eye contact with Umbridge, her near imperceptible smirk - only noticeable by the miniscule tension of her lips, just barely enough to feel - never fading. Umbridge herself looked almost bewildered as her eyes slowly tracked over Catherine's face, lingering on the scars and the cloudy stain of her one, blind eye.
"Professor?" she asked softly. "Are you alright?"
Umbridge sputtered. "Fine. Just fine." She raised a hand, flicking her wand at the door and slamming it shut. "Good afternoon, class!"
"Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge," they droned, practically conditioned at this point to respond as such.
The power hungry woman that she was, Umbridge preened at the chorus. "Open your books to chapter twenty-two, and begin reading." Her gaze once more turned to Catherine, as if waiting for an outburst.
Almost lazily, Catherine opened her book (newly sent by Dumbledore, to replace the one she had burned) and set to work reading. She flipped through the pages every minute on the minute, scanning through the half-hearted paternalism and thinly veiled nationalist dogma, all of it wrapped up in a love for bureaucracy that bordered on fanatical.
Every time she looked at the damned thing it reminded her of what a nightmare the woman ahead of her was, smugly looking down at the students as they puttered through the waste of parchment.
Animals died to bind these books. A goat, skinned, dried, and inked with a spell and an iron press - was slaughtered for the sake of this idiocy - and Umbridge thought herself clever, in the way only middle management could. In her quiet, narcissistic smile. The crinkle of her eyes.
How someone so painfully vile, so horribly close minded, so ironically self-assured could succeed despite all evidence to the contrary, Catherine would never know.
Old money spoke volumes in Britain. Blood purity even moreso.
To hold and advocate for both? Well, Umbridge was a proper shoe-in for exactly the kind of job she held now.
Parasite. Child abuser. Book burner.
Speaking of, Catherine blinked, pushing away her anger and instead focused on the scrap in her hands.
The one thing that irritated her most about the damned book when she had gotten her reading list for the year, was that the 'textbook' wasn't even good propaganda. It was lazy.
It was so lazy it made her skin itch, made her long quietly for the religious fervor of Yharnam and how terribly and effectively the Church had laid roots in every facet of the city. They hung over every home, every inn, every farmstead like a cloud, rain seeping into the cracks and infecting the minds of all who lived there.
Although, it wasn't as if the Ministry - Lucius Malfoy and his ilk most of all - didn't try.
Catherine could see how deep the Churches feelers ran through the way Adella spoke, how Amelia knew she was going to die and didn't look upon herself as a martyr, but as if her beasthood was a form of ascension. She revelled in the knowledge that she would soon turn into something more ghastly than any beast in that unhallowed city, raised from birth to be their figurehead and in the same breath, a form of cattle - bred and reared into a Blood Saint.
If Britain could muster up the ability to do such a thing, she imagined that they would in a heartbeat. The fact alone that a significant portion of magicals living here or across the channel would eagerly answer Voldemort's call were he to make himself known was staggering.
Umbridge, certainly, would be among that number, and she would go through her role in that genocidal machine with glee.
"Miss Potter, are you sure you should be in this class in your state?"
She glanced up. "Professor?"
Practically leering at her, Umbridge rapped her wand against the palm of her hand. "You're obviously frail. You should be in St. Mungos, after trying to hide from your lies in such a… permanent way."
"My lies?"
"Your lies," Umbridge repeated emphatically. "Your delusions."
"I don't know what you're talking about, Professor." Catherine flashed her knuckles, the imprint of letters carved into her flesh clearly stating I must not tell lies. "Can I please read?"
"You…" she blustered, face growing red. "Detention! For insubordination."
"Alright."
And Catherine went back to the textbook, eye twitching at how horribly put together it was. At least, she tried to, but she couldn't shake the feeling of Umbridge burning a hole in the top of her head through her glare alone.
She carded through the thing laboriously, reading well past their next 'classes' material. And the next, and the next.
Within the span of half an hour, only a third of the time they would actually spend in this awful room, she'd made it to the appendix.
Catherine didn't even realize how thin the thing was, or maybe it was just them being over halfway through the school year, and focused reading on what amounted to drivel wasn't exactly a slow going process.
It was to be assumed that Hermione had already finished the thing months ago, and her time was now spent re-reading it while silently fuming about having her time wasted when it could have been spent learning new, actually worthwhile information.
Sighing loudly, Catherine shut the textbook and pushed it away, Umbridge immediately snapping her gaze over to her table and scowling.
"Why are you not reading, Miss Potter?"
"I've read the whole thing."
"Read it again."
She raised an eyebrow, blinking away her exasperation. "Could I spend my time doing coursework? I'm done reading."
"I said, read it again."
"Why."
"Because I am your Professor and I said so. Now read."
"I already have."
"Another detention!"
Her eyes widened as suddenly, Catherine had an idea.
"Do you really want me to bleed all over your desk again?" Catherine tilted her head to the side. "That quill you've got is a hell of a thing."
The class fell horribly silent, the tension in the room growing until you could pluck it like a string and hear it scream.
"What the hell are you doing?" Ron whispered.
"Getting detention. Every detention."
"What!?"
"Come with me," Umbridge barked, marching over to Catherine and taking her by the arm. She snatched her bag as she was led out of the room, the door slamming shut behind them. "What in Merlin's name do you think you're doing, girl?" Umbridge demanded, pushing Catherine up against the wall.
"Bothering you."
"Why, I-" Umbridge seethed, air hissing out from between her teeth. "I have been nothing but patient with you, Potter. I have waited for you to, in your own words, confess to your ridiculous attention seeking behaviour so that the Ministry and I can put your lies to rest."
"I'm not lying." She smiled, a calm, petulant thing. "Voldemort is back."
"Do not- don't say that name!"
"Voldemort?"
Umbridge scowled. "Detention until next Friday!"
"For saying Voldemort?"
"Another week! Keep digging your grave, Potter. Don't think I'll take pity on you for your little attention grab."
"Trying to kill myself, you mean?" She pointed at her eye, hand lowering to trace the scars on her face. "You call this an attention grab? Jumping hundreds of feet to my death, an attention grab?"
Swallowing uncomfortably, Umbridge did her best to not let her gaze linger on the puckered skin. "Another week."
"You really like to see me suffer, don't you?"
"Another!"
"How long is that? A month, now? Didn't you give me detention last class, when I burned that awful excuse for a book?"
"I can do this all day."
"How tenacious."
"Two months, Potter."
"That puts us almost to May. Are you sure you want to see that much of me, Professor? I didn't know you liked me that much."
"Three."
Catherine grinned. "Alright, then."
She turned about, walking away from Umbridge and ignoring her hurried shouts, biting her lip with poorly stifled glee to know that no other student would have to suffer. Not if she took their space.
No more seeing Colin Creevey rubbing at his wrist and looking more than frazzled as he came into the common room. No more hearing from Ginny how Luna had left Umbridge's office looking paler than usual, lips shut tight and refusing to offer comments on her little conspiracies.
Thank god Umbridge was such a petty, frightful hag, otherwise she never would have taken such an obvious bait.
Hurrying through the corridors away from the whining demands of Umbridge, Catherine took the steps two at a time as she made her way towards the bottom floors and the Hogwarts grounds, to fresh air and open spaces.
Being inside the castle reminded her a bit too much of Yharnam, even if she found strange comfort in the place (both places, she realized, having become intimately familiar with the streets of Yharnam in her adventures there. Still lost, easily, due to the winding and maddened nature of its design, but familiar with it all the same). She felt on edge, just claustrophobic enough that she would find herself looking around corners with her hand hovering above her waist, where her wand was normally kept.
Catherine had learned to always be ready for a fight, especially in a place so eerily quiet and untenably 'safe' as Hogwarts. It was predictable there, but that just made her wonder what could happen in such a place. Would she one day turn the bend to see Draco with his wand raised, pushed one too many times and deciding to step beyond his father's shadow and attack her? Would Catherine walk into the Great Hall to see Ministry officials prepared to cart her away?
She would fight them, that she knew - win without far too much effort, so accustomed to killing things far larger and more fearsome than a simple wizard, especially a spoiled child - but she seemed to have a permanent drip of adrenaline tickling at her spine no matter how calm things seemed to be. Always ready for a fight, always looking for one, so as to avoid any confusion when one didn't happen. Better to instigate than react is what she had learned, and Catherine had grown a touch trigger happy as of late, Hemwick being the greatest example of such.
Trigger happy, but justified she would argue, spending her time trawling through muck and blood with two and a half stone of hardened steel strapped to her back and fire spitting from her wand. It wasn't every day someone found themselves in a place like Yharnam, and it wasn't as if they'd come out of it well functioning.
No, twitchy as she was, she imagined that was the best possible outcome. At least, now that she was past trying to kill herself.
Until Catherine, regardless of how alert she was, somehow managed to stumble right into Luna Lovegood.
"Shit, what-" She reached out, catching the stumbling girl by the arm. "You alright?"
Luna down at Catherine's hand, large eyes blinking lazily. "Fine, thanks. Are you?"
"Yeah."
"No." Luna ran her eyes over Catherine's scars. "Are you okay?"
"Oh, that. Ehm- just got three months detention because I decided to stop putting up with Umbridge, but… otherwise fine." She pointed at her face. "One off."
"You've been covered in wrackspurts," she stated, tilting her head. "It's okay to not be okay."
"I'd really rather not talk about it, Luna. It's… it's nothing against you, just-"
"It's alright," Luna droned, a lazy smile on her face. "We're not friends."
Catherine sputtered. "What?"
"We're not… friends?"
Blinking rapidly, Catherine gawked at Luna. "Where on earth did you- how are we not friends?"
"Well-"
"No. No, c'mon, let's chat outside. I need to figure out how the hell you thought we weren't friends."
Taking Luna's hand, Catherine led them outside, Luna stumbling awkwardly but otherwise quite happy to be dragged along, humming against the afternoon sun as they stepped through the doors.
"Lovely day. Feels like spring already."
Trekking over to a small, out of the way spot nestled between one of the many arcades lining the courtyard, Catherine sat the two of them down.
"Luna, how could you ever think I wasn't your friend?" She blurted, still flabbergasted that Luna could say such a thing.
"Well, I've never really had any friends except for Ginny, I suppose."
"Luna." Catherine took her hands in her own. "I am your friend. Yeah? Same with Ron and Hermione, and pretty much the rest of the D.A."
The smile she got in return was radiant, Luna beaming at her, teeth shining like the light of her namesake.
"That's great!"
Chuckling quietly, Catherine shook her head. "Never change, Luna. But… what are you doing out of class?"
"Oh. Professor Snape kicked me out. He said something about sneezing, but I wasn't really paying attention."
"Sounds like him."
"Catherine?"
She looked up into Luna's eyes, her tone suddenly serious. It felt jarring to Catherine, never having seen Luna with an honest to god scowl on her face. "Yeah? Are you okay?"
"I know what it's like, what you're going through."
Her heart dropped into her stomach, breath caught in her throat. "Luna…"
"I know what it's like, and… if I'm your friend, that means you can talk to me."
"I never knew."
She smiled, a quiet, painful thing. "Everyone sees what they want to see."
"Don't I know that… god. I'm so sorry."
"Don't be. It's not your fault."
"No, but I… you didn't think I was your friend. I know you have a rough time with your housemates, but is it worse than that?" Catherine's eyes widened. "Your shoes. I can't believe I forgot about your shoes. Who's doing that?"
"It doesn't matter-"
"The hell, it doesn't matter. You're being bullied, Luna. That's not alright."
"You never answered my question," Luna deflected. "How are you doing?"
"I'm fine."
"Then I'm fine too."
Christ, Luna could be conniving if she wanted to.
"I'm dealing with it. I'm feeling good, honest. Ron and Hermione have been great, and Dumbledore is helping me too. Really, all I'm looking forward to is the next D.A. meetup. It feels like it's been ages since I've seen everyone."
And it had been. They hadn't had a meeting since she passed out in front of them nearly two weeks ago, and Catherine knew that everyone was getting stressed about it.
She had a valid excuse as to why she'd cancelled every meeting, but trying to explain that a god had dragged her into a living breathing horror film wasn't something she could see going over well, not unless she wanted to have the Ministry knocking on her bedroom door ready to cart her away to St. Mungo's for good.
"So yeah, I'm doing the best I can." Catherine sighed, scratching her cheek. "If you don't want to talk about what you just told me, that's fine. Just know the same stands with me. You could come knocking on the common room door at three in the morning and I wouldn't mind, okay?"
"You mean that?"
"I do, and I'm sorry I never noticed. You're always so…"
"Head in the clouds? Lost? I know. I can't help it, but it doesn't mean I can't hurt too."
"Are you still… you know, thinking that way right now?"
"It comes and it goes." Luna sighed, her frown so terribly alien on her normally placid features. "The D.A. has been lovely. It's nice to spend time with people without them making fun of me."
"If anyone ever does that, you tell me, alright? I'll kick their arse for you."
"You're very violent, lately, aren't you?"
"I've had a wakeup call."
Luna let out a puff of air. "The wrackspurts have been around you, but… they've been acting strange, not like I've ever seen before. Is that what you mean?"
"Uh- not entirely sure, but I've basically come to terms with the fact that I can't be gentle with Death Eaters."
"You're saying you'd kill them."
"Yeah." She swallowed heavily. "Yeah, that's exactly what I'm saying."
"I don't like it. I don't like violence. It's awful, and it's scary, and it's too-too much." Twiddling her thumbs, Luna pressed her knuckles into her thighs. "But I do understand."
"Which is why I want to cancel the D.A."
"Why?"
Catherine reared back and Luna's sudden outburst, her words scared, strained. "Because by all of you associating with me, your lives are in danger. Voldemort is back, Luna, and he won't hesitate to kill my friends and their families, even if it's just a glorified study group."
"Is that why you jumped?"
She grunted a yes, looking up at the sky above. "My life has never been all that great, so it was at the back of my mind for as long as I can remember. Have to go home for the summer? Maybe I should jump in front of the Hogwarts Express. Another bad class with Snape? I think about making some jumbled up potion and drinking it in front of him. Ministry spreading more lies about me? Could go to the lobby and fire off a killing curse at my head." Catherine looked back down, wincing at the raw, untempered understanding in Luna's eyes. She didn't just sympathize with Catherine, she empathized with her, and not from forcing herself to see what Catherine was going through. No, she'd gone through the same. "I had enough. I couldn't see my life going anywhere that wasn't an early grave, so I thought I'd just get it over with now rather than eke out another two or three years before I'm killed in some horrible way."
Well, that's the thought she'd entertained before being thrown into Yharnam. Now she just wanted to get away from it all, existence far too much effort, far too much pain to be bothered with. At least, not without Ron and Hermione there to keep her from getting trapped in her own head, mind racing and conjuring up images of bloodied throats and stump legs, an unrecognizable mass of flesh that once was a father.
"I'm sorry."
And Catherine knew Luna was telling the truth. She could see it in her eyes, could hear it in her words. How they didn't carry that ephemeral lilt that her voice normally danced to, but instead dry, weathered, and cracked with the curse of knowing what it is to wish yourself dead. Even if you're doing alright, the thought that your mind could be flung back to those darkest moments still stood indomitable. A fear that could never be shaken, not entirely.
"Thank you." Biting her lip, Catherine hesitated, before speaking. "What about you?"
Luna's hands clenched, knuckles still rolling over the top of her thighs. "My mum died. I saw it happen. She was a researcher, and tried to solve something on her own." Her hands opened wide, pulling apart. "Blew herself up and almost got me." She pulled some of her hair back to reveal a long, twisted scar, running along the side of her head and hidden beneath locks of silvery gold. "It's why I am the way I am. Makes it hard to think, to say the right thing. I get lost sometimes in my own head. Makes me want to hide away from it all, even if it means..."
"Yeah…"
She let out a long, slow breath. "It sometimes feels like I'm trying to fight against my own head."
"Oh, that I understand." Catherine grimaced. "What about… the things you see?"
"Nargles? Wrackspurts?" Luna smiled. "Whatever mum was trying to learn, it worked. I can see things that aren't there. Not to you and everyone else, at least." Her eyes danced upwards, following something above Catherine's head. "Wrackspurts, all around you. But they're buzzing something fierce. It looks like they can't get into your head, they're just… bouncing off."
"Huh."
Catherine believed her, remembering that tight coil of blackened flesh she had found atop the workshop altar, and how it made her want to turn her eyes away and tear them out at the same time. It was if it wasn't there, wasn't supposed to be there, but it was.
So she said so. "I believe you."
"You don't have to lie just because you're my- my friend." The way Luna said the word, it sounded like she didn't believe it herself.
"I do believe you, really. Trust me, I've seen and heard of far, far stranger things." Like a city drowned in blood, filled with the screams of its people long turned to beasts, their teeth cut on misery and the unbridled pain of a mind lost to a curse handed down by the gods themselves. "You seeing little magic bugs, or whatever they are, buzzing around - that's hardly a scratch."
"And what do you see, Catherine?"
She looked past Luna, to the forest far beyond and the dim sun that shone down from above. "I see what happens when we try to understand something we never, ever can."
"Voldemort?"
Catherine nodded. "Yes."
It wasn't entirely a lie, to talk about him and him alone. Tom was only one casualty of Yharnam, and he'd brought the nightmare home.
"He tries so hard to hide from death, from what's eventually going to come for every single one of us. The things he's done to himself… it's beyond the pale. It's beyond imagination. Necromancy looks flowery and bright next to what he's done."
"That's… awful." Luna followed Catherine's gaze, but seemed to stare past the trees, past the sun and the mountains in the far, far distance. "How could someone do that to themselves?"
"Fear. It's why the two of us think the way we do, right? Fear, anger, spite… sometimes I want to do myself in because of all three. Voldemort, I think, runs on fear. Fear and rage."
"How sad."
She snorted. "That's one way to put it."
Luna's lips quirked up ever so slightly at the corners, gentle and familiar. "You'll beat him. I know you will."
"What makes you say that?"
"You're you," Luna stated, as if that was all that was needed to be said. "If anyone I know can do it, it's you."
"...Thanks."
Not quite knowing what to say, Catherine hummed a quiet tune, something she'd heard Eileen once singing to Emilie. A Yharnam song, haunting and slow.
Luna smiled at her, looking far more calm than she had before. It seemed they both needed that chat.
"You're not going to get in trouble with Snape?"
"No. He doesn't give me detention anymore. I think it's because I ask him questions."
"About what?"
"Whatever daddy has cooked up. Rotfang… things that would end up in the paper."
"Do you believe in all the things he writes?"
"I don't not believe in it." Luna chewed at her bottom lip. "Anything is possible, and I see things people tell me aren't real every day." She studied Catherine for a moment, expression still that same old, quizzical blank she always wore. "Your scars suit you. They make you handsome."
"My scars- what?" Laughing, Catherine shook her head. "Handsome?"
"You've always been handsome. Strong." Her hand hovered over Catherine's arm before it lowered, the pads of her fingers prodding softly at the stringy, inhumanly dense muscle that now made up her body. "It doesn't make you any less feminine. It just makes you... you."
That confusion she had felt in Yharnam came over her again, images of Arianna flitting through her mind.
Wait.
Wait.
Was this…
Was this flirting?
Blushing fiercely, Catherine tried not to flex the muscle of her arm beneath Luna's touch, but failed to hide the sudden nervous shake that had come over her, Luna cooing at the sensation of her biceps clenching as her hands wrapped into fists.
Hordes of the long dead and soon-to-die, and Catherine found herself lost of all bluster and confidence, staring down at where Luna's hand rested on her arm with buggy eyes and a swell of panic in her throat.
"I- I'm not single," she uttered, tempted to tack on that someone like her would never be able to be with Luna, even if she wasn't taken (and oh, that still made her mind itch to think about). Catherine would destroy someone like her, solely because of the things she had seen. The things she had done.
Luna was entirely undeserving of the corruption that ebbed from her every pore.
"Mmhm," was Luna's reply, simply a commiserate hum. "Hermione?"
"How-"
"You're very obvious, especially during D.A. meetings. You can't seem to take your eyes off her."
"Has anyone else noticed?"
"No, I don't think so. Cho, maybe, but that's just because she's always spent her time this year looking at you. Not the same, though. It's not healthy, what she wants."
Off-kilter, Catherine felt she could only keep asking questions. "And what's that?"
"Someone to lick her wounds. You said that you've always had a hard life. She hasn't. Not like you, or me." Luna pulled her hand away, Catherine just barely managing to stifle a sigh of relief. "Death is new to her. We've both grown up with it." With innocent eyes, Luna blinked owlishly at her. "Don't worry, I was just curious what your arms felt like. They've always looked very strong from all your quidditch."
"Er- thanks, Luna."
Had she always been so terribly oblivious? First Luna looking at her with… well, it wasn't the way Hermione looked at her, far too - to put it simply - Luna. Whatever it was, it made her realize that she wasn't as alone as she thought she was.
"So you're gay too?"
"I suppose. I like people, it doesn't matter what they happen to look like on the outside."
"Sounds like you."
Luna grinned softly. "It does, doesn't?"
A bell tolled, and Catherine stretched her arms out, shoulders cracking as she pulled herself together and shook the nerves from her body. "Want to sit with me, Ron, and Hermione at lunch? Spend some time with friends?"
Eyes shining, Luna nodded. "I'd love that."
I'm active on the fem!harry and lesbians Discord server if anyone wants to come by and say hello.
Discord Permalink: qfdAZ75x4X