A/N: apparently I've made my earlier author's note disappear, another prove I'm new to this and cannot really work with it. Anyway, this is still my first fic, so let me know what you think of it. I've made a few minor changes in the first chapters, like the last name of Steffie's mother's family (from De La Chienne to LaRoche), for the sake of the plot, actually becauseI have changed ita bit too.

Disclaimer: only Steffie, Hecate and Demeter belong to me. Rebecca belongs to my sister, everyone else belongs to JKRowling.

Chapter 2: Getting to know you

The next morning, Steffie woke up by the sound of Ginny's voice.

They went to bed pretty late last night, after another hour of talking about school and their families. Hermione had returned after some time, but went to bed right away, without saying anything to both girls.

Steffie had decided Ginny was a nice girl, but Hermione was way too serious for her own good.

After a moment, Steffie received a shove in her side, she opened her eyes, and glared at the redhead, who stood near her bed.

'Time to get up,' the girl was way too cheery in the morning. Slowly, Steffie, dragged herself out of bed, staggered to the bathroom, took a shower and put on her clothes, a short, lilac skirt and a purple t-shirt.

As she entered the bedroom again, Ginny and Hermione stared at her clothes. Steffie frowned, 'What's wrong?' Ginny answered hesitantly. 'Your clothes are pretty colourful, aren't they?'

Steffie just shrugged. 'That's my way of clothing.'

They left the room, and went to the kitchen, where Molly was preparing breakfast.

As the girls entered the kitchen, Molly greeted them with a cheerful 'good morning, girls'. The girls mumbled something in the same lines as a response.

Molly had decided to start over with Steffie. She looked a bit disapproving when she saw the girls clothes, but didn't say anything about it, instead she asked her if she had slept well.

Steffie, who was in a better mood now, answered in a more friendly way this time. 'Actually, I slept pretty well, Mrs Weasley, except I was woken in the middle of the night by someone snoring in the other room. What's for breakfast?'

Ginny started giggling. 'The snoring was probably my brother Ron.'

Molly smiled 'We are having pancakes for breakfast.'

Now, Steffie pulled a face, 'aren't there any croissants, in France, we always have croissants.'

Molly sighed, 'You are not in France anymore, Steffie, you will have to deal with the British kitchen now.'

'You should be grateful, Steffie, Mrs. Weasley is a great cook.' It was the first time Hermione said something to Steffie this morning. Steffie only sighed exasperatedly and mumbled 'Shut up, miss know-it-all.'

Before another argument could follow, the door to the kitchen opened, and a bunch of three red-haired boys entered loudly. As they noticed Steffie, they stared for a moment, before one of them asked, 'who is she?' Steffie stared right back. She saw two identical looking boys, and another boy who seemed to be their younger brother. Great, she thought, identical twins, are they purposefully trying to make my life here hard?

Molly did the introductions. 'Boys, this is Steffie Black, she just moved in here yesterday evening. Steffie, these are my sons, Ron, who is your age, and Fred and George, watch out for them, they are troublemakers.'

Steffie's eyes lit up when she heard the word troublemakers. But first, she turned to Ron, 'so it was you who kept me awake all night with your snoring, I think we should take turns with sleeping, you can sleep while everyone has left the house.'

Ron's face turned red, he glared at Steffie and sat down beside Hermione without saying a word. Fred and George burst outlaughing.

After some time, Fred managed to say between fits of laughter, 'you're good, a shame we didn't think of that ourselves.'

Steffie smiled, 'Not everyone can be as genious as me.' George grinned wickedly, 'Oh genious, could you save us some time later and look trough some of our ideas, we are starting a joke shop, and who knows we could use a the help of a genious mind.'

Steffie grinned too, 'A joke shop? Great, I would be honoured to help those who need my grand advice.'

Molly looked as if she was about to protest, but at that moment, the door to the kitchen opened again and Sirius and Hecate entered. After that, breakfast went by without much incident.

When breakfast was over, Sirius told Steffie he wanted to talk to her alone later. Her answer was impudent as ever. 'Yes father, I'll see when I can make time for you, kindly wait until I have bought an agenda so we can make an appointment.'

The next moment, Steffie had left the kitchen, leaving her stunned parents staring to the closed door.

Later that day, Sirius managed to catch his daughter finally alone, so they could have a talk. Unfortunately, it didn't exactly go as he had planned or hoped for it to go. Steffie had been talking to Ginny when he entered the girls bedroom, as he entered, Ginny took it as her cue to leave. Sirius opened his mouth to speak, but Steffie cut him off before he could even start.

'I suppose you want to have a father-daughter talk, that's alright with me, but there are a few things I want to make clear first. I'm 15 years old, the greatest part of that time, I have taken care of myself. I've never had a father to tell me what to do and what not, so I don't need one now either. Besides, you don't even know me, and I don't know you, so don't act as if we do know each other.'

After she had ended her firm monologue, Sirius stood there for a few moments, stunned by her harsh words. Then he seated himself beside her on her bed with a sigh.

'I know I haven't been there for you, Steffie, and I am really sorry about it. It was definitely not the way I had wanted things to go. There have happened a lot of things in the past you don't know about, there is a lot you don't know about me. I know I don't really know you either, but I want you to understand that I had wanted to be there, and if there was any way I could change things, I would make those changes in an instant so I could have been there to see you grow up. But I can't change the past as it is, so we have to make the present the best we can. I really want to get know you, Steffie, if you would let me. I understand that you have no need of someone telling you what to do, in fact, I know you wouldn't listen, so I'm not going to.' A mischievous glint appeared in his mostly haunted eyes for a moment. 'But please give me a chance to know my only daughter, maybe I wasn't there when you needed me, but you were in my thoughts every day, you are my only child, and I do love you.'

At first, Steffie wasn't looking at him and pretended she wasn't interested in what he had to say, but as he went on, she had turned towards him. Now she was looking at him, and for the first time in a very long time, she felt as if she could really connect to someone. She saw in his eyes that he was sincere, that he really wanted to get to know her. It wasn't often she felt as wanted and loved as she felt now, for some reason, she had always believed her parents never wanted her to be born at all. Apparently that wasn't true; her father wanted her and loved her and wanted to really know her. At that moment she decided she wanted to know him as well. She noticed tears coming up in her eyes, but she quickly blinked them away, Steffie Black never cried. Instead she smiled at him, and told him she wanted to get to know him too.

Sirius was genuinely surprised at this drastic change in behaviour of his daughter, but he was glad she gave him a chance. So he smiled back at her, and after a short but uncomfortable silence, he told her dinner was probably ready, and left the room quickly.

A few days had passed since their little father-daughter talk, and Steffie had spent most of her time with Ginny or the twins. She had talked to her father too, occasionally, but after their talk, Sirius had started acting gloomily, huffing around the house, although when they talked he seemed to lighten up a bit. He had told her parts of his childhood and schooldays, but there stayed many blank spaces, and he was more interested in talking about her childhood in France. It was Ginny who filled in some of the blank spaces, but she told Steffie that Harry could probably tell her a lot more. Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, appeared to be her father's godson; after Steffie had found out about this little peace of information, she confronted Sirius about it, and since then Harry Potter became a major subject in their talks. Harry became an interesting mystery to her, since everyone at Grimmauld Place was always talking highly of him, while the Daily Prophet was pulling him down in every way possible. Steffie was looking forward at meeting Harry for herself, but all the while, part of her was feeling jealous of him and the way her father liked to talk about his godson.

By the time her first week at Grimmauld Place had passed, Steffie had met everyone of the Order that came there at a regular basis. It was near the end of her first week when she met the most mysterious person she had probably met in her life. One evening, a man she had never seen before had joined them for dinner, this man was around the age of her father; he had greying sandy-brown hair and wore old tattered robes. Every other time when she had met a new Order member, her father had introduced her, but this time it was like he didn't think it necessary, as if he thought they were supposed to know each other already. But what bothered Steffie really was the fact that this man didn't even acknowledge her and after finishing dinner he rushed out of the kitchen again, as if making sure she didn't have a chance to say anything. Now it might sound strange that she took such a thing this personal, but Steffie was pretty sure that when this man exited the kitchen, he had cast a quick glance toward Steffie, as if making sure she hadn't seen him. This strange behaviour bothered Steffie to no extent; she wasn't used to people neglecting her, and it was something she couldn't stand.

After dinner, she asked Ginny who this man was; his name was Remus Lupin, and he appeared to be one of her father's best friends from school and stayed now most of his times in the old house with them. This only added to the mystery; why had her father never mentioned him, while he was around most of the time? Another thing that bothered her greatly was his name. She had once known another Lupin, could they be family? Somehow, she was almost sure they were. She wanted to ask him if he knew Rebecca, but for some reason when she tried to approach him the following days, he seemed to be avoiding her. Thus, Steffie decided to unravel the mysteries that surrounded Remus Lupin.

Thanks to Rose Black, micahmouse, MoonGoddess25 and LunasStar for your reviews.

Rose Black: Her name is actually Persephone, Steffie is short for it.

MoonGoddess: I know Steffie doesn't seem the kindest person, but she doesn't really mean to be cruel or something. She just wants to be herself, and she doesn't care what people think of her, and don't worry, her attitude might change.

LunasStar: I'm with you there, I still believe Sirius is alive, somehow. Anyway, as you see, Steffie starts to warm up to Sirius.