Chapter 15: Déjà Vu

Rose Weasley was not terribly good at doing nothing – not when there was clearly something afoot. With Scorpius absent and Al pretending to do homework, she realized what she really wanted to do was talk to one of her cousins. Of course, this being a Hogsmeade weekend, all the older Potter-Weasleys had jaunted off to the picturesque little village and left Rose and Al to fend for themselves.

Perhaps that wasn't quite fair.

Dom, Molly, Fred, Lucy, Louis, James, and Roxy would have, of course, made plans to go to Hogsmeade, as this was the first weekend they'd be allowed down in the village this year. Rose and Al, being only second years, were not yet old enough to be trusted on their own in the real world (to the extent that Hogsmeade could be considered the real world); they'd have to wait until their third year to be able to go. Normally, this wouldn't have concerned Rose. She spent most of her time at Hogwarts with the unconscious awareness that she could find a family member to talk to any time she wanted. So, for a few hours on a few weekends, that wouldn't be the case. So what of it?

It turned out that now, of course, was the one moment she actually wanted a relative – aside from Al – and there were none to be found.

It just seemed likely that, if what Scorpius was claiming was actually true, someone in their family knew about it. Or had heard about it – from a parent, another relative, in a classroom, on various trips when they'd all been dragged along to whatever Important Official Event – anywhere.

A secret record of everyone who had ever been a Death Eater. Could that really exist? Why would Voldemort have made such a book? Everything that had happened was jumbling together in her mind – the Book of the Mark truly existed (potentially), that it contained decades-old secrets about unpunished and unsuspected criminals (maybe), that the literal Head of the Auror Department didn't even know it existed (or, at least, had not seen fit to mention it, ever, to his twelve-year-old son, which, alright, fair enough). Surely, if it existed, and if Uncle Harry and her parents knew about it, one of her cousins would have heard . . . would know something.

And why did Lucius want to get to it now? After all, he'd been caught years ago, and had never really been properly punished for his crimes, to boot. He'd escaped Azkaban. What good would it do for him to get his hands on the Book now, after all these years?

When he returned from the library a while later (Rose assumed he'd been with Azalea), Scorpius was more thoughtful, or at least quieter, than usual. Rose was mostly pretending to do work but really staring out the window in the hopes of catching sight of one of her wayward cousins trudging back to the castle. Al had thrown himself onto a couch and was snoring gently after the twin hardships of a dueling Quidditch practice the previous night and the emotional anxiety of the day. Scorpius didn't say much when he came in, just joined Rose at her table and proceeded to stare out the window with her. Perhaps he was thinking about homework.

Or not.

"That's not . . . er . . . the Hufflepuff Weasleys, is it?" he asked, gesturing out the window.

"Dom and Lucy," Rose supplied. She craned her neck. There were, in fact, two girls trudging across the snow-dusted grounds. One was substantially taller than the other. It was hard to see what color their hair was under their hats, but the taller one looked like she had light hair. The duo made their way closer to the castle doors. "Could be, I suppose. It's hard to see all the way down to the lawn from here."

"Would they know?"

Rose lowered her voice. "About the Book of the Mark?"

Scorpius nodded.

"I think if anyone is most likely to know, it's James," Rose said. "I mean, Uncle Harry never mentioned anything to Al or I, but James always seems to know more than he should. He asks a lot of questions."

Scorpius very nearly made a face. Rose could almost see him fighting for control of his facial muscles. Instead, he huffed out a small breath. "I think James is unlikely to be helpful," he said, "Given that last time he did us a favor he wound up with a new set of weekly detentions from now until hols."

"We could go down and check if it's Dom and Lucy," Rose said. "No harm in asking at least, right?"

"Should we wake Al?"

"No," Rose said after a moment, "Let him sleep. We can fill him in later."

The corridors were emptier than they normally would have been on a Sunday afternoon; most of the older students would be taking full advantage of their Hogsmeade privileges. Rose and Scorpius made their way down to the Great Hall without running into a single other student. Even the portraits were still, although that was because Peeves had poured Sticking Solution on a good many of them on Friday, and neither Filch nor Pelfer had been able to fully remove it. Subjects who had been able to vacate their frames for their neighbors in other hallways had done so in droves. The paintings that remained looked more like those Rose had seen when her mother took her to a Muggle art museum – unmoving and flat. It felt very quiet.

They made it to the castle entrance just in time to pretend to not be rushing towards the doors when they opened and two girls who were definitely not Dom and Lucy entered. Rose and Scorpius slowed to a halt and leaned casually against a banister, pretending that they just happened to be in the hall chatting. Rose let her eyes drift back towards the two girls, who were talking to each other in low voices. She didn't recognize either of them, which was a bit odd at this point in her Hogwarts career. Rose would have thought she'd recognize most of the students by face if not by name (admittedly, she did not know most of them by name unless they were in Gryffindor or related to her). The girls were clearly older, though – if she'd run into them outside of school, she wouldn't have assumed they were students at all.

Melisenda Wilkes, of all people, was running across the stone floor to meet the two girls. She spoke hurriedly to them in low tones, an urgent look on her face, before the three of them turned and headed down a different corridor, away from the Great Hall. Rose met Scorpius's eyes.

"We can't very well follow them, Weasley," he said quietly, his eyes tracking the trio.

"Why not?" Rose asked, though she was sure there were a hundred different reasons. It was weird, for one.

"Because they're headed for the Slytherin common room," Scorpius said.

Rose grimaced. "Underhanded meetings? Unpleasant people? Of course they are," she said, rolling her eyes. Scorpius's face froze. She realized, belatedly, that she'd put her foot in it. Scorpius had probably been hanging out with Azalea literally this afternoon, and now here was Rose insulting his friend's whole house. And he was bound to be a little on-edge to begin with, given what had happened just this morning.

"Oh, no, Malfoy, I didn't . . . I didn't mean – " but she had meant, and he knew it too.

"Yes, you did," Scorpius said, his tone verging on reproach, "Listen, I know how you feel about my grandfather, and I can't pretend you're wrong, but it's not as though every single person in Slytherin . . . I mean, I do have some friends –"

"No, of course – "

"You must know you shouldn't just say things like that, Weasley. It makes you sound very judgmental."

Rose gaped at Scorpius. A moment ago, she'd been trying to dig herself out of whatever hole she'd accidentally opened. But, whether Scorpius knew it or not, this last comment was delivered in exactly the sort of self-righteous tone calculated to put Rose automatically on the defensive. "Excuse me?"

"You must know it does," he said, digging in.

Rose considered this for the briefest moment, found that he was probably, to some degree, correct, and promptly ignored that realization. "Not when I'm right," she said, crossing her arms.

"You have a cousin in Slytherin," Scorpius pointed out.

"Obviously I know that, Malfoy," Rose snapped. "And I love Roxy. But surely you, more than anyone, have to realize that what I said is spot on."

Scorpius looked at her for what felt like a long time. She should have known he was on edge, what with Lucius showing up. She should have known not to say what she'd said, and not to bristle when Scorpius reacted. But he shouldn't have . . .

"You can be very quick to judge, Rose," Scorpius said quietly. "And for you, it's easy. But I don't think things are always so black at white as you think they are."

Rose opened her mouth to retort, but it was too late. Scorpius had turned and was heading back up the stairs. Good thing, too. She probably would have said something she would have regretted later.

. . .

It was still somewhat tense between she and Scorpius when they all headed down to the Great Hall for dinner. She hadn't said anything else to him – what else was there to say? Al hadn't noticed; he was still pretty relieved that Scorpius had escaped his one-on-one time with Lucius unscathed. Rose wondered why that wasn't offensive to Scorpius as well.

Rose was largely quiet at dinner that night while the other second-years chattered. James and Louis were late coming down for dinner, and she didn't see Fred anywhere either, so she hadn't had a chance to corner one of them and ask them what they knew about the Book. This wasn't particularly unusual, given that most of them would have been out of the castle for the afternoon. Some of the older students would eat dinner down in the village and make their way back later. But just as she was finishing her dinner and scanning the Great Hall for another relative to target, James and Louis came barreling in and went straight for Al and Rose. They were panting, hands on robed knees when they skidded to a halt at the end of the Gryffindor table, trying to get words out.

"Did you see them?" Louis practically gasped.

"See who?" Al asked, fork in midair, a piece of pie falling tragically onto his robes.

"Fred and Kimberly!"

"Er, no," Al said, "Weren't they at Hogsmeade?"

James's jaw clenched. Louis glanced over at him briefly before responding, "No. They stayed at the castle. Wanted some 'alone time,' they said."

"We didn't see them all day," Rose said, "I'm not sure where they could have gone."

"We know where they are now," said Louis. "They're in the Hospital Wing – we just saw them."

"What?" Al and Rose blurted simultaneously. And then, from Al, "Are they all right?"

"They've been memory-wiped," James said grimly.

"What?"

"Another student found them just sitting in the hallway, staring at a wall. Tried to ask if they were ok, and they couldn't remember where they were or how they got there. Fred didn't even know he was at Hogwarts." Louis said all of this in a rush, tripping over his words. At this point, the rest of the second year Gryffindors were also listening in.

"Merlin," said Al, "Are they going to be ok? Do they know who did it?"

"They were memory-wiped, Al," James said. "They have no idea who did it. They can't remember anything about the whole day."

"They'll be all right," Louis said, trying to be reassuring while also wearing a look of confusion and no little anger. It was an odd combination. "They're fine, aside from the whole not-remembering-today thing. Madame Pomfrey and Nellie want to keep them overnight just to make sure there's not anything else missing from their memories, but we were just wondering if maybe you'd seen them anywhere around the castle today or knew where they were or –"

"We didn't see them at all," Rose said.

"D'you think it was because of the Quidditch game?" Al said.

"I don't see why," James said. "It's Hufflepuff-Slytherin next week. It's nothing to do with us."

"We have to go tell the rest," Louis said, gesturing to Molly at the Ravenclaw table.

Rose, Al, and Scorpius shared wide-eyed looks in the silence of their wake. Rose dimly thought she might have heard Molly let out a small shriek.

"I hope they're all right," Scorpius said with surprising feeling.

"They'd better be," Al muttered fiercely. Rose just nodded. Somehow, this all felt familiar, but she couldn't put her finger on it.

At the end of dinner, Professor Longbottom stood up and made an announcement, which was very unusual for him, reminding students that it was against the rules to be practicing "any spellwork with lasting effects" on each other. Rose and Al looked at each other. That had to be about Fred and Kimberly. So Uncle Neville knew, at least. And he thought that someone had just been practicing Memory Charms and that Fred and Kimberly were the unwitting recipients of said practice? Rose supposed that was possible. Memory Charms had been known to show up on NEWTs in the past. But any student learning about Memory Charms should have known already that they weren't to practice on other students.

She'd been doing her reading on Charms work all summer; Memory Charms were serious business and could go seriously wrong. You could wipe someone's memory of a traumatic incident and also erase their knowledge of the English language accidentally. You could remove the specific memory of yourself doing something embarrassing and also eradicate memories of family, or friends, or even their own identity.

Who would have risked that on a fellow student? Rose glanced around the room, looking into the familiar faces around each of the tables, not knowing quite what she was looking for. She saw Roxy at the Slytherin table, face like thunder, and had a brief moment of gratitude that it had not been her own Memory Charm that had found Roxy's older brother. Just down the table, she saw Azalea Selwyn's smooth, dark ponytail bob as she whispered something to Fiona Edgecombe, and . . . wait.

Azalea.

Hadn't Rose also found Azalea in a hallway, staring at a wall and unable to remember several hours of her day?

Author's Note: How did James and Louis end up seeing Fred and Kimberly in the Hospital Wing in the first place, you might ask. A valid question. It's very straightforward, really. You see, James and Louis thought it would be absolutely hilarious to convince one of the fourth year Slytherins to ingest what can only be described as a "massive overdose" of Fizzing Whizzbees, thinking logically that this would result in said Slytherin being stuck in a state of low-altitude levitation for several hours. Inconvenience and hilarity would ensue as their intended target would need to figure out how to navigate such simple tasks as "walking through Hogsmeade," or "doing homework," while stuck levitating a few inches off the ground. This was, obviously, revenge for a stunt this particular Slytherin had pulled involving the Quidditch changing rooms and a large quantity of bulbadox powder.

Unfortunately, James and Louis made one fundamental mistake. An overdose of Fizzing Whizzbees does not cause levitation a few inches above the ground for an inconveniently long time. It causes levitation to the height, of oh, say, the roof of the Three Broomsticks, over a timespan of about half a second. A fourth year Slytherin shooting in a manner very much resembling a rocket into the rafters of the Three Broomsticks caused, understandably, some consternation. No one in the ensuing chaos bothered to ask why James and Louis were so eager to help get someone they, by all accounts, rather loathed, to the Hospital Wing. The answer, of course, was guilt.

The fourth year Slytherin will suffer no long-term ill effects from this stunt, but Louis will refuse eat a Fizzing Whizzbee for about five years or so.

If this is a holiday week for you, I hope that you are spending it in a way that is restful and meaningful for you!

Love always, bbh