Alright so I have no idea what happened in the last upload, so here is chapter 17 again. Thank you to the reviewers who made me aware of it, and a big thanks to Kittalia Phantom for trying to fix it.
Hello everyone, I apologize for my long absence, I have a few excuses that aren't worth listing. Mainly though, I was uninspired, however now that my finals are done, ideas are coming fast and strong now. I could still use input from you guys though, so please review.
Disclaimer: As much as I wish I did, I don't own Harry Potter.
Chapter 17
"Alright, that was two questions. I will be taking Miss Potter now," Dumbledore said cheerfully.
Dumbledore then literally dragged Jem out of the courtroom.
He went back to the room that they had originally been in. Now, there were a few chairs and a table with a few mugs on it.
Jem's chains forced her into one of the chairs. Dumbledore sat down across the table from her.
"I expect that it might take some time for your parents to get down here, with the crowds and reporters, so make yourself comfortable." Dumbledore then started humming a tune that was seriously annoying.
Jem settled for glaring at the old man with as much hate as she could muster. Dumbledore seemed oblivious as he sipped his tea, still humming his song. The Aurors were just standing there, mesmerized by the sight in front of them.
Several minutes later, the door opened and the Potters rushed in.
"Ah, James, Lily, where are the others?" Dumbledore asked.
"They decided to meet at headquarters first, for more privacy," James explained.
"Then, they were going to go to our place to get the kids out of the way," Lily added.
"Perhaps we should go to headquarters for the night and move her in tomorrow morning?" Dumbledore suggested.
"Of course," Lily agreed.
Throughout this whole conversation Jem remained in her chair glaring at Dumbledore. James was glancing at her nervously, and Lily was looking at her in concern.
Dumbledore drew his wand, tapped the kettle, and muttered, "Portus." It glowed a faint blue for a second and then returned to its original color. He looked at Jem pointedly, but she made no move towards it.
Dumbledore chuckled idly, and with a sigh and the flick of his wand, her hand fell there on its own, and they were swept away.
A few hours later, the tension in the room was so thick, someone could cut it with a butterknife.
"Alexa..."
"Jem."
"We are not doing this again, Alexa," James scolded.
"My name is Jem, Potter," she retorted. The door creaked open.
"Erm... Molly wants to know what Alexa would like to eat..." Sirius Black trailed off at the tension in the room.
"You are the biggest dunderhead I have ever met," Jem stated in a deadly calm voice.
"ALEXA ROSE POTTER!" Lily exclaimed.
"How many times do I have to tell you! It's Jem Bloody Riddle!"
"Language!" Lily reprimanded.
"Shut up!"
James glowered at his daughter.
"Perhaps some soup would do," Albus finally cut in.
Sirius nodded nervously and went to tell Molly.
No one spoke until he came back. He reached out to hand the bowl to Jem and she just stared at him. Black doesn't expect me to actually eat it, does he?
Sirius retracted his hand and set it on the bedside table.
"James, Lily, may I have a word?" Dumbledore asked, although it sounded a lot more like a command. James and Lily looked reluctant to leave, but followed Dumbledore out anyway.
"Why did you need to talk to us?" James asked once they were seated in the living room.
"I was merely wondering what your plan was," Dumbledore stated.
"For what?" Lily asked. Dumbledore sighed.
"I think that this is going to be a lot harder than you believe," Dumbledore said gravely.
"Once she realizes that she has been misled..." Lily trailed off as Dumbledore shook his head.
"Imagine if you were captured by the dark side your whole life, and suddenly, someone you don't even know calls your closest companions 'evil' and tells you your life is a lie. You would be pushed farther away, would you not?"
"So we just send her back to the monster then?" James asked sarcastically.
"Not exactly." James and Lily sighed, hoping to get a straight answer for once.
Dumbledore continued, "We need to allow her certain freedoms. Clearly she does not trust the food we make or the potions we give her, so we could allow her to make her own. Instead of keeping her locked in her room, we could allow her to roam the house, putting wards up to make sure she cannot leave."
"In addition, we could provide her with exercise equipment, and access to the library so that she has something to do." Dumbledore stopped and looked at the parents expectantly.
"That could work," James agreed, albeit hesitantly.
"I'll work on safety-proofing your house," Dumbledore said. "In the meantime, try to find out anything and everything you can about Alexa."
James and Lily headed up the stairs as Sirius exited Alexa's room with a dazed look on his face.
"Padfoot..." James trailed off.
"Sirius? Are you okay?" Lily asked.
"Sirius? Sirius?!" James started to get worried.
"I... She... what... years... met... Wormtail... little... Diagon... Lucius...how?" Sirius rambled staring unseeingly at the ground.
James and Lily looked at each other, contemplating calling Madame Pomfrey.
"Did Alex-" James started.
"It's Jem you..." A list of profanities came out of the room that would put the saltiest sailor to shame.
James walked over and rested his head against the wall. That seemed to snap Sirius out of his daze.
"James, she was there! She was the one… She was the one who gave me Pettigrew!" Sirius stuttered.
"Wait what?" James was lost. Sirius took a deep breath.
"Remember how there was a little girl with Lucius Malfoy, and how she was the one who captured Pettigrew?" Sirius said. Understanding slid across the Potter's faces.
"We could've had her... we..." James was starting to slip into the daze that Sirius had been in minutes before.
"James! Snap out of it! We had a goal for coming up here remember?" Lily said.
"Right, right."
The two parents opened the door hesitantly. Jem was sitting on the bed, surprisingly not glaring. It immediately put her parents on edge.
"So.." James looked at Lily. Jem just stared ahead, determined not to make things easy for them.
Lily took a deep breath and asked, "What's your favorite sport?"
Whatever Jem had been expecting, it hadn't been that. James felt the same way. They both looked at Lily like she had grown two heads. Lily smirked. She was a clever witch and had known that she needed to catch her daughter off-guard for any sort of reaction.
Jem and James reached that conclusion a few moments later, and Jem scrambled to get her face back into her stony mask, while James broke into a wide smile.
"So what is it?" James prompted.
Jem had a sick thought and smirked cruelly.
"Muggle hunting," she said knowing that Lily was a muggle-born.
All of the amusement in the parents' eyes faded.
"Alexa-" James began to reprimand her when he heard a low rumbling noise. He looked around the room and saw it coming from Jem. Jem was growling at him and it was sending chills down his spine. As the inhuman noise faded, James looked at Lily for help.
"So, we'll be moving you into your room once Dumbledore gets back," Lily said, desperate for something to break the awkward silence. James tried to add on to it, with the hopes of starting a conversation.
"You can customize your room once we get there. Maybe we could go shopping to pick some things out," he said, thinking that idea of shopping would perk up his teenage daughter. He got no reaction.
Just then, Jem paled and ground her teeth together.
"Alex- are you okay?" James asked in concern. Jem couldn't have thought of a better time to curse her father. Her real one, not the man standing in front of her. It seemed that her father had found out about the trial and had forgotten to keep his temper cool. Jem thought that desperate times called for desperate measures.
A few years back she had found out how to close the link between her and her father. It wasn't gone, but it was like shutting a door. It could be broken down from either side, but if her father didn't realize that it was closed, he would have no reason to. She felt strange without feeling the emotions from her father, but it was refreshing at the same time.
She didn't take advantage of it much because she knew how angry and offended her father would be if he found out. It also scared her because she lacked the insight to what her father would want her to do. The thoughts that she sometimes had when the door was closed terrified her.
Jem grit her teeth and dragged the imaginary door shut, then locked it. Coming back to reality, she saw that the Potter's were staring at her.
"What happened? Are you okay?" Lily asked frantically.
For the first time in a long time, Jem was unsure of what to do. She could make her own decisions, but now she had to deal with not knowing if her father approved.
Before she could decide what to do, there was a knock on the door. Sirius poked his head in.
"Dumbledore's here. The portkey is ready when you are," he said.
James took out the portkey that he always had on him in case there was an emergency at home.
He took it out and muttered the code word. Lily put her finger on it, and James sighed and grabbed ahold of Jem's chain as the portkey whizzed away.