Book 4: Astoria Greengrass and the Curse of Quennell Park
Song rec: "I Need My Girl" by The National

The Carrow family had always been known paralians. Hestia grew up in an isolated house in Cromer overlooking the sea. It was very nice, Rhiannon thought, compared to the dilapidated flat in the bowels of London where she grew up. The Carrow house would have been even nicer with more furniture, but most had been cleared out. Each time Rhiannon asked, "How can I help," it echoed loudly against the walls as if the place was mocking her question.

Flora had made it through the paperwork to ensure that Hestia and their father would benefit from what little money Amycus and Alecto had left behind. The Greengrasses had offered to help the last of the Carrows, though there was a reason they refused help. In more than one discreet conversation, Hestia had hinted to Rhiannon that the lack of cold hard cash had initially misled them; there were actually assets galore if one knew how to safely get rid of them. The unspoken truth was that Flora had briefly taken up the Knockturn trade again in the post-war commotion. She earned enough from grimoires and banned books to put her family in a better flat, and by the end of June, her stint in Knockturn was over already. The three Carrows had said goodbye to the shoddy place in Carkitt and moved to a clean, spacious flat in Diagon.

Rhiannon wondered why the twins bothered with flat living when they had a perfectly good house right here. From top to bottom, there was a spacious, finished attic, two levels with two bedrooms each, a parlour, a small kitchen and dining room, and plenty of storage in the basement. The attractive back garden (Hestia had maintained it) and the sound of the ocean through the surrounding trees were enough to sell Rhiannon.

At first.

Rhiannon had been invited along for the farewell, as Hestia wanted her to see Cromer's pier. The longer Rhiannon was in the house this June morning, the more she felt why Hestia and Flora were saying goodbye to the place. There weren't good memories here, at least not enough to outweigh the bad.

"I don't know why she doesn't just sell it," Hestia remarked, conjuring white sheets over the furniture they were leaving.

The heiress of the house, Flora, was sitting on the bench in the back garden, the sandwich she packed sitting uneaten next to her. In the past month, Flora had done ninety-nine percent of the work clearing the place out and dealing with her relatives' effects. Rhiannon, Hestia, and Aban were allowed to help Shrink and transport furniture. They were getting ready to have lunch, but nobody seemed to know the best way to interrupt Flora's depression.

"I think it's been harder on Flora than she expected," Hestia whispered, though there was no way Flora would hear them inside. "She knows it's not hard on me and Dad at all. She's not sad, I know that for a fact. It's just a transition for her. The structure's gone. Flora loves structure."

"She sure does," said Rhiannon. "You're probably right."

Through several Wizengamot proceedings, Flora and Hestia were declared independent a month early from their seventeenth birthday, and their Trace was removed (nobody at the Ministry was currently checking Traces anyway except to find missing persons). Rhiannon didn't understand much of it, since there was no Muggle equivalent, but Flora and Hestia essentially gained custody of their own father. They could own and let property. It was, again, a lot of paperwork.

The Ministry would be paying Flora, who owned the Carrow house, to use the place for research. Rhiannon had never heard of such a thing before; in the Muggle world, when the government came to your house, they sure as hell didn't pay you. However, in the past month, Flora had been barraged with letters from two Ministry departments who wanted to purchase the property for research: the Spirit Division and the Department of Mysteries.

Flora had explained these offers thoroughly, but Rhiannon only paid enough attention to know the gist. The Spirit Division had offered a bit more, but Flora didn't trust them to "leave well enough alone." She swore she couldn't sell the house in spite of the delicious amount of Galleons offered to her and somehow struck up a deal with the Department of Mysteries, who "could handle it." To be honest, she made it sound like an exorcism was in order, not a bunch of Ministry researchers.

Exorcisms aside, Rhiannon didn't understand Flora's choice of Mysteries over Spirits. It seemed like every ten minutes, she saw something vaguely person-shaped out of the corner of her eye. It was odd that such a clean, sunny place had so many ghosts and that Rhiannon couldn't catch decent glimpses of any of them. It didn't look like Hestia or her dad could really see them, either.

"We're gonna eat lunch, Flora," Hestia called out back.

"Sounds good."

Hestia gave Rhiannon a look and started setting out the ham sandwiches, crisps, and oranges at the kitchen table. Hestia's dad tucked in straightaway, filling the room with a pleasant citrusy smell. Rhiannon took a seat and looked at the stained-glass accents in the front windows. They depicted sailboats. She expected them to move, as most magical art did, but the boats were all permanently anchored.

"Will your wife be coming to live with us, Hestia?" Aban asked.

Aban Carrow had a lot going on in his head that easily confused him. With regular St Mungo's appointments, he was regaining his daily living skills, but there was still a long way to go. He had been under the Imperius Curse for even longer than Barty Crouch Jr, and it showed. Aban's mind being buoyed by the magic of his older siblings for so many years was the mental equivalent of slinging an unbroken arm and leaving it to atrophy. The more time Rhiannon spent round him, the sadder it seemed. He often did purposeless activities round the new flat, like making wiping motions across the countertops when there wasn't a cleaning potion in sight. He dropped things frequently and continued to garble his words. Every so often, he spent hours sitting perfectly still, staring into space. It made Rhiannon angry to see the remnants of his abuse, but there was little she could do besides offer to take him to some appointments. Most the time, he still didn't know who she was. His most recent conclusion was that she was Hestia's wife, but whenever Hestia stepped out of the room, he would forget again and act like Rhiannon was a different person. He might have thought she was a fellow St Mungo's outpatient, because he always asked her about her health. Poor bloke had never got out much.

"Rhiannon's my girlfriend, Dad. She lives with the Greengrasses at Quennell Park," explained Hestia for the dozenth time.

"She's no Greengrass," Aban said bluntly. (Rhiannon wondered what gave that away).

"Right, she's not. She's been living with them due to the war. She's a family friend."

"But that's silly, Hestia. She's our family. She should live with us," Aban argued.

Hestia stuffed her mouth with crisps and looked away, starting to blush. Rhiannon was blushing, too, but she had the freckles to hide some of it.

"Dad, we're not married."

"You're together."

"That's not — not exactly the same thing."

"Your mum and I were together. We lived together. We weren't married, but I was her husband," Aban said with stern conviction.

"Yeah, okay, Dad, yeah. I know."

"Well, it's wrong you don't give your wife a place to live. We've a nice place now. Your mum gave me a place to live when I ran away from home."

"Okay, Dad, listen. Rhiannon's not my wife, and she's not homeless. She lives at bloody Quennell Park! That's the opposite of homeless," Hestia laughed.

"Quennell Park?" Aban finally processed, but then he went into another fog. "Could we come live in Quennell Park with you, Rhiannon?"

"Er…"

"Dad, Rhiannon doesn't own Quennell Park. She's staying there with the Greengrasses."

"Could we stay with them? I heard it's so nice."

"We just got a new flat, Dad. Quit asking that."

After several minutes of staring at the empty chairs, Aban asked, "Where are the others?"

"Flora's outside, remember?"

"Are your aunt and uncle still sleeping? She'll wake them up if she comes in and slams that back door. I don't want another row."

"They're dead, Dad."

"Oh. That's right. Have they met your wife?"

"No, Dad, they're dead. Gone."

"Oh, good. Where are they staying?"

Hestia snorted, "The damned abyss."

"Oh, I've never been there."

Hestia rubbed her forehead in exasperation as Rhiannon tried to keep herself from laughing (or crying). Aban's Healer from Spell Damage was due to start him on new potions next week. Rhiannon knew how hard this was on Hestia and Flora. Their dad hadn't been this badly off when those cursing him were still alive to guide his mind into coherence. That came at the price of slavery, though. There was no miracle cure to get him back to his pre-Imperiused state. It had been too long.

Aban reached into his pocket and pulled out a crumpled invoice from the hospital. He folded it a few times neatly, then with his wand, he started cutting triangles and half-moons into it, making a papery mess all over the table. He then unfolded it and gave Rhiannon a snowflake in June. Rhiannon accepted it graciously.

"Thank you, Mr Carrow."

"'Mr Carrow?' You can call me Dad," he said pleasantly.

Hestia was scarlet, but Rhiannon didn't mind. It wasn't so bad to be considered part of a family. Geoffrey and Jessica had never wanted Rhiannon at all. Due to being Imperiused, Aban certainly wasn't father of the year, but he loved his daughters.

Rhiannon's samplings of the feeling of family came from the Greengrasses taking her under their wing, but she still felt like a guest. Professor Lupin was everything to her, but he hadn't been able to be around much.

Being in Hestia's childhood home, it was very difficult not to reflect on what her own childhood was like. When the couple talked about it, Hestia always said things like, "You had it worse," and "It's not a big deal compared to what you went through." Rhiannon wished Hestia would stop minimising what she'd been through just because nobody shot heroin, left her without food, or put a gun in her face. Rhiannon wished Hestia would talk more without drawing comparisons. Rhiannon actually had some advantages compared to Hestia, believe it or not. P.R. from the music shop had been a priceless source of support for a young Rhiannon, and he wasn't Imperiused. Rhiannon was left unmonitored, which was terrible, but she had made some neighbourhood playmates when she could keep her magic hidden. Everything Hestia did had been scrutinised, criticised, and controlled. On the surface, yes, that was better than being beaten by drug addicts, but it was no way to grow up, either.

After the meal, Flora came in to brace herself for the Unspeakables who were due to arrive to "survey" the magic on the property. She got busy explaining that to her dad, and that gave Hestia and Rhiannon a chance to take a stroll on the pier. As clean as the house was, there was a peculiar sense of breathing fresh air the moment Rhiannon exited it. Hestia led the way down a dirt path through the trees, where more and more ocean blue became visible. The path conjoined with a Muggle trail, and Hestia remarked that everything of their property was Unplottable.

Rhiannon knew Hogwarts' Unplottability made it look like dangerous ruins to mundane eyes.

"What's the house look like to Muggles?" she asked.

"More trees."

The patch of woods dispersed, and Rhiannon realised exactly how high the cliff was. Turning round, she saw a steep drop-off from the wooded area down to the sandy coastline. Hestia led her down a zig-zag path to the beach, where people milled about wishing it was slightly warmer to swim. Even surrounded by Muggles, Hestia still took Rhiannon's hand. They ambled to the pier, climbing up to what Hestia called the "promenade," and walked as far out as they could. There was a pavilion at the far end, and behind that, a lifeboat station. Rhiannon wished she owned a camera to get a picture of Hestia leaning over the rails and watching the waves crash. This place had clearly been one of her sources of joy.

"I wish you could have lived here as a kid instead, Rhi," Hestia said. "I'm sure we would have met if you had. Magic works that way. I could have told you that you were a witch, not a freak. Dad could've contacted the Ministry if we'd known about your parents. I'm sure he would have been able to do that much."

Rhiannon shrugged, "Not how life played out. I would've tried to help you, too, Hestia."

"Oh, I was fine, pretty much," Hestia shrugged back.

Rhiannon rubbed the sun on her neck.

"Listen, er, I guess I wanted to talk to you about that. I don't want you to feel like you can't talk just because I had it 'worse off' or whatever. Your childhood was rough, too. I guess I just don't want you comparing apples to oranges. We used to talk all the time without comparing."

Hestia looked a little guilty. She faced the ocean, not Rhiannon.

"I think the war gave me some perspective about suffering. Thinking of what you went through helped me get through it. I just feel like I'm whining when I talk because it could have been so much worse."

"You're not whining. You keep saying like, 'it could have been worse,' and it's like you're forgetting that it could have been loads better," Rhiannon said.

Hestia grinned in defeat, "You're right. I'll stop comparing."

"All right then."

Leaned over the rail of the pier like this, Rhiannon felt bold enough to give Hestia a kiss on the cheek. It was dangerous in Muggle society, she knew, but she was also a witch. Muggles couldn't actually succeed if they tried anything harmful. Still, many Muggles felt better about themselves when they stared or glared at the girls' broad-daylight love as they walked. Hestia took Rhiannon down to the beach, where they inevitably made a mess of their shoes and started writing silly things in the sand with lots of hearts. Rhiannon thought she heard something musical out at sea, like bells. Hestia started humming to herself, the way she sometimes did when she was putting on her makeup in the morning.

It was much, much too soon for Rhiannon to think the thought that came to her, but she thought it anyway and kept it private for safekeeping.

I could listen to her every morning.

Draco did not tell his parents where he was going, and lately, they had taken that lack of information to mean that he was going to Quennell Park. He didn't correct them. However, he knew that Astoria would be busy at the Tonks house that evening, so today was as good a day as any for him to go to St Mungo's. For the record, he hadn't told Astoria, either.

He walked down the main stair without touching the handrail. He couldn't possibly say it aloud, but he did not want to inherit this house. He didn't even want to stay in it anymore. He spent many nights at Theodore's place in Falmouth even though it was tiny and weird, because here at the manor, he had flashbacks. It was hard to talk himself out of them.

The Dark Lord is dead — but he seemed to hide round every corner in Draco's mind.

Bellatrix is dead — when Draco heard his parents in the kitchen, he heard her.

Rodolphus is dead — his large shadow skulked in the evening candlelight.

Rabastan is dead — Draco heard sick words sounding against the walls.

I am alive — but he dreamt always of Fiendfyre, a hot prison where his own friend had tried to murder someone in cold blood.

Draco put on a wide-brimmed hat and stepped into the fireplace once his parents went out to clean the peafowl coops. Draco wasn't fond of Muggle London, and he had never been able to time his entrance from the street properly to avert Muggle eyes. Nobody ever looked at the fake Purge and Dowse's, but they often looked right at him.

Draco wasn't fond of St Mungo's either, because that was the place that had sent his pox-riddled grandfather home to die a little too far in advance of him actually dying.

Couldn't change anything now.

Most people didn't prefer to go to the hospital by Floo because it let out near the visitor's tearoom and gift shop, where there was no access to a directory. Draco didn't need a directory, and he didn't have an emergency, so the Floo would be fine.

As a whole, the fourth floor was for spell damage. On any given day, most patients were there for misfired or misused charms and were out of there within an hour. However, the war had seen this floor exceed its utmost capacity. The wards included intensive care for curses, urgent care for hexes, and physical therapy for jinxes. There was also the Janus Thickey Ward for irreversible spell damage, which housed people who had been Cruciated or Imperiused for too long, totally Obliviated, or Kissed by dementors. This ward had recently received a generous sum from an anonymous donor, not only for the purpose of supporting what stood, but also to alleviate the flood of patients reporting there in desperation for a different kind of irreversible spell damage — the kind that carried few physical signs besides a racing heart. Thus, to take the weight off of Janus Thickey, which had never been designed for that purpose, a new ward was built with the money. Nobody, not even the wizard who had opened the letter, knew where the donation had come from. It wasn't from any of the families that usually took credit for such a thing: the Greengrasses, Smiths, Macmillans, Abbotts, or Springhouses. So it must have been someone with Ministry money, which, in its current state, wasn't the Ministry. Nearly every ward in the hospital was named after its founder or the most famous Healer to have worked there, but there was no lead in the donation mystery. Somewhere along the lines, someone had declared it the Avicenna Ward.

Draco only had to read about the new ward's services a few times in the Daily Prophet to know that he needed to go there for his sleep. Then he thought about it a little more and realised sleep wasn't the only thing. He needed to go there for his general recovery. Well, it was for more than wartime recovery, too. Draco felt like he was building his life from scratch, which was saying something, because he hadn't had the slightest ideas of what to do with his life before the war. He did know he wanted to be with Astoria. Thus, his favourite reason of all to show up at St Mungo's was for her, because even though she loved him, he didn't love himself. He wanted to be a good partner, a good future for her. So he went down the rickety staircase and traversed the fourth floor to the shiny new sign.

Avicenna Ward for Mental Health

Commissioned May 1998

for the People

Healer-in-Charge: Emma Young

Trainee Healer: Maslow Cloverine

Even though Draco wasn't comfortable with the white-walled design, the Avicenna Ward had a lot of things going for its atmosphere. Not only was it the newest part of the hospital, it was also the part without any oozing injuries or half-transfigured people coughing up purple plasma. The queue was eight deep, so Draco waited patiently with his eyes to the floor. The first two wizards were checking into their appointments, but the next witch was there to schedule her first appointment like Draco was. He paid more attention. The witch was given a clipboard to fill out in the waiting room, which was behind a wall with two minimalist paintings. Draco looked back at the floor. As he zoned out, one of the waiting room conversations reached his ears.

"…so I was discharged from the Dai Llewellyn Ward today, and I thought, 'If I'm to look like this for the rest of my life, I'm making an appointment here, too!' So I had it set up ahead of time for today."

The voice sounded familiar. Not close, simply familiar and a bit annoying. Was that Lavender Brown? Yes, it was… Draco hoped they wouldn't have to cross paths. Lavender continued chatting:-

"They were real nice about it, they just asked if I was gonna, you know, do that thing, and I said no, here's my paperwork. No fur, no claws, just ugly! So here I am. You can only put spells over top of Dark damage so much, so they fixed me up with this. Yeah, see, this is my fake nose, so I'm glad you can't really tell! It'll be a while for the transfiguration surgery, and that won't fix it all. Oh, girl, trust me, my face looks like the fjords of Norway underneath all the makeup. Parvati's been so supportive, you know, I was afraid she would think differently of me, but no. Everything's been good with us. Don't you want a salami stick? No?"

Draco was next in the queue after an elderly wizard. He was mournful looking, but proof that it was never the right time to give up. Although Draco had initially listened in on Lavender's conversation, her voice was still pervasive now that he didn't want it to be.

"When's my naughty cousin Hazel going to write me, by the way? We're hearing everything through Aunt Maple. We were all deathly worried about her after reading what happened at the house."

Hazel Brown… Why is that familiar? Not the eye colour. I know that name.

"Good afternoon, how can I help you?"

Draco had to stop thinking of Hazel Brown for a minute to ask for new patient paperwork. The witch at the counter gave him a clipboard. She warned him that appointments were already backed up, but that they would get him in as soon as they could.

"That's all right. It's not… it's not an emergency…" he said, extremely awkwardly.

"Don't forget to return the clipboard on the way out, by the way," the witch said kindly. "I've had a few take it with them. It's so long… I bet people start thinking it's a magazine in their hands…"

Draco flipped through the pages as he walked round the corner to the waiting room. The form asked some pretty heavy questions about three pages in. He wondered what he should circle for those questions, and then eventually considered that the truth was an option.

"Please excuse me, Lavender."

"Oh, sure!"

Draco looked up and back to the clipboard, and then back up again at the girl standing in front of him. His heart jolted.

"Merlin."

Astoria was on the other side of the clipboard, smiling at him.

"Fancy seeing you here," she said.

Astoria was a source of absolute happiness even with the sad questions awaiting his sad answers on the clipboard. It was the dead of summer, and she had finally shed her fashionable but ultimately Shielding cardigans, allowing everyone the perusal of the cherry blossom tattoo over her magic-tinged veins. As usual, she was dressed to the nines, and Draco was silently glad to see her wearing the earrings he had bought her. He wouldn't point it out; that'd be gauche. Damn. What a place to run into his girlfriend.

"Fancy seeing you here," he echoed.

"This is my third appointment," Astoria said openly.

"It is? What'd you put for number 24 on here?" he said, bobbing the chart upwards.

Astoria exhaled his bad joke and sat next to him.

"I was Alecto Carrow's human diary for a year. What do you think I put?"

"Ah. Yeah."

At first, Draco was worried that Lavender would talk the whole time, but a wizard in a lime-green uniform came out to tell her it was her turn. They didn't have the waiting room to themselves, but at least they didn't know the other people there.

"I figured I'd come here because I couldn't sleep," Draco said, since that seemed like a respectable thing to tell the girl he was always trying to impress, even in this ward.

Astoria nodded, "That makes sense. It will be good for you. I really like Healer Young. She's a tough lady, but she's not judgmental."

"Oh, I would definitely hope not, not with what I'm walking in there with…"

"It will be fine, Draco," Astoria reassured, squeezing his knee. "I'm proud of you."

He wasn't expecting that.

"Thanks?"

"Well, it wasn't easy for me to come here, so I imagine it wasn't easy for you, either," she said.

"I mean, something had to be done. I can't spill it all to Moaning Myrtle now that I've left school," he responded with a grin.

"Oh, you'll have to find a way, though, or she'll harass me when I go back in September."

"Ah, that's right, and what am I to do whilst you're in school, Astoria? Wistfully stare out my window? I'll do that, you know."

"Stop teasing," Astoria giggled. "I'll tell you each time there's a Hogsmeade trip, and surely you won't be prevented from watching the Quidditch games."

"Astoria Greengrass at a Quidditch game? Hm, the only time I've known her to do that willingly was to see the Slytherin Seeker with hair gel in," smirked Draco.

Astoria blushed and said, "We'll have to meet up during the holidays, too."

"That sounds great. I'll get a camera to capture all of the facial expressions your parents make when I show up on your doorstep."

"My parents' faces don't make half the shapes your dad manages to twist out of his nose," Astoria noted, and Draco chuckled because she was right.

"So, tell me what it's like in that office. You're a Legilimens, so how does it work?"

"Well, Healer Young is an Occlumens… I would say on the level of your mother or Professor Sinistra's husband. As much as I'd like to know what she's thinking about me, it's futile! She doesn't use Legilimency herself because it infringes on people's rights, you know. Really, she's a great witch. She worked for ten years as an Unspeakable in the Brain Room and trained as a Healer in Wales. You can tell she likes her job, and she's good at it. She's kind."

Draco nodded. It was a new concept to him, and it was all very interesting. When he started filling out his paperwork, Astoria respectfully looked away.

"You don't have to stare at the wall, Astoria. There's nothing on here I wouldn't tell you, anyway. For one thing, I think you already know my name and birth date, seeing as you went out of your way this year to get me such a nice present. Unless you guessed the day."

"Oh, you are so funny, Draco Malfoy."

Healer Emma Young was a middle-aged Black woman with a sweeping updo of hair, a pinstripe pantsuit, and a monocle on her right eye. Her presence filled the whole office even though her shy, younger intern, Maslow Cloverine, was also there for learning purposes. Draco had a guilty feeling that he was going to be the reason Cloverine would one day suddenly change career paths. Hopefully not.

Draco could see why Astoria had taken a liking to Healer Young. Her manners were impeccable, and she had a gentle but serious voice. She kept a full bookshelf on display, with texts such as Seers Seeing Hope: Acceptance Therapy for the Clairvoyant Client and Spell Shock: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Recovery.

"Well, Draco, I'd like to thank you for coming in and trying this out," Healer Young said knowingly once they had introduced themselves. "Let's talk about what brought you in, shall we?"

Draco laughed at himself.

"Where do I start?"