Disclaimers: J.K. Rowling is the sole owner of most of the characters here,
though I'd like to think Trevan Leigh, Julianne Adhlar and the rest of the
originall characters are my own intellectual property. Oh, and since I
neglected this in the initial update, thanks to all reviewers, and I always
like more feedback.
- - -
Part 2
Of People Who Don't Give Good Welcomes
- - -
"Yes, Mrs. Kelson, I'll be careful." A pause as the woman on the other end of the telephone conversation spoke, "Thank you, and I really am sorry for leaving so suddenly, it's just that it's something truly important. You'll take care not to strain yourself too much? Good, thank you. Good bye to you too." Then she placed the phone back in it's holder.
Julianne took a deep breath. This was it then, not quite too late to back out yet. Looking into the stone fireplace, she could still decide not to light that fire, not to toss in that green powder, not to step through to this 'Number 12 Grimmauld Place'. I can still as good as say, that's not my fight and not my place anymore. Being estranged from that part of the world so long, why wouldn't she want to stay that way? Against her better wishes, she already knew she just couldn't let things be when it seemed she might be able to do something for 'the good guys'.
Why did she think they, whoever Albus Dumbledore was currently representing were the 'good guys' anyway? People changed, like she herself had these last fourteen or fifteen years, just because he'd been on the forefront of the effort against You-Know-Who's forces last time didn't mean he was still a good guy. Since when had she cared what side she took in their troubles? It was only because it was a question of someone's life that it mattered.
For all her shortcomings in terms of compassion and empathy, she'd never been able to deny the importance of any life. Whether it was refusing to smash a spider that had somehow gotten into her trunk or not changing a beetle into a button during Transfiguration because she wondered whether that would kill it. There had been times when she'd had some sort of strife with other students but she always stopped at cruel words, and never managed to whip out her wand and actually jinx them because she couldn't bear to actually cause anyone pain. Even if potentially fatal curses or hexes were far beyond her level then, Julianne had always found something about most of those occasionally painful little tricks to be rather reprehensible. Sure, maybe it would only make someone's legs give out for the next several hours, or set a corner of their robes on fire but she'd always stopped before actually using those hexes or curses on anyone. Thankfully, conflict with others occurred rarely, since she didn't have all that many many friends that she could potentially disagree with.
She glanced at herself in the mirror hung above the mantlepiece again. What she saw was a Muggle woman, dressed in demure everyday clothes. Plain woolen skirt that went to her knees, equally bland sweater. Those certainly were a far cry from the loud colors and flamboyant styles of robes that most of the witches and wizards in her day seemed to like wearing. Nothing paticularly witch-like about her rather plain black hair in it's shoulder- legnth layered style, or her straight and mathematically precise features. Brown eyes of an ordinary shade looked back at her balefully, the only thing that showed her magical half was the wand in her hand.
Just this morning she'd taken it out of that rarely used back cupboard, dusted it off with a rag, and tried a small spell on mending one of her slightly torn curtains. It'd hadn't really worked, and Julianne had wondered if wands could take on their own personality. It had felt a little like the old thing hadn't much wanted to cast any small spells being rather pettily upset at having been put away for the last fourteen going on fifteen years. Eleven inches, willow, rather springy, with unicorn tail- hair, one of many very similar ones available for purchase at Ollivander's. As far as she could recall, her wand-buying experience had been rather uneventful, and when she'd finally gotten her hands on an allegedly 'suitable' wand there hadn't been anything more than a few colorful sparks to show it.
"Hmph." She muttered something about how horrible and inefficient Floo power was as she tried to get as much as she could from the evelope by tipping it this way and that, "Maybe I should have waited it out until I could get an Apparition License." She thought out loud.
Lighting the fire took more time than she would have like. She didn't even remember why she hadn't splurged on having a gas fireplace installed along with the other renovations she had commissioned before she first moved in. It certainly would have saved her no small amount of trouble what with having to drag the store-bought logs all the way home. And just tossing lighted matches into the haphazardly stacked pile of wood hadn't been as effective as it should have been. But it could have gone on forever, and Julianne probably would not have minded it too much, better to be slaving away at trying to get the fire going then stepping back into a world she didn't feel much like returning to.
Yet soon she was standing in front of a merrily crackling fire, tongues of orange, red, and yellow flame dancing merrily as she tried to wipe away all her doubts. Some part of her mind realized vaguely that she had no idea what sort of location Number 12 Grimmauld place, was it an office? Someone's home? It would hardly do to pop into some wizarding family's living room even as she was still clutching the letter to verify her identity to whoever could be waiting on the other end.
As she prepared to toss the green powder into the flames, she wondered vaguely at what would happen to her house if she left the fire burning. Hopefully it would just put itself out when it ran out of fuel, and not do any damage to the mostly-wooden structure. She'd grown quite fond of it, having lived here for the last more than 10 years.
Oh, but Floo travel had never made for an entirely pleasant experience. It was like being dragged in some indeterminite direction, she was so disoriented she couldn't even tell if it was down, up, sideways, or somewhere in between. The only thing to be thankful about was that it was also a reasonably quick method of transportation, although it certainly felt like quite a while to someone who was getting dizzier with each passing moment. Supposedly Floo travel wasn't supposed to have quite such an unpleasant effect of anybody, but Julianne did have an unfortunate tendency for motion sickness whether it was by brooms, Muggle automobiles, or even Floo powder.
When she came through, she found herself in an old-fashioned kitchen. Stone floors, long wooden table, and no sign of more modern Muggle appliances. Definitely a wizarding kitchen, or some Muggle might have very strange ideas of how cooking should be done. (She herself had long been accustomed to using microwaves, electric stovetops, and toaster overs. They were actually quite convenient, and if one wasn't going to be using magic to cook anymore, why not employ all those conveniences that most Muggles couldn't do without?)
And then there was a wand being pointed straight at her, by a haggard man with severely graying hair and a very odd mismatched pair of eyes. One was probably of glass, bright blue and spinning madly while the other was darker and beadier, probably the man's natural eye. From her faint memories of notable figures in the wizarding world, this was most likely the Auror Alastor Moody. As far as she could recall, that was the only wizard she'd ever heard of who had resorted to taking on a glass eye.
She winced inwardly, it wasn't exactly the best welcome back to the wizarding world, and she did remember very well all the rather unpleasant things that could be done with a wand. A single word or two, and the possibilities were endless. One could, injure, maim, kill. She wouldn't put anything past that rather crazed looking man whether he was rumored to be on the side of good or not.
"Don't make any sudden movements, and you have five seconds to explain who you are and how you found this place." His words were said with a rather rough, growling voice.
"Ah." Julianne stammered, this was rather sudden and unexpected, as she held out the letter, "Well, this is where it wrote that I had to go to and." She'd as good as forgotten she also had a wand, but she wasn't exactly very confident in her abilities as far as defensive spells went.
She'd have kissed the next person to come into the kitchen, probably after hearing her crash onto the stone floor after coming through the fireplace. It certainly distracted the person threatening her with the wand anyway. Of course, that would probably have gone under sudden movements, and the glass-eyed man was still staring at her. Not the nasty swivelling eye, though, that had spun itself to look at whoever just came through the door, if it was able to look through the back of his head anyway. When you had stepped into the magical world, one never knew.
"You're Miss Julianne Adhlar I presume?" Yes. He had a much more normal voice than the one with the funny eye.
"Yes, that's me." She thrust out the letter in no paticular direction, "This is the place.Er, Number 12 Grimmauld Place, I mean? I'd hate to have messed it up." Still, one had to be careful and she was probably glaring rather unhappily at both of them right now.
One-eyed-man grabbed it, read it quickly, then set it aflame as Julianne just stared. Well, at least it seemed he wasn't going to do something of the sort to her anymore.
- - -
"Oye, what's going on?" Trevan's said in a sleepy drawl, "I thought I heard something crash through or whatnot. And what's Mad-Eye doing getting so riled up with his wand out already hexing anything that moves and half the stuff in this abysmal house that doesn't. Oh."
"Trevan. Leigh?" Yes, it was little Julia, that voice was still the same if only because he had a good memory for nitpicky little things like voice, "It's been a long time." She smiled, most likely at seeing a somewhat familiar face.
"If none of you mind, I'll be whisking her off, she doesn't take well to Floo travel, gets terribly sick afterwards." With that he put his right arm around her shoulders and guided her firmly toward the door, "And Mad-Eye, I'm not putting unwise trust in a relative unknown, we were close friends in our younger days."
"I do not get terribly sick after Floo travel." She said quietly in her usual matter-of-fact tone, "Although it's not exactly pleasant during the ride, for me or for anyone else."
"You're doing it again, you know." He stopped when they were in the hallway, still a very short distance away from the kitchen door and took his arm off of her shoulders.
"What?"
"That thing where you get all odd because you're nervous. It just makes other people wary. That sort of behaviour is what nearly got me hexed six ways to Sunday by ol' Mad-Eye when we first met." He grinned at the memory, "I was just trying to be friendly, but he thought it was highly suspicious."
"Odd? How so?" Julianne inquired with a wry smile on her face, "I didn't notice that so much."
"Oh, but let me count the ways, although I grant you it's difficult to notice unless one has consorted with you since early childhood days. You get all flustered looking, first thing and your face pales. You also push your hair back, and keep your eyes downcast." He ruffled her shoulder- legnth black hair with his hand, "You haven't changed much, I'm glad to see."
"Don't do that." She gently pushed his hand away. "Is anyone else from our schooldays still around? And where are we? I didn't expect such a welcome back, what with a wand that might as well have been openly blazing pointed at my face. And who's the other, how did he know who I was?"
Yes, she hadn't changed and neither had he for the most part. Trevan was somewhat glad to see that in terms of height, he could still best her by a good head and shoulders. A petty thing he knew, at this point in time when there were much more important things to worry about, but he hadn't liked being shorter than her and most girls back in his school days. (Between fifth and sixth year, he'd grown substantially taller and filled out a bit, no longer being the lanky yet dismally short scarecrow he'd been while Julianne was still attending Hogwarts.) Whereas he'd once been just another nerdy bookworm, dimiunitive yet cursed with an oversurfeit of boney limbs, he'd become the self-assured and arguably handsome Trevan he was now. She still asked too many questions, and he was still the sort to like aggravating her.
"Now, now." He started ruffling her hair again, "One question at a time, Julia dear. Although since the other Julianne works far away playing Quidditch somewhere, I guess I can call you by your proper name now."
"That's nice, go on please."
"Alright then, I haven't the authorization to tell you much about this place, a small minority among our old school friends might drop by, I think some of them are in. this." He rubbed his chin, as if he were thinking hard, "You've met Alastor Moody and the other guy was Remus Lupin, you might have met him; he was a seventh year when we were in first, Dumbledore told him to be expecting you. Although Dumbledore should probably have told Moody about it also, as he has a nasty penchant for jinxing first and asking questions later when he thinks there might be a security risk."
"I figured as much." Then she frowned slightly, as if trying to figure out what else she desperately wanted to ask, "And Trevan, who exactly fell through the Veil?"
"Oh, he actually owns this charming place, it's been cleaned up nicely though, was very full of character when we first came here, it's Sirius Black." He smiled rather deviously at the shocked expression on her face, as she was most likely wondering why anyone cared to bring back a convicted murderer.
Right, she'd left right after the disaster with Black's allegedly murdering all those Muggles and Peter Pettigrew in that street way back when. She hadn't been around to hear he'd long since escaped from Azkaban, and certainly had no way of hearing he'd been innocent all along. A full five seconds later, and she was still staring at him with those wide eyes and with jaw practically dropped to the ground. Shocked enough that when that horrid painting of Black's mother started screaming about 'that ungrateful monster' finally being dead and gone, Julianne didn't seem to hear.
- - -
Sirius Black blinked once, twice, three times. There was nothing but darkness, and an odd feeling of weightlessness. Where was this place anyway, and what was he doing here? A sort of leaden calm remained fog-like over his thoughts, as if he was exhausted beyond reason, and couldn't possibly do anything of his own accord. Not until he gave in to the shadows, and let himself rest.
No, he couldn't do that just yet. Not right now, it was difficult to but he remembered what had been happening to him before the darkness had taken over. Yes, he was reasonably sure that he did remember. He remembered Bellatrix Lestrange, a cousin he'd never really liked but recognized almost immediately. They'd been dueling perilously close to an arch, and he'd fallen through when she'd managed to hit him straight-on with a curse that had emanated red light. After that there had been silence, shadows, and that bedamned sense of calm hanging over anything in his mind that resembled coherent thought.
But he couldn't afford to just lie here for an eternity. There were people who still needed him, a was was going on and he had to fight, and how could he rest if Harry didn't know where he was? It would be more than his life's worth to allow his godson to blame himself for whatever plight he was currently finding himself in. No doubt, if he didn't emerge from that arch those remaining on the other side would worry. Knowing the current circumstances, they would probably assume the worst. Most likely if he didn't contact them soon, the would think that he'd. died.
Knowing Harry, he'd blame himself. From all their correspondence, from all that he knew about his godson - even if it wasn't much, Harry always seemed to harbour some guilt whenever something tragic happened. Just as Sirius had been blaming himself earlier, whenever the smallest setback occurred, he always had to wonder, what if he'd been able to help? That sort of guilt had been the basis for his insisting on going with the other Order members when they realized that Harry had gone to the Department of Mysteries. Guilt was what had landed him in this position, wherever he was. Such guilt was potentially dangerous, leading even the most rational people to do rash and foolish things. Not that he'd ever been among the most rational of people. And if Harry was safe, participating in the rescue mission was hardly rash or foolish.
Funny, his thoughts didn't usually wander like that. Except in the past year when he'd been ordered to stay at that horrid house with only his mother's painting and occasionally Kreacher for company or in the year before that when he'd been hiding in a cave near Hogsmeade while his godson had been competing in the Triwizard Tournament. (For the record, Buckbeak the hippogriff had been much better company than Kreacher and his mother's painting put together.)
Was there anything stopping him from getting up and going back through the arch? It would be rather risky to attempt at leaving the Ministry building undetected, but at this point letting word get out that he was alive and well was most important. So that no one would have to feel any sort of guilt over him.
- - -
Author's Notes: The part with Sirius in it was rather weak, if I do say so myself, but around part seven or so, he'll have been extracted from beyond the Veil already, and he will be playing a much larger role. Sirius x OC (Julianne) won't appear for a while though, since it doesn't look like it's going to be a main focal point of Cursed.
I'm also possessed with a sudden urge to write of Julianne's school days, focusing mainly on the 'other' Julianne, a Quidditch player referred to by her last name for the sake of not getting the two mixed up. The first part of that will come up soon, although it'll be almost wholly an OC-centric story, with mentions of MWPP and the oldest Weasley boys. (James Potter and Sirius Black are already coming to be rather bratty, a la 'Snape's Worst Memory', though that's because the story is seen through the eyes of a rival Quidditch player.
I've rather come to the conclusion that Trevan and Julianne aren't going to be really MS or GS-ish in the most obvious ways at least. Trevan's not very well-respected by the canon characters because he's less than entirely friendly to them, all his work for the Order has gotten to him a bit. Julianne meanwhile, is too busy trying to distance herself from them to be 'perfect' in behaviour. Oh well, I have several more parts and two 'interludes' already in the works, although I keep on modifying them. (Although the canon romance is almost always a big no-no, but I guess it can be done alright, and we have yet to see if mine will be one of those?)
Until next part that I feel has been polished enough, see you! (I forgot to thank my reviewers as of yet, and request yet more to further inflate me steadily growing ego. So please, leave a comment or two.)
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Part 2
Of People Who Don't Give Good Welcomes
- - -
"Yes, Mrs. Kelson, I'll be careful." A pause as the woman on the other end of the telephone conversation spoke, "Thank you, and I really am sorry for leaving so suddenly, it's just that it's something truly important. You'll take care not to strain yourself too much? Good, thank you. Good bye to you too." Then she placed the phone back in it's holder.
Julianne took a deep breath. This was it then, not quite too late to back out yet. Looking into the stone fireplace, she could still decide not to light that fire, not to toss in that green powder, not to step through to this 'Number 12 Grimmauld Place'. I can still as good as say, that's not my fight and not my place anymore. Being estranged from that part of the world so long, why wouldn't she want to stay that way? Against her better wishes, she already knew she just couldn't let things be when it seemed she might be able to do something for 'the good guys'.
Why did she think they, whoever Albus Dumbledore was currently representing were the 'good guys' anyway? People changed, like she herself had these last fourteen or fifteen years, just because he'd been on the forefront of the effort against You-Know-Who's forces last time didn't mean he was still a good guy. Since when had she cared what side she took in their troubles? It was only because it was a question of someone's life that it mattered.
For all her shortcomings in terms of compassion and empathy, she'd never been able to deny the importance of any life. Whether it was refusing to smash a spider that had somehow gotten into her trunk or not changing a beetle into a button during Transfiguration because she wondered whether that would kill it. There had been times when she'd had some sort of strife with other students but she always stopped at cruel words, and never managed to whip out her wand and actually jinx them because she couldn't bear to actually cause anyone pain. Even if potentially fatal curses or hexes were far beyond her level then, Julianne had always found something about most of those occasionally painful little tricks to be rather reprehensible. Sure, maybe it would only make someone's legs give out for the next several hours, or set a corner of their robes on fire but she'd always stopped before actually using those hexes or curses on anyone. Thankfully, conflict with others occurred rarely, since she didn't have all that many many friends that she could potentially disagree with.
She glanced at herself in the mirror hung above the mantlepiece again. What she saw was a Muggle woman, dressed in demure everyday clothes. Plain woolen skirt that went to her knees, equally bland sweater. Those certainly were a far cry from the loud colors and flamboyant styles of robes that most of the witches and wizards in her day seemed to like wearing. Nothing paticularly witch-like about her rather plain black hair in it's shoulder- legnth layered style, or her straight and mathematically precise features. Brown eyes of an ordinary shade looked back at her balefully, the only thing that showed her magical half was the wand in her hand.
Just this morning she'd taken it out of that rarely used back cupboard, dusted it off with a rag, and tried a small spell on mending one of her slightly torn curtains. It'd hadn't really worked, and Julianne had wondered if wands could take on their own personality. It had felt a little like the old thing hadn't much wanted to cast any small spells being rather pettily upset at having been put away for the last fourteen going on fifteen years. Eleven inches, willow, rather springy, with unicorn tail- hair, one of many very similar ones available for purchase at Ollivander's. As far as she could recall, her wand-buying experience had been rather uneventful, and when she'd finally gotten her hands on an allegedly 'suitable' wand there hadn't been anything more than a few colorful sparks to show it.
"Hmph." She muttered something about how horrible and inefficient Floo power was as she tried to get as much as she could from the evelope by tipping it this way and that, "Maybe I should have waited it out until I could get an Apparition License." She thought out loud.
Lighting the fire took more time than she would have like. She didn't even remember why she hadn't splurged on having a gas fireplace installed along with the other renovations she had commissioned before she first moved in. It certainly would have saved her no small amount of trouble what with having to drag the store-bought logs all the way home. And just tossing lighted matches into the haphazardly stacked pile of wood hadn't been as effective as it should have been. But it could have gone on forever, and Julianne probably would not have minded it too much, better to be slaving away at trying to get the fire going then stepping back into a world she didn't feel much like returning to.
Yet soon she was standing in front of a merrily crackling fire, tongues of orange, red, and yellow flame dancing merrily as she tried to wipe away all her doubts. Some part of her mind realized vaguely that she had no idea what sort of location Number 12 Grimmauld place, was it an office? Someone's home? It would hardly do to pop into some wizarding family's living room even as she was still clutching the letter to verify her identity to whoever could be waiting on the other end.
As she prepared to toss the green powder into the flames, she wondered vaguely at what would happen to her house if she left the fire burning. Hopefully it would just put itself out when it ran out of fuel, and not do any damage to the mostly-wooden structure. She'd grown quite fond of it, having lived here for the last more than 10 years.
Oh, but Floo travel had never made for an entirely pleasant experience. It was like being dragged in some indeterminite direction, she was so disoriented she couldn't even tell if it was down, up, sideways, or somewhere in between. The only thing to be thankful about was that it was also a reasonably quick method of transportation, although it certainly felt like quite a while to someone who was getting dizzier with each passing moment. Supposedly Floo travel wasn't supposed to have quite such an unpleasant effect of anybody, but Julianne did have an unfortunate tendency for motion sickness whether it was by brooms, Muggle automobiles, or even Floo powder.
When she came through, she found herself in an old-fashioned kitchen. Stone floors, long wooden table, and no sign of more modern Muggle appliances. Definitely a wizarding kitchen, or some Muggle might have very strange ideas of how cooking should be done. (She herself had long been accustomed to using microwaves, electric stovetops, and toaster overs. They were actually quite convenient, and if one wasn't going to be using magic to cook anymore, why not employ all those conveniences that most Muggles couldn't do without?)
And then there was a wand being pointed straight at her, by a haggard man with severely graying hair and a very odd mismatched pair of eyes. One was probably of glass, bright blue and spinning madly while the other was darker and beadier, probably the man's natural eye. From her faint memories of notable figures in the wizarding world, this was most likely the Auror Alastor Moody. As far as she could recall, that was the only wizard she'd ever heard of who had resorted to taking on a glass eye.
She winced inwardly, it wasn't exactly the best welcome back to the wizarding world, and she did remember very well all the rather unpleasant things that could be done with a wand. A single word or two, and the possibilities were endless. One could, injure, maim, kill. She wouldn't put anything past that rather crazed looking man whether he was rumored to be on the side of good or not.
"Don't make any sudden movements, and you have five seconds to explain who you are and how you found this place." His words were said with a rather rough, growling voice.
"Ah." Julianne stammered, this was rather sudden and unexpected, as she held out the letter, "Well, this is where it wrote that I had to go to and." She'd as good as forgotten she also had a wand, but she wasn't exactly very confident in her abilities as far as defensive spells went.
She'd have kissed the next person to come into the kitchen, probably after hearing her crash onto the stone floor after coming through the fireplace. It certainly distracted the person threatening her with the wand anyway. Of course, that would probably have gone under sudden movements, and the glass-eyed man was still staring at her. Not the nasty swivelling eye, though, that had spun itself to look at whoever just came through the door, if it was able to look through the back of his head anyway. When you had stepped into the magical world, one never knew.
"You're Miss Julianne Adhlar I presume?" Yes. He had a much more normal voice than the one with the funny eye.
"Yes, that's me." She thrust out the letter in no paticular direction, "This is the place.Er, Number 12 Grimmauld Place, I mean? I'd hate to have messed it up." Still, one had to be careful and she was probably glaring rather unhappily at both of them right now.
One-eyed-man grabbed it, read it quickly, then set it aflame as Julianne just stared. Well, at least it seemed he wasn't going to do something of the sort to her anymore.
- - -
"Oye, what's going on?" Trevan's said in a sleepy drawl, "I thought I heard something crash through or whatnot. And what's Mad-Eye doing getting so riled up with his wand out already hexing anything that moves and half the stuff in this abysmal house that doesn't. Oh."
"Trevan. Leigh?" Yes, it was little Julia, that voice was still the same if only because he had a good memory for nitpicky little things like voice, "It's been a long time." She smiled, most likely at seeing a somewhat familiar face.
"If none of you mind, I'll be whisking her off, she doesn't take well to Floo travel, gets terribly sick afterwards." With that he put his right arm around her shoulders and guided her firmly toward the door, "And Mad-Eye, I'm not putting unwise trust in a relative unknown, we were close friends in our younger days."
"I do not get terribly sick after Floo travel." She said quietly in her usual matter-of-fact tone, "Although it's not exactly pleasant during the ride, for me or for anyone else."
"You're doing it again, you know." He stopped when they were in the hallway, still a very short distance away from the kitchen door and took his arm off of her shoulders.
"What?"
"That thing where you get all odd because you're nervous. It just makes other people wary. That sort of behaviour is what nearly got me hexed six ways to Sunday by ol' Mad-Eye when we first met." He grinned at the memory, "I was just trying to be friendly, but he thought it was highly suspicious."
"Odd? How so?" Julianne inquired with a wry smile on her face, "I didn't notice that so much."
"Oh, but let me count the ways, although I grant you it's difficult to notice unless one has consorted with you since early childhood days. You get all flustered looking, first thing and your face pales. You also push your hair back, and keep your eyes downcast." He ruffled her shoulder- legnth black hair with his hand, "You haven't changed much, I'm glad to see."
"Don't do that." She gently pushed his hand away. "Is anyone else from our schooldays still around? And where are we? I didn't expect such a welcome back, what with a wand that might as well have been openly blazing pointed at my face. And who's the other, how did he know who I was?"
Yes, she hadn't changed and neither had he for the most part. Trevan was somewhat glad to see that in terms of height, he could still best her by a good head and shoulders. A petty thing he knew, at this point in time when there were much more important things to worry about, but he hadn't liked being shorter than her and most girls back in his school days. (Between fifth and sixth year, he'd grown substantially taller and filled out a bit, no longer being the lanky yet dismally short scarecrow he'd been while Julianne was still attending Hogwarts.) Whereas he'd once been just another nerdy bookworm, dimiunitive yet cursed with an oversurfeit of boney limbs, he'd become the self-assured and arguably handsome Trevan he was now. She still asked too many questions, and he was still the sort to like aggravating her.
"Now, now." He started ruffling her hair again, "One question at a time, Julia dear. Although since the other Julianne works far away playing Quidditch somewhere, I guess I can call you by your proper name now."
"That's nice, go on please."
"Alright then, I haven't the authorization to tell you much about this place, a small minority among our old school friends might drop by, I think some of them are in. this." He rubbed his chin, as if he were thinking hard, "You've met Alastor Moody and the other guy was Remus Lupin, you might have met him; he was a seventh year when we were in first, Dumbledore told him to be expecting you. Although Dumbledore should probably have told Moody about it also, as he has a nasty penchant for jinxing first and asking questions later when he thinks there might be a security risk."
"I figured as much." Then she frowned slightly, as if trying to figure out what else she desperately wanted to ask, "And Trevan, who exactly fell through the Veil?"
"Oh, he actually owns this charming place, it's been cleaned up nicely though, was very full of character when we first came here, it's Sirius Black." He smiled rather deviously at the shocked expression on her face, as she was most likely wondering why anyone cared to bring back a convicted murderer.
Right, she'd left right after the disaster with Black's allegedly murdering all those Muggles and Peter Pettigrew in that street way back when. She hadn't been around to hear he'd long since escaped from Azkaban, and certainly had no way of hearing he'd been innocent all along. A full five seconds later, and she was still staring at him with those wide eyes and with jaw practically dropped to the ground. Shocked enough that when that horrid painting of Black's mother started screaming about 'that ungrateful monster' finally being dead and gone, Julianne didn't seem to hear.
- - -
Sirius Black blinked once, twice, three times. There was nothing but darkness, and an odd feeling of weightlessness. Where was this place anyway, and what was he doing here? A sort of leaden calm remained fog-like over his thoughts, as if he was exhausted beyond reason, and couldn't possibly do anything of his own accord. Not until he gave in to the shadows, and let himself rest.
No, he couldn't do that just yet. Not right now, it was difficult to but he remembered what had been happening to him before the darkness had taken over. Yes, he was reasonably sure that he did remember. He remembered Bellatrix Lestrange, a cousin he'd never really liked but recognized almost immediately. They'd been dueling perilously close to an arch, and he'd fallen through when she'd managed to hit him straight-on with a curse that had emanated red light. After that there had been silence, shadows, and that bedamned sense of calm hanging over anything in his mind that resembled coherent thought.
But he couldn't afford to just lie here for an eternity. There were people who still needed him, a was was going on and he had to fight, and how could he rest if Harry didn't know where he was? It would be more than his life's worth to allow his godson to blame himself for whatever plight he was currently finding himself in. No doubt, if he didn't emerge from that arch those remaining on the other side would worry. Knowing the current circumstances, they would probably assume the worst. Most likely if he didn't contact them soon, the would think that he'd. died.
Knowing Harry, he'd blame himself. From all their correspondence, from all that he knew about his godson - even if it wasn't much, Harry always seemed to harbour some guilt whenever something tragic happened. Just as Sirius had been blaming himself earlier, whenever the smallest setback occurred, he always had to wonder, what if he'd been able to help? That sort of guilt had been the basis for his insisting on going with the other Order members when they realized that Harry had gone to the Department of Mysteries. Guilt was what had landed him in this position, wherever he was. Such guilt was potentially dangerous, leading even the most rational people to do rash and foolish things. Not that he'd ever been among the most rational of people. And if Harry was safe, participating in the rescue mission was hardly rash or foolish.
Funny, his thoughts didn't usually wander like that. Except in the past year when he'd been ordered to stay at that horrid house with only his mother's painting and occasionally Kreacher for company or in the year before that when he'd been hiding in a cave near Hogsmeade while his godson had been competing in the Triwizard Tournament. (For the record, Buckbeak the hippogriff had been much better company than Kreacher and his mother's painting put together.)
Was there anything stopping him from getting up and going back through the arch? It would be rather risky to attempt at leaving the Ministry building undetected, but at this point letting word get out that he was alive and well was most important. So that no one would have to feel any sort of guilt over him.
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Author's Notes: The part with Sirius in it was rather weak, if I do say so myself, but around part seven or so, he'll have been extracted from beyond the Veil already, and he will be playing a much larger role. Sirius x OC (Julianne) won't appear for a while though, since it doesn't look like it's going to be a main focal point of Cursed.
I'm also possessed with a sudden urge to write of Julianne's school days, focusing mainly on the 'other' Julianne, a Quidditch player referred to by her last name for the sake of not getting the two mixed up. The first part of that will come up soon, although it'll be almost wholly an OC-centric story, with mentions of MWPP and the oldest Weasley boys. (James Potter and Sirius Black are already coming to be rather bratty, a la 'Snape's Worst Memory', though that's because the story is seen through the eyes of a rival Quidditch player.
I've rather come to the conclusion that Trevan and Julianne aren't going to be really MS or GS-ish in the most obvious ways at least. Trevan's not very well-respected by the canon characters because he's less than entirely friendly to them, all his work for the Order has gotten to him a bit. Julianne meanwhile, is too busy trying to distance herself from them to be 'perfect' in behaviour. Oh well, I have several more parts and two 'interludes' already in the works, although I keep on modifying them. (Although the canon romance is almost always a big no-no, but I guess it can be done alright, and we have yet to see if mine will be one of those?)
Until next part that I feel has been polished enough, see you! (I forgot to thank my reviewers as of yet, and request yet more to further inflate me steadily growing ego. So please, leave a comment or two.)