DISCLAIMER: Bla dee bla dee bla…if you really want to read it, click the back button on your browser and you'll see it at the top of the last chapter.
Okay, so this is the next chapter. Creepy things begin to happen with you-know-who's rise to power, and one of the gang will leave forever.
Want to read it yet? Here it is.
SIT VIS TECUM—Chapter 9
"Blimey, this is her?"
It was a few hours later, after all of the dinner platters and dishes had disappeared and the long wooden tables magically scrubbed. Sara sat in the Great Hall with James, Lily, Sirius, Remus, and Rena at the far end of the Gryffindor table. They were all crowded over a large book covered in blue cloth, whose cover, though it could not be seen at the present moment, bore the Beaumore Academy for Young Sorcerers crest imprinted in gold and stuck fast with magic.
The book was a photo album, a scrapbook of sorts, filled with magically moving photographs and other trinkets symbolic of Sara's adventures and misadventures with her friends back in the States. The page they were on, the first one, bore a large photograph of all who had contributed to making the book. It comprised of maybe a dozen and a half young witches and wizards, all smiling and waving at her. The album had been a gift that was mailed shortly before the letter came; some of Sara's friends from her old school had decided to put the album together as a late parting gift.
"So these are all the people who helped to make the scrapbook for you?" Rena asked curiously, eyeing a particularly muscular boy in the photograph who had light hair and hazel eyes with interest.
"Yes," she said as she felt a stab of pride. "And yes, Sirius, that's Ariana," she said to Sirius, who had been eagerly indicating a girl with curly chestnut-brown hair and warm brown eyes who was smiling and waving perhaps the most energetically of all in the photo.
"Excellent," he said, absentmindedly running a hand through his elegant black hair. "I am definitely writing and sending a photo to her." He turned back to Sara. "Are you sure you don't mind?" Sara grinned.
"No, Sirius, for the tenth time, go for it. I can't control you, but please be nice, she is my best friend, after all." James snorted as Sirius began to pull a clean sheet of parchment and a quill and ink from his bag and smoothed the parchment out on the table.
"This should be interesting,"Remus muttered so that they could all hear. Rena and Sara sniggered at him, and Lily seemed to be laughing silently.
"Okay, cool, Sara. Do you mind if we look at the rest of it?"Lily asked from across the table. The others looked up eagerly.
"Sure, I don't mind," she said earnestly, flipping the page. Pages and pages of photographs followed, some with Sara in them, and many more of others with whom she had been close. Every few pages, there would be an object, like a feather or a charred coin, which was fastened to the page with an interesting story behind it.
"So what happened then?" Sirius asked, having momentarily abandoned his letter to Ariana to listen to the story.
"He walked right into the trap," Sara said, grinning mischievously.
"He fell for it?" Rena asked, captivated by the details of the story. Even Remus had laid his book down to listen.
"Completely; and so the next thing that we knew, Marquez was shrieking about something (we knew, of course, exactly what it was), and ran screaming like a girl all the way to the school nurse's office, handsclamped ontohis –"
"You put an engorgement charm on his—" Lily began to ask, making sure she was getting the point.
"Gonads, testicles, balls, genitals—" Sirius listed, counting on his fingers, shaking madly with laughter.
"I think that Sirius has gotten the point," Sara said, glancing around at them. Remus and Lily looked slightly pained, but the rest of them were nearly howling with laughter. Sara,who rememberedthe incident as clearly as if it had happened the day before, grinned widely and laughed with them.
"Don't you think that might have been a little harsh?" Lily asked a moment later after the rest of them had quieted their laughter. Sara shrugged.
"Oh, come on, Lil," Rena said, throwing her arm over Lily's shoulders. "Sara and her friends were just teaching the boy a lesson about the hazards of bragging."
"Yeah," James laughed, "I doubt that any guy in that school will be flaunting his manliness too much in the next few years." Sirius suddenly stopped laughing, his face lit up.
"Hey," he said, grinning mischievously, "what if we—"
"No," said Lily flatly.
"But Malfoy—"
"Don't even think about it."
"I'm already thinking about it, and I'm liking the thoughts." He turned to Sara. "Could you explain how exactly you did that engorgement thing? I think it'd be—"
"Sirius, please," Lily started, beginning to look visibly upset. "We don't need to cause any more trouble."
"I think she's right, guys," Remus said, looking up again from his book. "I don't think that we need to be giving Malfoy or Snape any more reason to attack us."
"What reason do they have to begin with?" James asked, his voice suddenly exploding with anger. "Lily being Muggle-born? My being good at Quidditch? Sirius being a blood-traitor? Remus or Sara being intelligent?" Sara thought that she hadn't even known them long enough to be a reason to provoke attack from a couple of slimy Slytherins. She shot James a look that quite clearly read 'Don't bring me into this,' but he ignored her and continued his rant. "They're reasons, yes, but their validity equals about as much as a pile of doxy droppings." James ran a hand up and back through his hair, not because he wanted to look as if he had just been off of his broomstick (which, Lily had told her, was something that he often did), but out of blatant anger and frustration.
Sara was somewhat surprised by the sudden shower of rage James had emitted, but as she looked around at everyone else, she realized that she was the only one astonished by his temper. Remus had buried himself back in his book, but Lily and Rena looked at him with sympathetic eyes, as if knowing that there was nothing to do about his frustration except let him vent. Sirius reached over and patted him on the shoulder.
"It's okay, mate," he said, trying to sound comforting. "We know that the Slytherins are nothing but pathetic, slimy gits anyway."
"We just need to deal with it the best we can until we're out of here," Rena put in. Lily sat in her seat, staring somewhat guiltily into her lap, her eyes taking on a sort of glazed, watery look. She was carefully choosing not to look at any of them, as though the issue at hand were singularly her fault.
"I know, I know," said James in a much calmer voice (though he heaved a massive sigh). "But it kills me, you know? We are persecuted for simply living, and for circumstances we have no control over." Sara saw that he glanced in Remus' direction for a moment. Remus, as though he knew what James was doing, carefully met his eye and a glint of warning seemed to come into it, but it left so quickly as they broke eye contact that Sara might have imagined it; it was a look as if to say 'Not now.'
"Forget about it, James," Lily said, so quietly that Sara might not have heard it if she hadn't been sitting next to her at the time. James looked like he was about ready to go into another fit of rage, but he held his tongue and simply nodded, pretending to be extraordinarily interested in his fingernails.
The silence that followed was so heavy and tense that Sara was tempted to leave; however, she neither wanted to linger there nor be the first one to make a very obvious attempt to break a very pregnant moment. She sat there, smoothly resting her hands in her lap, waiting and watching, hoping, for somebody to do something.
To her relief, a very pregnant pause later, Rena valiantly cleared her throat softly and redirected her attention to the photo album spread out on the table, turning the page. Spread across both pages was an enlarged photograph that must have contained over one hundred people. They were all spread over a stone staircase leading up to a large brick building, younger ones on the lower stairs, and the older ones on the higher stairs. Glad to have a distraction, Sara leaned over the book and quickly spotted herself and her friends, smiling at the memories.
"What's this photo of?" Rena asked quietly, as if easing cautiously back into a louder volume. The others, seeming just as relieved at the distraction, leaned over the album.
"That," Sara said, "was my dormitory photo from last year; Andromeda house." Rena nodded, looking at the photo more closely.
"Wow, is that you?" Sirius asked, pointing to a longer-haired version of herself from the beginning of the previous school year at Beaumore. Sara nodded, smiling.
"Yes, and there's Ariana, and my friend Kaleigh," she said, indicating a witch with almond-shaped brown eyes and long, wavy white-blond hair, "as well as Austin," she indicated a young wizard with sandy hair and hazel eyes, "Maria," she pointed to a girl with olive skin, smooth, dark hair and glasses, "and Frankie," an Asian boy with jet-black hair and matching eyes.
"Who's the kid that's with you?" Lily asked, referring to a small girl no older than ten who had her arms wrapped over Sara's neck and was peeking over her shoulder, giggling and waving enthusiastically.
"Oh, that's my little sister, Olivia," Sara responded, looking fondly at the girl's long, curly hair and blue eyes. "I should really write to her, actually."
"You have a sister? I thought you said—"Rena began, looking confused.
"Sorry, she's not really my sister. In the fifth grade—year, I mean—each person is assigned a little sister or brother as a kind of bonding activity. That way, they get to meet the older students and get, you know, advice on classes or someone to tutor them when they need help. It's kind of a mentoring thing."
"Hey, that's cool…that would be fun if Hogwarts did that, don't you think?" Lily asked enthusiastically. Rena laughed, pointing at James and Sirius, who both had identical smirks on their faces.
"Maybe not for them, though," she said, "it looks like they're planning some sort of torture or something." The girls grinned at each other, continuing to flip through the pages of the book. The last of the photos was the only one that was taken after Sara's parents had died. It was of Sara and Ariana, arms thrown around each other in front of Sara's old house.
"That's kind of depressing," Remus said, frowning slightly. "Why were the two of you moping?" Sara bit her bottom lip, feeling their eyes on her. She stared at the photograph, suddenly missing her old house and the life she had in it more than ever.
"That," Sara began quietly, "was taken right before I was shipped off to England." Her eyes widened; another slip. "I-I mean, you know, when I came here." James and Lily exchanged looks; Lily's said plainly 'I told you something was up.' Sara shrugged.
"It's okay," Sirius said. "I understand if you didn't want to move. The States seems like a cool place to be." Sara gave them a small smile.
"Yeah, it was," she said. "I really do miss everyone there, but you all remind me of them a little—well, a lot actually. Mostly," she added, turning toward James and Sirius, "the same love of playing pranks on people." The two guys cracked a huge grin.
"Speaking of pranks," James said quietly, glancing around at everyone. "I reckon it's time to start planning our Halloween bash." He grinned at Sirius, Rena, and Remus. Lily, it seemed, still seemed to be avoiding his eyes, but the expression on her face was one of obvious displeasure. At hearing these words from James, Remus' face, too, fell as he sadly laid down his book.
"What's up Moony? Why so blue? The Halloween prank is always amazing," Sirius said, confused. Remus looked more sullen than ever.
"I know, that's the problem," he said miserably. "It's the full moon on Halloween this year." Sara was slightly puzzled.
"So, why is that bad?" she asked. James' eyes widened with the same look as when she had run into him at King's Cross weeks ago, and the expression on Sirius' face wasn't much different. Rena was staring at her brother, horrified, who in turn picked up his book and hid his face behind it. Lily, too, looked as if she had just realized that something was out of place.
"I have to visit my mother," Remus replied quickly, his forehead (the bit that Sara could see, anyway) reddened over the book (which was upside-down). "She's ill." Next to her, Rena put her elbow on the table and rested her forehead in her hand, seeming to realize something that her twin did not.
"What about Rena?" Sara asked, growing more confused by the second.
"I go on the new moon," Rena said, not facing Sara.
"But the new moon was last week, and you were—"
"Sara," Lily said cautiously. "I don't think that we should talk about this—"
"I'm only curious and, quite frankly, extremely confused," Sara said, slightly angered. "None of it makes sense."
"Yes, it does," said Remus quietly. Sara nodded, giving up. She wasn't going to pry—she didn't want to lose some of the best friends that she had at Hogwarts.
The following day, a large flyer had been put up on the Ravenclaw message board. Quidditch tryouts were scheduled for the following Friday evening on the quidditch pitch on the lawn. This news caused a great buzz of excitement from many of the students, but equally as many were unfazed by this news.
"I don't know what's so exciting about quidditch, anyway," Lisa Finelli said over a large plate of oatmeal in the Great Hall for breakfast. A great groan went up from all of the Ravenclaw 5th-years who were sitting around her at breakfast. Noah Baker nudged Sara's right shoulder, momentarily ignoring his own breakfast.
"She makes this speech at least twice every year," he said, muttering low under his breath. "Once at the start of the season, and once before the final match at the end of the season. We all know it nearly by heart by now." Sara raised her eyebrows and continued to resolutely stir sugar into her tea.
"Oh, really, Lisa, do we really need to hear this speech again?" Alaina asked, throwing up her arms in a gesture of dramatic exasperation.
"Whatever you say," Lisa replied, sniffing indignantly and letting her spoon fall back into the dish of oatmeal. "But just because—"
"You don't think that people chasing balls on broomsticks is a sport—" Luke chimed in.
"Doesn't mean that we can't have our fun with it." Serenica finished monotonously, rolling her eyes and taking a sip of her pumpkin juice. "Yeah, yeah, we know, we know."
"Lisa's 'quidditch is stupid' speech?" Tabitha Lou asked, swinging her legs over an empty spot on the bench and taking a seat at the long Ravenclaw table. "I'm really so sorry to have missed it."
"Do any of you play on the team?" Sara asked, looking around.
"I'm the Keeper on the house team," Christian Walker said, smiling with pride. "And Basti is a Chaser on the team. Of course, we don't know if we will be this year, because tryouts haven't happened yet, so we'll see where we end up."
"What about you, Sara?" Basti asked, interested. "Did you play quidditch at your old school?" Sara shrugged.
"I was a Chaser on my house team last year," she said, "And the year before that I did commentary on the games with my big sister." They nodded in understanding—Sara had told them previously about that particular program at Beaumore.
"You should try out," Christian said, holding a strip of bacon halfway to his mouth. "The Ravenclaw team lost a Chaser and a Beater last year when Annie McNulty and Forbes Brewer graduated."
"I don't know," she said tentatively. "My broom's not that great, and I have other stuff to do, anyways…"
"Like what? Retake notes from classes you've had already?" Basti said, sounding frustrated. "It's not like you've got any actual studying to do."
"That's true, Sara. You really should go out for the team."
"It'd be a great way to get to know more people."
"Plus it's a wicked lot of fun!"
"Tryouts," Christian began, "Start at seven on Friday afternoon. Be there." Sara shook her head and rolled her eyes, but she wondered whether they were all right; maybe a little bit of quidditch would do her some good. At least, it would give her something to focus on…
The next morning, Sara woke early and wandered off to Professor Dumbledore's office for her supplemental education lesson for the week. She had been scouring the books that he had given her to look at for lesson suggestions and marked the pages in which she was interested. She had just made it through the winding passageways and tapestries to arrive at the feet of the gargoyles when the wall-door sprang open and the headmaster himself, in midnight-blue robes adorned with tiny silver sparkles and his half-moon spectacles flashing in the morning light, appeared in the corridor. He gave Sara a smile, beckoning her up the twisting staircase and into his office, where she sat presently in the chair facing his desk.
"So, Miss O'Hanlon," Dumbledore said, folding his hands and looking at her through twinkling eyes. "Have you given any more thought to what you would like to study with me? Mind, I wouldn't dream of knowing everything, but I daresay I can teach you to the best of my ability."
"Yes, Professor," Sara replied, drawing an enormous book from her bag and setting it carefully on her lap. "I've marked some of the pages—magically, of course—and there are a few subjects that I found particularly interesting."
"Well, as long as they are reasonable, I have no problem teaching you what I can," he answered. "What have you been thinking of?" Sara flipped open the book to the first marked pages.
"The first thing, the thing that I am most interested it," she said, carefully avoiding Dumbledore's eyes, "is Legilimency, and, of course, Occlumency." Looking up, she saw that Dumbledore was looking at her strangely, as if he did not quite know what to make of her.
"Sara," he began quietly after a moment, still looking into her eyes with his own piercing blue ones. Sara was slightly taken aback by his addressing her by her first name. "I don't know if I should teach you that. I daresay that you are more than capable of learning legilimency on your own, and occlumency isn't much more difficult than that. I do, however, have an obligation to protect my students' best interests, and I believe that one's thoughts and memories ought to remain one's own, do you not agree?" She sat quietly in her seat, now feeling a bit guilty.
"I agree," she said quietly and guiltily. "And I understand why. I apologize."
"Now, there's no need to apologize," Dumbledore said kindly, smiling a little. "Just choose something else that you would like to learn. Are there any charms or other spells that you would like to learn about?"
"Well, I always did want to be a Healer. Is there any chance of learning medicinal spells or draughts?" At this, the headmaster smiled and rose to his vast wall of books, stacked at least two deep. After considering them for a moment, he slid one from the shelf, handing it to Sara.
"This, I can help you with," he said, turning back to sit at his own desk, robes swishing behind him. "Take this book. It is rather worn and old, but in it you will find simple spells to cure minor ailments. Unfortunately, all I can do here is help you with the wand movements and incantations as there are no ailments to cure. However, I promise that the next injury I sustain, I will save for you to heal." Sara smiled, bidding her thanks and goodbye to the headmaster and turning to leave. She had planned to meet with the Gryffindor gang that morning for breakfast, so she hadn't eaten anything earlier. She arrived in the Hall to find that Lily and Remus had saved a seat for her between the two of them. She gratefully slipped into the seat and poured herself a cup of tea.
"Morning, Sara," James said pleasantly before diving into a stack of pancakes.
"Good morning," she greeted them, smiling. "What's new?"
"Nothing, really," Lily said, pouring a glass of pumpkin juice. "How was your lesson with Dumbledore?" Sara began to explain to them what had happened, with the legilimency and occlumency and Dumbledore's reaction.
"—but he wouldn't allow me to learn how to actually do the spells," she finished, looking around at them. James and Sirius exchanged looks; they seemed mildly disappointed.
"Too bad, too," James said, "you could have used them on Snape and Malfoy...it would have helped with the pranks anyway."
"But Dumbledore did have a point," Lily said pointedly, staring the two of them down. "It is a major invasion of privacy, going into someone's mind."
"Oh, come on, Lils," Sirius said. "It's mostly just to find out whether someone is lying or not. And, of course, to close your mind when other people are trying to get into it."
"But anyway, he did let me borrow one of his books to learn a few things for how to cure minor injuries and ailments," Sara finished, buttering a piece of toast and taking a bite.
"Excellent," Sirius said. "If you manage that, we won't have to go to Madam Pomfrey so much, and she won't be so suspicious that we are making trouble…" his voice carried away dreamily. They all laughed. A sudden rushing of owls told them that the morning's mail was here. The swooping owls circled them and dropped letters into their owners' laps. A battered-looking brown owl delivered a letter to Arabella, who was always so quiet that she hardly realized she was there. Arabella shrugged, looking mildly surprised that she'd gotten any mail at all, and without opening the envelope she turned back to her bacon and toast.
Owls continued to deliver their letters and parcels, and Sirius was so started when an owl gave him a pink envelope that he choked on his tea and accidentally spit some at the owl who had delivered the letter, who ruffled his feathers and took off indignantly. Sirius tore the letter open, pulled out a card the size of a postcard, and smiled.
"What is it?" James asked, peering at the card over Sirius' shoulder.
"My cousin Andromeda had her baby last night. Andromeda and Ted Tonks are proud to announce the birth of their daughter, Nymphadora Calliope Tonks, at 11:34 pm on September 16. Nymphadora weighed 6 pounds, 1 ounce at birth and continues to thrive," Sirius read aloud from the card. "There's a picture, too," he turned the card around to reveal a moving photograph of a baby wrapped in a pink blanket, sleeping contentedly in a crib. "But blimey, Andromeda's my favorite cousin, but she's got to be a nutter to name a kid Nymphadora—" his voice drained off and he looked about wildly.
Nobody seemed to have been listening to Sirius. Every person's attention turned to Arabella, at the end of the group, who had finally opened the letter that she had been sent. She now stared blankly at it, too shocked to speak, her eyes glazed over with tears. She was visibly shaking; she could hardly hold her hand steady enough to keep the letter in it.
"Bella!" Rena started, alarmed. "What's the matter? What's happened?" Arabella seemed unable to speak. She simply shook her head as a tear made its way slowly down her cheek. She opened her mouth as if to say something, but no words came out. She blinked and two more tears streamed down her face. The letter fell from her hands as she crumpled onto the table, hiding her face in her arms, still shaking violently. Sara suspected that she had burst into uncontrollable tears.
Rena, who had been sitting beside her, cautiously picked up the letter and read it so fast that her eyes seemed unmoving. Her mouth dropped open as she silently, wordlessly, passed the paper to a shocked Lily.
Arabella's father, it turned out, had been violently killed in the fire of a Death Eater attack that happened on the muggle street where he worked. Arabella's mother (whose name was also Arabella) had written to tell her this, and to say that she was going to be personally removing her from Hogwarts as soon as possible. It seemed that Arabella too stunned at the death of her father that she could not even protest leaving Hogwarts.
The rest of the morning was so tense and subdued for them that Sara was mildly glad to have been put in different classes than them. A depressed Lily told her in the corridor later that afternoon that Arabella would be leaving at seven the next morning to go back to the Muggle world forever. She had been excused from classes that day with the greatest sympathies from the professors so that she could collect her things and say her good-byes. She hadn't known her long, but she knew that Arabella, no matter how shy or quiet or magically-challenged she might be (her mother was a Squib, her father a muggle), she played an integral part in the team of Gryffindors that Sara had grown to like and trust.
Sara gave a tearing Lily a supportive hug and told her that she would be in the entrance hall the next day to say good-bye. She looked after Lily's retreating back, feeling that she, too, had suffered a terrible loss.
That afternoon after she had finished her homework for Charms, History of Magic and Potions, Sara strolled down to the library to look for a book. Though Sara had pored over the healing book that Dumbledore had given her, she was still way more interested in Legilimency and Occlumency. Even if she couldn't learn to practice it, she thought, at least the theory had to be interesting. After searching the hundreds of shelves for nearly an hour, she came across what she was looking for: it was a moderate-sized leather-bound book entitled Magical Mind Manipulation by Axonan Dendrite. She tugged at it, pulling it off of the shelf and flipping it open. Running her finger down the list that was the index of the book, she hastily turned to the page.
There it was—a beautifully drawn moving illustration and detailed descriptions on how to perform the legilimency spell, as well as how to close one's mind through occlumency. Sara smiled to herself and snapped the book shut, moving back through the tangled maze of bookshelves to the front desk, where Madam Pince, the librarian, was flipping through a very old and tattered book, restoring the pages with prods and pokes from her wand. She peered up at Sara through her eagle eyes, which narrowed when she approached the desk.
"Not causing trouble, are you, Miss O'Hanlon?" she asked, setting her own book aside and fingering her wand, eyes on the book in Sara's hands.
"Of course not, Madam Pince," Sara said earnestly, placing the book on the desk. The librarian pursed her lips in thought as she flipped through the book. Sara tried to look as innocent as she could and began adjusting the straps of her bag on her shoulders. Finally, Madam Pince jabbed her wand at the book, handing it back to Sara.
"Just make sure you return that in a month's time," she said. Sara nodded, smiling, and tucked the book carefully into her bag, turning to walk out. Unfortunately, she wasn't paying a lot of attention to exactly where she was going and who was in her path, because a moment later she smacked into something quite solid.
"Ouch! Hey, watch where you're going, O'Hanlon!" it said. Sara suppressed the urge to laugh.
"Sorry, Sirius," she said. "My fault—are you okay?" Sirius rubbed his head (which he had knocked into a bookshelf after Sara smacked into him) and winced.
"Yeah, I'm fine," he answered, now squinting at the ground. Sara saw a book lying open on the floor by her feet, so she bent down to pick it up. She closed it; the cover read Animagi: an Understanding and Guide to Transformation. She handed it back to Sirius, who looked mildly panicked, but he seemed to regain his composure almost immediately.
"Thanks, I was just coming back to return this," he said, a sudden smirk crossing his face. "We don't need it anymore."
"'We?'" Sara reiterated, slightly puzzled. "Have you suddenly become two people, then?"
"That's funny. I meant me and the guys, the Marauders. We checked it out at the beginning of, like, our third year. I bet that Pince'll have a fit over it. Peter thought he had lost it after we learned about animagi in the third year."
"Oh," she said. Then, feeling the need to say something to him, she blurted, "I heard about Arabella. I'm really, really sorry about what happened."
"Yeah," Sirius breathed after a moment, scuffing the toe of his trainer on the floor. "I've known her for over four years, and to be honest, she was one of the last people that I would have expected to be affected by Death Eaters, but I guess that you can never tell, not with the rate of their activity growing."
"So has it been like this for a while, with people dying and such?" Sara asked, alarmed.
"No," Sirius said, speaking in a low, dark voice. "But I get the feeling that this will only get worse. So far, I think that Ara's the only one here to lose a loved one. It's a pity that she has to leave." Sara didn't quite know what to say to this, so she settled for a shrug of the shoulders.
"I should probably get going," she said. "I'll see you around, I'm sure."
"Yeah, see ya, O'Hanlon," Sirius called, smiling at her over his shoulder as he, as well, turned on his heel to find Madam Pince's desk.
Okay! That's the 9th chapter. Coming in the next chapter…
Remus falls ill, Dumbledore makes an announcement that changes the Christmas holidays for them all, Snape and Malfoy make a dangerous discovery.
Please review! I don't think that I'll post the next chapter until I get at least 5 reviews for this one