It's here! It's finally here! I can't tell you how sorry I am that this took so long! I just can't. But I want to thank everyone who reviewed the last part, you guys are the best! This part is twice as long as most others, one because once I got going I just couldn't stop, and also this way at least it makes up for the huge time gap in between!
If you are reading this right now, it means that Bobbi was successful when she came to my aid, and uploaded the story when fanfictio.net decided to not allow me to upload anything. So thank you tons!
Huge, unexplainable thanks goes to the best beta-reader I could ever ask for; Static. Everyone owes this chapter in great part to Static; who on Saturday night, about a week ago, let me email her what I had, and then helped me figure out what was tripping me up. Thanks to her advice I was able to write this part, and write it in this decade too! And she also beta read this chapter in record time! Thank you, you are the best!!
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Two Roads Diverged
Chapter 8 - Pieces of the Puzzle
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The tunnel was dark and sinister. That was basically it; after all, it was a tunnel. There was scarce lighting provided by the dim torches that were very greatly spread out - so that from far away they seemed like a light at the end of the tunnel, to use a very abused saying. The dampness that was associated with the darkness came unannounced, making itself known only through being trodden upon by Draco. And from the looks of it he was the only person to have ever been in the uncharted area.
His muscles ached, and his senses blurred. He was only dimly aware of what was going on, which wasn't much. Draco felt like he had been walking forever, and as though he had made no progress at all. The idea of stopping in the uncertain, continuing darkness wasn't appealing. Once he tried to stop, yet somehow it didn't feel possible, as though his legs had no choice but to carry him forward, as though something in the shadows was reeling him in.
"Where the hell am I?" He yelled in disgust, but his only answer was the annoying repeat of the question, as his words echoed through the tunnel.
The light of an approaching torch cast a sparkle on his gray eyes, making them seem to light up and shine through the pitch black. His silver-blonde hair reflected the glow from his wand, as he continually pushed it aside to get a clearer glimpse. Despite the dark, the damp, or uneven stones, he never tripped; he was a Malfoy, he never screwed up.
"I need to find a way out of this spelunkers paradise gone wrong. Wandering through never-ending tunnels may be one of Gemini's hobbies, but I think I'd be happier reading about it back at Hogwarts."
He swiveled to the side directing his wand at the stones. "Gemini's an idiot. Her family are idiots. I bet this whole place opens up with a simple Alohomora, just like that 'locked' front gate…Alohomora!" He pointed his wand at the wall, he waited. He waited a little longer…a little longer…well!?!? "What the bloody hell is up with this wand!" Now was not the right time for him to be discovering his wand was useless.
He pointed the wand at his shoe. "ACCIO SHOE!" A white jet came out of the wand, illuminating the stone floor. Draco feel flat on the floor as his leg flipped up, the shoe came off, and landed, with a thud, on his stomach.
He peeled himself off the floor in an instant, eyeing it with disdain, as though ready to yell at it for being made of stones. "Ok this just needs the extra effort of shouting. Stupid twit Gemini. She thinks she can lead me here and stick me in her bloody tunnel where I won't get out. I'll show her, the fool, no one messes with Draco Malfoy…ALOHOMORA!" Almost to make up for it, the whole place suddenly seemed way too silent for him. "MARRONION!" He commanded, announcing the spell to turn the walls brown. Nothing happened.
"Blasted, good-for-nothing, shove-a-broomstick-up-my-arse wand! Damn this house, this tunnel, and GEMINI!" He screamed, throwing the wand on to the floor, where it clattered and rolled away, into the darkness.
He picked up the nearest torch and bent down, searching for his wand. When he found it, finally, he straightened his robes, and was about to set off. He noticed a turn ahead. A turn. The first turn he had seen since entering. He was about to stop to consider what to do when an old saying of his father's floated through his mind. "Cowards are afraid to continue when there is no reason not to. Fools are all too happy to rush ahead to their death. A smart man knows what he is entering, and deprives the enemy the chance of surprise." He walked on. There was no debating what was to be done. As far as any Malfoy was concerned this problem had one solution: Be a man and tough it out. So he foraged on with the little comfort of having a wand, no matter how useless, in his pocket.
He was still holding the torch in his hand; at the moment he was pissed off at his wand. "One thing for my spell to rebound, it's another for it to not come out at ALL!" He didn't care if the magic in the tunnel prevented it from working, it was all the same to him.
As he journeyed along he wondered about things such as food, sleep, and if there was an end to the tunnel. "Maybe it just goes on forever? I wouldn't put that kind of torture past Gemini, or anyone related to her." Somehow he was feeling more awake as he walked on. It seemed like the tunnel was giving him energy, or at least taking away his need for sleep. This, more than anything bothered Draco. Rather than being glad to be alert, or happy to not be slumbering on the floor, he was pondering why that wasn't exactly what he was doing. He had been taught that when something good happens that shouldn't happen, he should never become comfortable about it, or it would prove to be his undoing. Another lesson from Lucius. He could write a book from all his father had taught him, and then perhaps name it something fitting like; "A Sadist's Guide to Never Being Optimistic About the World."
The turn was still a good couple of yards off. He was taking medium strides, more than a walk, less than a jog. He wanted to know what was behind that turn, and he wanted to know now. It was probably another path, complete with a lovely décor, much like the one he was in now. He quickened the pace and ran right around the bend, as fast as his legs would take him, which was very fast. The stones on his sides blurred into one pattern of dark black, and he felt stale air hitting his face, when suddenly he realized he had rounded the turn. Draco abruptly stopped. He had assumed that ahead would be another, long corridor. It was not.
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Five floors below Gemini, Andromeda was shivering in the near dark. The heat didn't work as well in the areas below the main floor, and everything felt colder, lonelier.
Andromeda was not a morning person. However, with the recent events of early morning she was sure as heck not going back to bed. Not after Sirius had stopped by…Sirius…her mind turned the name over in her head; she hated that name, hated that man.
"No…I'm not thinking about him. He's definitely not thinking about me right now. I'm not thinking about him."
As if there wasn't enough to think about anyway. Her mother had cancer, and she was down in the cellar of her house, checking it out because she didn't believe her. She didn't believe her own mother. How horrible of a person did that make her?
Well, she wasn't in the cellar yet, but close. She had ventured down here once before, and only once, as a young girl. She still remembered the day, when Cassiopeia had found her playing in the boxes of filed information, and documents.
Andromeda was only five years old, and as most five-year-olds are, she was very curious. Having already explored the library, the study, the courtyard, and the studio; she longed for something else, something more important. That was when she had picked the cellar; she had seen Cassiopeia downstairs, dropping off one thing or another from time to time, and yet Andromeda had never been allowed, or able to get inside.
"This room is not for little kids," Cassiopeia told Andromeda one day when she had asked to go in the cellar. "This room is for adults. Why don't you go read one of your books, or perhaps play with your toys? There's a good girl."
"Yes." Andromeda had told her mother, but she hadn't left, instead she waited around the corner for her mom to go inside. Once Cassiopeia had become distracted, she slipped inside, hiding behind a stack of old papers. The plan was to wait for Cassiopeia to leave, and when that happened Andromeda would come out and play. How much fun that would be!
Cassiopeia had indeed left, not looking to see if Andromeda had been inside because; "Well, Andromeda must be upstairs playing, I suppose I'll get her for lunch soon." And hen Cassiopeia left, she locked the door behind her.
Andromeda failed to notice it, she was too busy praising herself on a mission accomplished. Only a few hours later, when the room had proved to be thoroughly searched, did she reckon to open the door. She couldn't.
Those had been the scariest hours of her life by that age. Locked in the cellar, nowhere to go, and after a while it seemed no one could hear her screaming. The walls felt like they were closing in on her, and she simply sat there, on the ground; eyes streaming with tears.
When Cassiopeia found her, after searching every room in the house, such a yelling Andromeda had never experienced. Phrases such as "Scared out my mind," "Didn't know what to do," "Never would have believed this would happen," "Irresponsible thing to do," and "I'm so disappointed in you," had come up more than once.
After that day Andromeda never went down into the cellar, or anywhere near it; she never wanted to again.
Andromeda had reached the room. The door was one like any other, no one would have noticed it if they hadn't been looking for it. She tried the handle. It was locked, just as it had been all those years ago. "Alohomora," she whispered, directing her wand at the door, and watching it slide open.
A thread of dust fell down into her eyes from the ceiling, and finding a light switch, she turned it on. The room looked like it hadn't been used in ages; the boxes had always been lined up in order, most recent things nearest to the front. Now, looking at the closest box she saw that it was dated: 1999. This room didn't have anything in it from the last two years, or so it seemed.
She yanked the cover off the box and pulled it all down on the floor, where she sat, sifting through the documents. At first everything seemed in order, nothing from before or after 1999, holding true to her mothers extreme organizational habits. As she flipped through, nearing the middle of the crate she thought she saw something dated 2000…stopping her work, she pulled the sheet out. On the top she read: "Bill for Library Service."
The rest of the box contained nothing outside of the ordinary. "No information on Mom, no doctor names, prescription notes, anything that might give me something about my mom. This visit was totally useless." Andromeda was very disappointed in the results.
"Where would there be anything about Cassiopeia's medical records?" Andromeda puzzled over the box, as she replaced the lid an hoisted it back onto the rest.
"Well, it's possible she's got it all in her room…trying to get in there, wouldn't work very well - I'd get caught. Even if she didn't see me, somehow I'd be found out, or I'd screw up and let out what I know. Which, at the moment, is nothing except the fact that I'm pissed off over that man…if you could call him a man, Sirius Black."
"Wait!" A light bulb turned on in her head. "What about the medication Mom takes every morning? There would have to be a label on it, in fact I know there is, I've gotten her medicine for her before."
Standing up, rushing over to turn off the light, locking the door, and then making sure nothing in the room was amiss, Andromeda Apparated up to the kitchen.
The light radiating from the kitchen windows seemed very harsh compared to the dim lighting of the cellar. The white refrigerator, tabletops, and floor, were all in perfect, shining condition.
This didn't surprise her in the least, everything in the house always sparkled. "Well, at least the things that might ever be seen," she thought to herself.
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Sirius walked in the door. His shirt was stuck to him in sweat and perspiration. He had just returned from a four mile run, hoping it would clear his mind. He couldn't just sit around downstairs all morning. He felt as though he would die if he didn't do something. Things were so much easier when he went out running or did something else to take his mind away.
Wandering into the kitchen he found a bag of bread. "Good, I'll make some toast." He thought as he took off the tie. Reaching in and grabbing a piece, he pulled out the bread - which was covered with little furry green dots. "On second thought," he began, promptly dropping the bread in the sink, "maybe coffee would be better. I could use a strong cup of coffee right about now."
Lifting the top of his coffee can, he saw his reflection on the opposite side. No coffee. "Is anything else going to go wrong today? Because if it is, I want fair warning now, so I can stop trying to beat a bad a mood."
He stared up at the ceiling, waiting for a sign. Nothing happened. "Good, that's all I needed to know."
Making his way to the living room he went to turn on the radio; maybe he'd catch that new song, "Just Brew It." The radio didn't turn on. Picking it up, Sirius flipped it over to discover its MagicoWare, the sensor that picked up stations, was totally ruined.
"AH!" He screamed, venting his rage.
In fact none of these things had broken or gone wrong today. He had finished the coffee yesterday, Harry had broken the radio a week ago, and the bread had been there for four weeks. This was just the first time he had noticed any of it.
The tiny house didn't seem to hold any of the heat and warmth which made it so quaint. Nothing was changed; in fact everything was just as it had been, with the difference of one thing; Sirius.
Hours before, he had felt so sure that he was going to feel good once he had finished his trip. He thought somehow that revealing the truth, and dispelling his lies would lift some sort of weight off of his shoulders. Now he was only more confused.
"What's next?" He asked himself. "It's six in the morning and I can't sleep a wink. What now?"
What now indeed. He had replayed the morning's events in his head a few times. However, every thought he had only brought him back to the decision that he had made the right choice, and said the right things. "What else could I have done?"
His face wasn't shaven; he looked rugged and dangerous. His unfathomably black eyes were staring straight ahead at the wall. Facing the fireplace.
He remembered all his remarks. "That's right! You wish I had, so that you could pretend that you had nothing to do with anything that happened that night, so that you could add your name to the list of Women Taken Advantage of by Sirius Black. I'm here to let you know, my dear, you'll be hard pressed to find any such list."
"Hard to believe I said that…"
And then he remembered a few of hers.
"Like hell you did! You were never going to tell me, you slimy, insensitive, self absorbed, conceited ASS! You were just going to lead me on, in circles, while you silently joked over how hilarious it was that you could ruin the same persons life TWICE." She screamed the last word, and she saw him flinch.
"Gosh was she upset…and just how did I ruin her life? If she wasn't so annoying her rage could have been sexy…wow, I did not just think that. Andromeda has issues. Major issues. And it's not like we were gonna get married…yeah, me ever get married."
"Can you believe my luck though! The letter had to come right then. At that moment. I didn't even get to tell her myself. Well… would I have really told her? I was going to when I left, but once I got there, the thought sort of, slipped my mind, I dare say…"
"I remember it everyday, it's not something that you can just forget, not with a living, breathing, constant reminder."
That was definitely what bothered him the most about the whole situation. "What did she mean? I don't know…I'm too tired for riddles. If she wants to convey a message she might as well have put it in a bottle from Brazil for all the good her cryptic hint did."
He flipped on his Muggle TV. It was one of the only Muggle devices he owned. But it wasn't hard for him to figure out why Muggles liked them so much. If he really wanted to he could spend the whole day watching it, never needing to get up.
"Oh…commercials." He had learned that Muggle term by watching it from time to time.
A woman on the television was there advertising some sort of food for babies. "Baby-Go, it's the only thing I'll feed my little living, breathing bundle of joy, and perfect for a mother on the run!" She now held up a bottle of the most unnatural looking slop Sirius had ever seen.
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Gemini was still standing in her room. She had been in that same position for five minutes now, torn between the bed, and the door. Her eyes landed on the soft, purple, sheets which graced her bed. It seemed to grow bigger, softer, and more inviting by the minute. She almost hoped that the bed might sprout a mouth and say, "Come take a nap!" So that she could, without feeling guilty.
She turned to the door. There wasn't anything especially inviting about it. It wasn't warm, soft, or horizontal, it was just a wooden door. What lay outside of the door was what made Gemini feel the obligation to move on. Draco. He was out there, somewhere, and she had no idea where. This whole plan was feeling like one big crapshoot, the more she thought about it. So she didn't allow herself to think about it.
All that mattered was bringing Draco back from wherever he was, getting back on the broom sticks, and flying like a bat out of hell, all the way home. One small dilemma, she had no clue where he was, not the faintest. And it was a huge house.
Wandering around aimlessly would only prove to be a race against time, and one that she felt sure she would lose. How could she attempt to find him when they were both moving at the same time? "What I need is a map! Then I can enchant it to track Draco! Ok, wait, that wouldn't work, to do that I need something that belonged to Draco…ugh."
Gemini glanced down at herself. From head to toe not one thing on her was anyone's but her own. Well, except for the paper concealing notebook. "Ok, so I can't enchant a map, but I can still use one when I don't have any idea where things are." She plopped down on the floor, it was far from uncomfortable, but at least that way she knew she wouldn't be as tempted to fall asleep on it. "Where would a map be? A map… Well, that's the kind of thing that would be in a book about the house. But who would be obnoxious enough to buy a book about their own house? Well, ok, bad question, I can think of a few off the top of my head…"
Did her house have a book on itself? She didn't have a clue. "How many times is that going to be the answer to my own questions! Bad enough that I am talking to myself, but when I can't even give myself a decent answer!" She ran her fingers through the carpeting absent mindedly.
"To find a book with a map I would need the library…to find the library I need a map… well won't this be fun." Gemini peeled herself off the floor, and crossed the remaining distance to the door.
As it closed behind her she looked both ways. "I've been to the library once, well never actually in it, but once I was in a room right near it, the study. I need to remember the way to the study. Was it left, right, or straight?" Something told her straight, though she wondered if it was just her mind wanting to make some sort of a decision.
The walk down each corridor always felt familiar. "Maybe I'm getting nearer?" she hardly dared to believe it. "Or maybe," said a voice in her head, "you are going insane. No," she answered, "the first sign of being insane is talking or singing out loud, when you are alone, and then, just to spite her worries she began,
"We're off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz, tra la, tra la, tra la, tra la, tra la la la la, la la, because of the wonderful things he does…" She skipped off down the corridor, what was the point of being in the mansion on a night when she should be at school without her mother's knowledge, if she wasn't going to have some fun?
Finally she stopped, the hallway ahead ended abruptly, and she had not found the library. Gemini walked straight up to the end and touched the wall to make sure it wasn't some illusion. It was real. "But I felt like I was on the right path! I did! Maybe I only missed it by one turn?
Gemini quickly trotted back to the most recent turn, looking the opposite way of which she had come, and then setting off. There was a light on in one of the rooms. "It's six something in the morning, who would be up now? Ok…besides myself and Malfoy, that is unless he passed out somewhere. Maybe that would be for the best, I'd have an easier time finding him."
The light came from the library, which they always left turned on. Not to ward off burglars, or because someone might be taking a midnight trip to the bathroom down that hall, just because they always did, and it was a habit that was simplest to not break.
Nothing could have prepared her for the size and structure of the library. "Holy crap in a cauldron!" Gemini gasped, the room was nothing short of astounding.
Shelf upon shelf of books stacked higher than two levels of the house, with a surface area roughly the size of a large ballroom. And then she thought, "No…no…no! This can't be!! How will I ever, in any lifetime, find a book in here! Not just any book, but the one I actually want!"
This would be a problem, indeed it appeared as though the man who built this library would have easily found *himself* lost in it. "I wonder if there are random areas where you can hit an emergency buttons if you get lost…no this isn't a time for jokes. I need to figure out how everything is organized here, in the next decade."
There was something like a main desk in the center of the room; perhaps it contained some kind of muggle system like card catalogues, no obviously not, the desk was big, but it wasn't that big! Approaching, she saw nothing odd or out of place, but when she was ready to go behind and rummage around she noted a sign on the desk.
Please Ring Bell for Service
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Just like the hospital wing, her bed was made with perfectly pressed white sheets. Her walls were white enough to make a person feel blind, and everything in her room was properly stored away.
"Tap, tap, tap."
Madam Pomfrey rolled over in bed; surely she had a few hours of sleep left. "It's probably some first year, coming to tell me that they need a potion to get rid of their extra head…"
"Madam Pomfrey? It's Dumbledore, I'm afraid I have some rather pressing news," came a voice through her door.
"Mhhhh," mumbled the nurse as she found her way out of bed, across the floor, and over to unlock her door. "Hello, Professor Dumbledore," she greeted him, her eyes dim and confused.
"Poppy, this came for you, the owl brought it to my window by mistake. I'm afraid in my confusion at being woken, I opened it before I realized it wasn't addressed to me." He handed her the letter inside an already ripped envelope. His eyes looked concerned and full of sympathy.
Poppy took hold of the paper, smoothed it out, and lowered her eyes to read. When she looked at Dumbledore again, there were tears forming in her eyes and she seemed very distraught. "My brother Ellis just died yesterday - heart attack, my family wants me to come down right away, for a few days."
"I'm sorry, Poppy." And indeed, Dumbledore seemed extremely sorry. "You definitely need to go."
"But, the students, who will take care of them?" Though upset beyond words, Madam Pomfrey was still worried for her students.
"Don't you worry, It's all under control. You should go pack now, right away, and I'll be sure to have someone here to keep watch. Leave as soon as you're ready, I can understand you will want to hurry to be with your family.
"Thank you, Albus…" she seemed ready to say more, but then decided that was enough, for tears were running unchecked down her face.
Dumbledore left the room, closing the door slowly behind him, leaving the poor woman to pack.
Outside in the hall he found the replacement nurse waiting. "Hello, Gilderoy." He greeted him, as cordially as he could.
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Ahead was a table, and a firm, towering wall behind it. The table seemed to be old enough to crumble upon a touch. There was a light tablecloth, made of unfathomable soft silk, and resting on top of all this was an old board and stack of little pegs, collecting dust.
Draco now realized that he was gripping, rather hard, a chair which matched the table, and thought to himself, "Perhaps I'll sit down." No sooner had the thought been completed when the chair suddenly sprang out. Or perhaps, attempted to spring out is the correct way to put it, because Draco was blocking the way, and the result was Draco being slammed in the stomach. He sidestepped the chair, with a hand over his mid-section.
The chair slid out, as it had attempted to do seconds earlier, Draco eyed it suspiciously, almost letting it know he would use it for scrap wood to build a fire if it tried anything else. But it didn't. It was simply a chair. And he was simply sitting at the table, for apparently no good reason, with a blank board and little pegs in front of him.
"What is all this…oh wait let me guess! Another one of the wonderful attributes of the highway to hell." And before his very eyes the board began radiating from the middle out, turning color as it did. Until it was quite obviously a map. Each little room was a different color, with a tiny label. And everything seemed 3-D.
He turned his attention to the pegs, they seemed innocent enough. Draco reached a steady hand to pick them up, planning to give them a good looking over. No sooner had he come within a millimeter of holding them, than his hand had whipped backwards, smacking into his face with great force. His eyes glittered with malice and misgivings.
He removed his wand from the depths of his robes, and pushed it closer, using it as pointer to nudge the pegs with. The wand was no closer than he had been, when it instantly flew out of his grip, up into the air, hit the ceiling, and fell back into his outstretched hand.
"Why can't I pick up these pegs?!" His hand, not of his own accord, jerked forward swept up the pieces and gripped them tight. Draco was not amused. He swore about how screwed up and creepy this whole place was, while moving his arm.
But it didn't move. He tried to move his feet, but they felt plastered to the ground. He opened his mouth to curse, but his lips would not allow it. All he could do was sit there, in a lifeless body, thinking about his lack of motion.
"Oh bloody lord…I'm crippled, paralyzed, trapped…I'm stuck!! Wait - don't panic, there's obviously a simple explanation to why you can't move. Just think. You need to chill out so you can move."
And now, like an accordion, his arm collapsed on the table. It was now so clear to him. Like a puzzle he had to solve in Arithmancy class. He felt dumb, and immensely annoyed all at once. "Every time I've made anything happen it's been after I thought it. The chair, the peg, moving. This is all controlled by thought." Then he paused to contemplate the next logical thing that this situation required. "Put the pegs on the board." He stated.
The pegs pried his hand open and as if a magnet were pulling them flew onto the board and positioned themselves quite obviously in certain rooms. One in a bedroom. A second in the kitchen. One in the cellar. Another off in a black area. And a few in the hallways in between.
What remained to be done? The pegs were on the board, which was a map. Surely that wall behind him would be opening up any second now.
But it didn't open.
Was there any logic to this game? Probably not. The whole thing was probably some torture device to drive him insane. They should have just locked him up with Gemini. It would have worked faster, and been a lot more cost effective than buying a mansion.
The pieces were moving on the board. The whole thing looked like Harry's Marauders Map, which he had overheard Snape ranting about one day in his third year.
"Stupid fool Potter boy. He thinks I don't know what that parchment was! It was James Potter's old map, obvious! If I could just have proved it before Lupin took it. Harry Potter would have been expelled…but no instead we all get to continue putting up with 'pint-sized celebrity'…"
"Maybe I need to put the people in the right rooms? Pick up the piece… put it in the first room…now pick up the second piece and put it in the first room. Put the second piece in second room and the first piece in the first room…" But the damned pieces refused to stop moving long enough for Draco to attempt to form new combinations, it was obviously not going to work.
Something about the map didn't quite make sense to him. He knew the house had to be much larger than that, by far, even from the little bit he and the brat had explored. Draco stared, moving his eyes across the board, counting the rooms, 20… no this was definitely not the entire map. Malfoy Manor had more rooms than that on a single floor.
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On the counter nearest to the stove, she saw a little basket filled with bottles. "This is too easy," Andromeda thought to herself, as she picked out the container Cassiopeia used each morning to get her pills from.
"Paper…paper…paper?" She needed somewhere to write the information down. "Ahh, here we go." She tipped a section off the list that they used to write down things they needed. Pulling the pen out of a nearby holder she eyed the label on the bottle.
"Dr. Lanskolminis…and the prescription is Byhopatomine…" she jotted the information down, using the counter as her desk. Being careful to place her equipment back where she had found it, Andromeda now pocketed the paper and headed upstairs.
"It's too early to fly my broomstick, imagine what kind of riffraff I might come across this early…and I'm too tired to apparate that far. The cellar to the kitchen was one thing. But here to the library is completely different, I'd probably splinch myself. I'll have to get there by floo," she thought as she passed through the corridors, which were, with time, becoming more familiar.
When Andromeda entered her room, she flinched, she had forgotten just what a mess it had been when she left it. The clock bits lay all over the bed, the sheets were all tangled in a mess, a great book was laying next to her bed, and the letter was thrown on the floor. Instead of looking at the mess, she attempted to cross the room, and make her way without thinking about him, it hurt too much.
"Ok, concentrate," she told herself, remembering she had gotten over Sirius Black once; doing again should be all the easier. There was a large, purple bag of floo powder next to the tall fireplace, she threw some in, watched it ignite, and stepped forward through the flames. Closing her eyes thought how Sirius had entered her room through this very same fireplace, only hours before, unable to think straight she stammered "The….li..brrar…y"
When the fire subsided, she was anywhere but a library. She could feel it even before she opened her eyes to look around. It didn't feel like a library.
It wasn't. Unless the library had big, fancy tables, with a diamond chandelier, and a plush carpet. "Uh…oh…" A foreign man that she couldn't identify, came over and said to her "Welcome to The Librrar," he rolled his R's, "Will you be breakfasting alone this morning?"
"Well, actually, I didn't mean to come here at all…" the man looked appalled at her rudeness. "What I mean is, I was trying to get to a library, so if you don't mind I'll just borrow some of your floo powder and be off."
"There is a charge. We receive too many people hereby accident to have them all using our floo powder. The only people allowed powder are people who eat here, the rest pay, one knut."
Andromeda shot him a "Well I never!" look and fished around in the pockets of her robes, extracting a knut and thrusting it at him. "If you get so many people here by mistake maybe you should change the name of the bloody restaurant!" She snatched the floo bag on the floor, picked it up, took care in pouring the entire contents into the fireplace, stepped in and screamed, "The library!" before the man could stop her.
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It took Gemini a few minutes to find her voice, and decide what ought to be done. "What..? Umm, well maybe I should. I certainly won't find anything on my own. It's not like some old witch with thin rimmed glasses on the end of her nose is going to turn up when I hit it. Here goes nothing…ring, ring, ring." She waited with her arms crossed over her chest.
She finally turned away, and started to inspect the desk; that's odd, there was a picture of a family sitting outside "Magic Galore" only the best American Wizarding theme park.
"Excuse me!" said a harsh voice above Gemini, as a hand snatched the frame out of her hands. "Do you mind! And have you any clue how rude it is to ring more than once, as if I didn't have ears, as if I couldn't hear you…" she broke off into mumbling incoherently.
Gemini, finally finished with the Spanish Inquisition, had the opportunity to size-up her assailant. A small woman, old, with thick glasses was standing in front of her. "I just wanted to find a book…"
"You got me up from a perfectly good sleep to find you a book!" The witch looked as though this was the most horridly dumb thing she had ever had the misfortune of hearing.
"Well you know this is a library," Gemini wasn't able to, nor did she trouble to, keep the edge out of her voice. "The sign said please ring for service, maybe if it said please only ring when I am in the right mood to do the job I'm paid for, ring, and expect a thorough yelling, I might understand why you were so rude, but as it stands, you can see the sign."
Apparently the woman could not see the sign, she slid her glasses up her nose and picked it up, reading the one line over ten times, as though she had never seen it in her life. "Oh!" said the witch, understanding flashing across her eyes, "this is Sagitta Estate, well, now I understand, I haven't been here more than once since I first took the job, forty years ago. As a result, I am sorry to tell you but your sign is outdated." She now took the opportunity to reach in her pocket, remove one of a dozen pre-made and folded signs, pick up the old sign, eyeing it with distaste, and place the new one in its spot.
Gemini bent down to read the amended sign.
Please Ring for Service
On the 23rd day of any month of each odd year
Between 5 am and 5 30 am
"Thank you for using, 'Book Find - if we can't find your book, feel free to shut the book on us.'" The witch gave a nod towards the sign, smiled and disappeared as quickly as she had come.
"Well," said Gemini, "that was certainly interesting…Now I need to find that book!"
She sat down at what she finally found, a book catalogue that was in some sort of magical portal. "How does this work?" There was a button on it called search. Gemini hit it, not so sure it was going to work. More likely some message would pop up, that the button was no longer search, it was actually end the world, and thank you for using "End the World Corporations"…
Instead a message came up on her screen, but it was not discernible until she used the sleeve of her robes to push aside the centuries-old dust. She stuck out her tongue in disgust as she quickly tried to rub it off on the table, but alas the table only added more dust, and she raised her eyes skyward. "Is nothing here from this century!"
Turning back to the screen she saw a few categories, title, subject, and author. Apparently she could search for all three. Deciding her best bet was to search for a title she told screen. "Search for Sagitta."
While she waited she rested her head on her arm and wished vaguely about snatching some sleep. No. That was not what she was here to do.
The screen now had a bunch of titles on it:
Sagittarius, Why You Are The Sexiest Sign
Sagittan, The Hot New Resort (glancing at the date: 1128)
Sagittarimos, The Plague That Killed a Thousand Men, And How You Can Start It Again!
Sagitta, a History of Sagitta Estate
She stopped, there was the book! There was the book! "Where is this Sagitta, a History of Sagitta Estate?" Gemini asked the computer. Her eyes were flashing, and though she didn't realize it, she was holding her breath; something was actually going her way!
****
****
"That's disgusting. I pity the baby who has to eat 'Baby-Go, the only thing I'll feed my living, breathing bundle of joy, and perfect for a mother on the run!'" He imitated the woman's voice.
"…wait a second…my living breathing, breathing, bundle of joy…living, breathing…Andromeda does have a daughter…but she's around seventeen years old…and the last time I saw Andromeda…no, definitely not. We were only together once. Definitely not. Then again, Andromeda's not married. And she never talks about Gemini's dad, but well, that's not really first date material…"
A voice in his head asked him. "How would you know? You never got passed the first date…"
"Shut up," he scolded his mind.
"There's no harm in finding out who the father is; as long as Andromeda hasn't got a clue about it…where do you get that kind of information? I'm guessing you can't call about it over the phone…I need to go to a hospital to find out, take a look at her birth certificate. I hope someone will be there? They have to be there; it's a hospital, it's not like they're going to close for the night and kick out all the waiting, sick people." he walked over to the fireplace, and tossing some floo powder inside.
"Well…here goes nothing," he stepped inside, "The Hospital!" he announced, and the room around him faded away.
The hospital materialized around him. Sirius was standing in the front lobby; there wasn't anyone around, and all of the chairs were empty. The tiling was the economy type, off white, with alternating pink and blue.
The last time he had been in the Greater Wizardry Hospital was when he had been born. It had changed a great deal in the time elapsed.
Finding his way over to a map of the building Sirius realized what he was looking for was the information center. It was on level three. Apparating up the distance he found himself now in front of a desk, with a young witch sitting behind it.
She was wearing a halter top with her perfectly flat stomach showing; her hair was dyed an unbelievable shade of red, the nails on her fingers were extremely long, and when she saw him, she ran her tongue -with a tongue ring- over her teeth.
"I find it hard to believe that her clothing fits the hospital's guidelines…" He mused.
Sirius actually felt uncomfortable. He wasn't in the mood to flirt with some tart half his age. All he wanted was to get the information that he wanted to know, and get the hell out of the hospital as quickly and painlessly as possible.
"What's your name?" She asked him right before he could ask here where the birth certificates were filed.
"Sirius and-"
She cut him off, "Sirius? As in serious? My what a dangerous name…" she paused to wink at him. "My name is Natashia," she now ran her finger below the name tag to emphasize the name.
"Right…" he tried to bring the conversation back around to the hospital. "You know a lot about the hospital, right?"
"I know everything there is to know. If you'd like something by way of a tour perhaps?"
"No, that's ok, I can give myself a tour, I'm sure they need you very much here…anyway, do you know where they keep the birth certificate files?"
"Yes, I know where they are…but those are confidential. No one is supposed to get into the room where they're kept." She obviously was proud of the fact that she knew this bit of useful information.
"Is the room locked?" He needed to get in.
"Yeah, but it can't be opened by a simple, 'Alohomora,' you need a specific key." She looked mischieviously, while pulling a chain around her neck from under her shirt to reveal a ring of keys. She singled out one and held it in her hand, swinging it back and forth.
"That key?"
She nodded.
"Well, you know, it's very important," he stressed those last words, "that I get into that room. I'm sure no one would ever notice if you just gave me that key for a minute or two. I'd be in and out before any one ever realized."
"This would be against all policies. It would have to be worth my while," she looked up at Sirius, with large brown eyes.
"Oh, trust me, it would be," and he arched an eyebrow mysteriously.
Natashia fixed him with a devilish grin. Breathlessly removing the chain from around her neck she unhooked the key, and handed it to him. "It's the last door in the corridor, after you turn left over there."
He accepted the key.
"You know, my break is coming up soon, and I'd love to spend it with someone." She fixed him with a glare to melt ice.
"Right, well, good luck on that one. I'm sure you'll be able to find someone who's not too picky." And he left the table, where Natashia sat breathless; she looked both confused and indignant; apparently no one had ever turned her down before.
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Flash. The screen came up again. "Sagitta, a History of Sagitta Estate, can be found in row 2460, shelf three, 7th book over."
She dashed away from the computer, leaving it on. "Row 2460…2460, shelf three, book 7.." She turned it into a song, and repeated it as she passed by rows 403 and 920.
"Only a little while more," she told her self, row 2359 coming into view. She sprinted the rest of the way to row 2460, panting when she finally reached it.
Finding shelf three and the seventh book over was a cinch. Lifting the massive book proved to be the biggest task of all. However, when she had finally brought down the book, and landed, butt first on the floor she ignored the pain in her legs, and the numbing sensation; she had the book!
"Table of Contents…" she ran her finger down the long list, from the finest foods at Sagitta Estate, to a full list of flowers in the garden, and even a section on sports. Flipping the page to find another side of sections she located the one she needed:
A map of Sagitta Estate….page 1642
Turning over half the book she began to reach 1642. "One thousand, six hundred, thirty-nine…one thousand, six hundred, forty…one thousand, six hundred, forty-one…one thousand, six hundred, forty-four…wait! Where is One thousand, six hundred, forty-two!?" She had the page before, and the page after, but the page she needed, along with its back, was ripped out.
She could hardly sense the room around her as she fled out of the library. Making circles in the hallway, unsure of which way to go, not believing anything that was going on, she ran haphazardly through the house, hoping every minute to run straight into Draco Malfoy. When at last she had no idea where she was, she fell onto the floor, searching her mind for another solution to this ordeal, another way to locate Malfoy, rather than trusting in lady luck.
A few minutes later, Gemini stood up, her hair was strewn into her face, her arms were clenched by her sides, and had a new plan in mind. "Find the nearest gargoyle and see if Draco had passed by it."
The gargoyles weren't hard to find…there was at least one on each turn. The first one she approached seemed to be asleep. Gemini's first impulse was to kick it awake, but on second thought, she decided that might not be such a great idea. Leaning over she lightly tapped the gargoyle on the shoulder.
"Mhh…grr…" The gargoyle was waking up.
"Umm," Gemini stalled, "have you seen a boy; tall, blonde hair, about my age wander through here?"
"No!" Snapped the gargoyle, settling it self to go asleep again.
Tap, tap. "Are you sure you haven't seen a boy wander through here?"
"Positive, but if I see one I'll be sure to page you, happy?"
"What?"
"Goodnight." Said the gargoyle shortly, and it was now asleep.
"Don't I wish I was asleep." Gemini muttered as she kicked her foot lightly on one the nearest stone wall.
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The seventh-year, Gryffindor, girls room was quiet, as it should be at six thirty in the morning, when classes don't begin for hours. The drapes were pulled around all the beds, except for one, which was completely empty. Everyone should have been asleep. However, they were not.
In the third bed over, between Parvati's bed, and the empty one for Gemini, was Hermione's bed. And inside of it lay Hermione, but she was not asleep. Instead she was clutching at a piece of paper, in her hand, that she had read at least a dozen times. Next to the paper was an envelope with the stamp of some far away country, and on the paper was a letter, from Viktor Krum.
He had broken up with her four days ago, just before the start of school, through a letter sent back to her by her own owl, after she had sent him a letter.
In a letter. By her own owl. That was how he let her know that he was breaking up with her, he had been traded to another Quidditch team, and didn't think he could spend all year alone, like he had the previous two years.
They had been together two years, though they hardly ever saw each other in between. What a waste of time. She didn't know if in the last year she had even liked Viktor, how could she tell, when their visits were only over the summer. And the last time she had spent with him he seemed distant, as though a girl three years younger than he could no longer hold his attention.
The break up was not necessarily a horrible thing to have happen, but definitely a shock. Though they were certainly not head over heels for each other, she somehow couldn't imagine the day they wouldn't be going out. It had become a habit to consider him her boyfriend. And now she felt as though he weren't even a friend.
No one knew, except Hermione. She felt as though she should tell Ron and Harry, but telling them would hurt so much. Not because she loved Viktor, and was heartbroken, but because the way he had done it hurt so much.
How pathetic would she look when Parvati and Lavendar discovered that her long time, foreign boyfriend broken up with her, through owl post? Extremely. And how bitter did she feel? Extremely.
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Books. That was the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes. "Whew," she thought, "books, everything is fine."
Still feeling rebellious from her actions moments before, Andromeda stopped to observe the library. Yes, there were books, but there was also a great deal more. There were large tables perfect for setting down mounds of heavy books, search portals like the ones back in Sagitta Estate, soundproof booths for people who couldn't be interrupted, and a librarian's desk in the front, with a librarian sitting at it. The walls were painted yellow, and each row of books contained a ladder for reaching the ones that were higher up on the shelf.
Walking up to the librarian's desk, Andromeda rested her hands upon it and looked at the woman. The librarian smiled at Andromeda, but Andromeda didn't smile back. "I'm not in the mood for smiling today, lady," she thought to herself.
"Hello, and how are you? My name is Linny, and I'm the librarian."
"Well, I'm breathing, so that's a plus," said Andromeda not bothering to offer her name in return.
The woman tried another approach. "How can I help you?"
"Is there anyway you could tell me if a certain person is a doctor? And what a kind of medicine is?" Andromeda didn't know much about libraries, but she figured none of this would be possible.
"Why of course, so long as you have it all with you." The woman smiled again.
"Yes, I do." She took the opportunity to flash a very fake smile, which showed all her teeth, while thinking, "Did you think I was going to ask you to search for anyone with the letters Dr. in their name?"
"Ok, let me see then, and I'll see what I can do for you." She didn't smile this time, but she still looked happy.
"Would that woman still be smiling if I took her outside and shoved those chopsticks up her arse…" Andromeda wondered, while removing her sheet of paper from her pocket.
The woman now turned to the portal on her desk and said. "Search for a doctor by the name of Lanskolminis…L-a-n-s-k-o-l-m-i-n-i-s." The portal made a light humming sound, which Andromeda assumed meant it was searching. The librarian took the time to stare around the room, trying to catch the eye of any person in the room, and shine a smile on them.
When the computer stopped making the noise the librarian focused her attention on the screen again. "Miss…are you sure this name is spelled right?"
"Yes." said Andromeda, leaving no room for doubt.
"Well, it appears that there is no such doctor registered in England, or anywhere under that name, might I know what this is for."
"No. Can you please run the same check on the medicine, too?"
"Why sure. It would be my pleasure." Looking at the screen she said "Search for Byhopatomine…b-y-h-o-p-a-t-o-m-i-n-e." The computer made the identical humming noise and this time while they were waiting the librarian asked Andromeda, "So where are you from?"
"England, and yourself?" She attempted to be polite, she was in a bad mood, finding out her mother's doctor didn't exist, moments from her confrontation with Sirius kept popping through her head, and the last thing she wanted to do was be here with this woman, but she couldn't change any of it.
The librarian seemed shocked. Apparently she figured that Andromeda would simply brush her off again, and was almost lost for words. Almost. "Well, I grew up on a farm north of London, and my mum, died when we were ten, so I was sent off to boarding school…" the rest went in one ear and out the other of Andromeda.
"Is this lady still talking? This is what I get for trying to be polite. As if I care at all what this lady's life story is. Maybe I missed it, but when I looked in the mirror this morning I didn't see a sign that said: Blue plate special. I asked where she was from; not to hear about every bug bite she got; or every cookie from Aunt Sally. Note to self: never be polite to librarians." Andromeda sighed.
"…and my first husband left in the middle of the night, never did figure that one out becau-"
"Excuse me," Andromeda interrupted, "but I think it's done searching." She was glad to have a reason to cut off this runaway train of useless blabber.
"Oh how right you are." The librarian looked slightly hurt that she had been cut off before the end of her life story, but she quickly recovered herself when she said, "is there any chance you spelled it wrong?"
Andromeda sighed "No."
"Well, the search says that there is no type of medicine, or anything for that matter by the name of Byhopatomine."
"Well," thought Andromeda, "what a surprise."
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He had an impulse. "There is a black space. What if that isn't for me at all, it isn't the secret tunnel that I am in. Maybe the markers themselves had nothing to do with anything! That black space could be the extra rooms! But where are the extra rooms? Maybe I need to name them? Let's see what rooms is this place missing?" He scanned the map after a few minutes he started listing possibilities. "Ballroom… conservatory… trophy room…" The map looked the same and Draco stared ahead, cold eyes emotionless, and completely nonplused.
He sat there watching the little pegs move over the board. Surely they weren't just there as a distraction? That could be achieved so much easier, through magic to make them a part of the map. Something left out for hundreds of years, would be out for a reason important enough to need it out, wouldn't it??
He hoped so. "Pick up the peg," he said, staring straight at the nearest one. The peg obeyed its commands and flew into his palm. "Open the peg," he commanded, entirely sure that the peg would fly up his nose or something. But it unfolded to reveal a number, 4. "WHAT?! Unless they have numbers as part of their house I don't see what good this does me!" He was quickly visited by a vision of Gemini sitting in a room shaped like a gigantic 4, where everything in the room came in sets of fours. "The most obnoxious part about this, is that I can actually imagine it happening."
One by one, he opened the pegs. 4. 7. 2. 1. 5. 3. 1. 5. He had numbers. NUMBERS. Not pieces of a map, not clues, not even a "Haha, you fool, you're gonna die." Just little pieces of paper with numbers on them. Draco began massaging his temples, not because they hurt, but because he was so thoroughly annoyed that it seemed like the only thing to be done.
He slammed his hand down on the table and halfheartedly said "Get me home." Pretending to actually believe that just like the pegs had flown into his hand, he would fly straight through the wall and back to Hogwarts. But, it was no great shock to him when he found himself still in the chair.
"When I get my hands on that horrible little freak I will throttle her, kick the crap out of her, stick her in this tunnel, and install a speaker system so that I can taunt her and give her false clues while she tries to get out." Somehow just talking about revenge made him feel much better and very in control again. He was Draco Malfoy, and what was this? A pathetic board in some very poorly ventilated tunnel.
"Ok, these numbers mean something. Perhaps they stand for dates when things happened? No… it can't be, I don't know enough from that damned Professor Binn's class to have this be dates," he made a personal note to curse Professor Binn's once he was done with all this, if he ever indeed got out…
Draco had taken just about all he could stomach with this board and its never-ending circles of non-answers. He stood up and stretched out his legs by striding around the tunnel. He stopped under the light of an overhead torch to read his watch. He had avoided looking at it before, simply because what good was it knowing how long he had been there when, he didn't know how long it would be until he was out. At the moment, he just wanted to satisfy his curiosity and do something besides stare at that blasted table. It was 6:30, only an hour and a half after he entered. That wasn't something he liked knowing, when he had already been annoyed by the circumstances. He started counting how long it had been since this journey began when, acting on inspiration, and determination, he sat down again and willed the pieces towards him. He started thinking in his head to arrange them like an equation.
"Three minus one, plus seven, divided by one, times two, minus five is thirteen, one plus three times four is five…no" And so he continued moving the eight pieces around, controlled by his thoughts. Eventually he picked the watch off his arm and thrust it into his pocket, along with the neglected wand, annoyed with himself for checking it again. "Three plus five, divided by one, times 2, minus 1, divided by three, plus four is…seven…damn." The mental list in his head of ones that didn't work mounted, as he continued to try. He had all day, no hurry, he would solve this confounded puzzle, and make Gemini eat it when he was done.
He was no longer tired, which still troubled him. Yet, that he was able to continue staying awake was the reason why, some indiscernible amount of time later, with his head lazily propped on his palm for support; silver hairs sliding into vision, he was able to try another arrangement. "Seven plus three plus five equals fifteen one plus five is six minus two is FOUR!"
Draco stared at the papers, doing the math once more in his head and then in a controlled voice, because he expected another problem to arise, said "Move the papers to the black space." As they fitted themselves onto the board, he watched as they slowly turned into another part of the map. "What's next map?" He asked shrewdly.
As he spoke, he looked up when he heard the sounds of a very old hinge turning. The stones ahead had melted away into a wooden door, which had swung open and beyond it Draco could see a path continuing, he slowly got out of the chair, leaving table and map behind, crossed the threshold, and hardly dared show his pleasure at moving on. Instead he contented himself to stare straight ahead and say "Gemini, you had better start running, because at this rate I'll be killing you, stuffing you for a pillow, and taking a nap on it this afternoon."
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Her progress didn't change much, either gargoyles were too tired to answer, or simply had no information to give her. She stopped asking more than once, if they didn't tell her anything she just kept walking. Therefore there weren't many times when she stopped for more than a few seconds.
The walls of the mansion were becoming darker, and the atmosphere wasn't nearly as inviting. Gemini was nearing the East Wing. Her intentions hadn't brought her there, but after checking everywhere else, this was the last place to look. Draco couldn't have dropped off the face of the earth. Someone had to have seen him. All the same, she wasn't afraid to admit her fear of the forbidden East Wing.
"Maybe, I'll just turn back? What are the chances of Draco having even found the East Wing?" She was trying to find some reason to not to good any further than she already was, which was much further than she had ever wanted to be.
"Oh, not her too. What a shame." came a light voice from her right.
"What a tragedy indeed, two in one night." a separate voice agreed.
Gemini turned; there were only gargoyles. "Did you just say something?" A dumb question, when it had obviously been them, but all the same, she asked.
"Yes, we did, we were commenting on what a pity it was that two of you should enter the East Wing, on the same night, too!"
"Two of us? Someone else was here?" 'Draco' she thought! 'Draco entered the East wing?!'
"Oh yes, there was a boy, tall, blonde, rather handsome if I do say so myself, and he went across to that wall, gave the answer and entered." She said this all in a rather sad voice, Gemini found it hard to believe a gargoyle could care so much, all the rest had been absolute monsters.
"And you LET him!?"
"We tried, we warned him, he looked very tired, I don't think he heard a word we said." This came from the second gargoyle.
"What do you mean he went to the wall, gave the answer, and entered?" Gemini was confused, and tired, and didn't appreciate fishing for answers.
"We mean just that. He went over there, read what it said, gave the answer, and when the wall opened, he stepped through."
"Oh no…oh no, no, no…" Gemini was beyond belief. She ran to the end of the hallway, past more gargoyles who all attempted to warn her, and murmured what "a pity" it was. There was something written on the wall, obviously what the gargoyles had mentioned Draco reading.
You will find many versions of me
Yet only one is right
I can be bent, twisted, thrown away
I've been known to bite
In pure form I'm clear as day
You can find me in black and white
"Uhhh.." Gemini was have trouble taking this all in. Draco was in the East Wing. THE East Wing. Not the West Wing. The East Wing. And somehow she was supposed to figure out this riddle while trying to process all the rest of what was going on?
She resorted to reading it again. After a few minutes she said. "Oh crap, I don't know!…The truth?"
The wall shifted aside, allowing her passage. Chancing a look inside she saw the deep brick walls lined with torches. All of them lit. What to do? "I need to go after him, if he dies in my house that will be the end of me. I'd be a murderess. I'd never be allowed back in school without him!"
What was that on the floor? Someone's robes had gotten caught. Draco's robes. There was no doubt, he was inside. Crossing the threshold, her eyes apprehensively took in the scene around her. Seconds later the door closed behind her. There was no turning back.
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It was only a matter of time, mere minutes, before Sirius was standing in front of the last door, at the end of the corridor, after he had taken the left turn. Sliding the key into the lock, he glanced around, in case anyone was there, and then turned the key slowly until it clicked. He quickly pushed the door open, and slipped inside.
He wandered around the room for a few minutes. He didn't really feel the need to hurry. There was a desk in the back of the room, it was clear, aside from a few papers and some pens in a holder. The walls were painted a pattern of blue and pink.
"Whoever painted this room obviously knew what it was going to be…"
He felt a little weirded-out by the fact of what he was about to do. He was going to check and find out if he was the father of a child he had never really met, from a mother he had a one night stand with years ago. This certainly didn't happen everyday.
"Well, it looks like I'm the only one here," he thought to himself. Each stack of boxes had a different letter on it, apparently they were arranged alphabetically. He was sure there must be some faster system to know where everything was, but whomever ran it was probably asleep at home.
So he positioned himself in front of the first box in the S group. Sagitta. It should be in one of the first boxes, there were about twenty per letter.
When he located the right box, by looking at the first and last one in each box, he started the search for Gemini's name.
"Safra… Sasflomingo… Saturaniaze… Sausagu… Sagain… Sacteri… Sado… Saflaztod… Sagitta…Andromeda…Gemini…"
The first thing he noted was a yellow stamp on the front; though he didn't know it, the stamp meant that Gemini had not been born at that hospital, however her records had been transferred when her family moved.
Sirius began reading the document, "Full name…town…hospital…time…Mother's name: Andromeda Sagitta." He couldn't look, this was crazy. He turned the paper over, and was getting ready to place it back in the box, but part of him wanted to know. He couldn't just leave not knowing, after all he had gone through. Well he hadn't been through that much, but still, he wanted to know. He would always wonder if he didn't find out now, and when was he ever going to have this chance to be in the room where they held all the birth certificates, that weren't supposed to be available to people like him?
He flipped the paper back over, "…Father's name: not given."
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So you'll have to tune in next time to see: Do Draco and Gemini catch up to each other? What does Sirius decide? Will Andromeda say anything? Does Gilderoy Lockhart notice the missing students?
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Thanks for their awesomeness, to:
Emma, don't worry now you know why Hermione was being that way! Little Miss sorry it took so long! Lene I know I'm cruel, and even crueler was that fact that for two months I didn't know what to do with the story…Static (!) Thank you thank you thank you for helping me out so much! What would I have done without you?! I don't know how I would have figured out what was going on with Draco, without your Draco wisdom! And your beta read was so great! Everyone go check out ALL OF STATIC'S STORIES!!! HP Freak, Dauphin, Sarah Black thank you and I agree, Sirius is a babe!, Bill Weasley's Girl IM me to talk! Zannuuh thank you for the great review! Sarah Black I hope this isn't the same person twice! LOL! Tabby I'll talk to you online! Kayle Jim, GEM, Beatles thanks for the really nice review, Ingenious, Morgana, Voodoo thanks for the great review! Silver Theory yay! Someone came here after reading voices, winks at static! Blotts, thanks for your review! M-Girl thanks so much for your letter!, Phoebe, don't worry, he's already suspicous, Holly thanks for the nice, long, review! Toga Lady, Nyias thank you for all your great reviews!
See you all next time, and feel free to make my day and leave a review!
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