A/N: This is a really short chapter. I just wanted to get it out and kind of see if anyone's still interested in this story. So, yeah leave me a review and tell me what's up.
Chapter Ten: The Legacy of Names
The halls were dark and quiet as Keela and Clara rushed through them, few torches lit in the silence of the night. Outside the chilled windows, Clara caught the dark shapeless wisps of shadows and robes.
"Dementors," Clara breathed, her legs pumping harder as the creeping dread and chill filled the halls of Hogwarts.
"They had to let them in," Keela panted, rounding a corner, her eyes narrowing at the dark hallway behind them. "They've been here since his escape but they were never allowed into the castle - Just for tonight. Dumbledore won't let them stay long - just enough time for them to search the grounds.
All too quickly, they reached one of the main corridors that opened to the courtyard. Clara's head spun, her breath coming fast and hard. Her father would already know about the break-in at Hogwarts. He would be sending word soon. Unwanted, her eyes moved to the sky, cloudless and vast. It reminded her…
"Clara-" Darkness eclipsed the moon, something like a rumble filling the back of her mind.
"YOUR WAND, ALICIO!" Beside her, her mother gave a soft sob, her hands tightening on Clara until the point of pain. Just ahead, kneeling in their grove, her father's face had gone hard, his skin going an off white. Three men circled him, all wearing the familiar long coats of aurors, wands pointed rigidly at her father's kneeling form.
"Bartimus, please-" A flash of white time cut through the evening darkness and Willa gave a short scream as Alicio's head snapped to the side. The trees and flowers around them shivered.
"YOUR WAND!" There wasn't much discussion after that, Clara remembered. After they had kicked away Alicio's wand, the men had performed a quick shackling spell, the shortest one of the bunch quickly pulling out a roll of parchment.
"For your families involvement with the Dark Lord-"
"We've served the ministry loyally!" my mother wailed, her hands claw-like as her body bent to shield me.
His lip twitched. "You have been identified as a risk and therefore will be held in custody until the capture of He Who Must Not Be Named."
"Bartimus, please don't do this," Alicio whispered and for a moment regret and shame whipped across the auror's face.
"The crimes against the Lestranges are too great," he breathed, his eyes misting over as he stared down at the man that he had called a hero just a month before. Alicio had saved his life in one of the first battles of the French ministry. He had sat at the same table just two months prior with his own wife and children and eaten dinner with the Deschamps.
"I am a Deschamp," Alicio said and although his voice was low there was something like a snarl there as he stared up at the man who he thought was one of his closest friends. Hatred was there - such burning hatred that Alicio thought it might eat him alive.
"Related to the Lestranges by blood and the Blacks by marriage." Was that enough to prosecute her family? Even now she didn't know. Maybe her blood was bad. It was enough for them to take her father away, strip him of his rights as an auror.
Her mother held her and wept as they apparated, vanishing into mist and the night sky.
"EXPECTO PATRONUM!" The ground was hard and unforgiving as Clara crashed to it, darkness looming above her. Distantly, as if her ears were full of cotton, she heard the yell of Keela matched with the deeper tone of a teacher.
Shrieking, the dementor that had crept into the halls of Hogwarts whipped away in a flurry of dark, tattered cloaks.
"Awful, nasty things," someone was saying, their voice shaking as Clara was hauled into the warm, soft bosom of Professor Sprout. "Look at what they've done to the poor girl."
"Get her to the hall," another voice snapped. "Quickly."
Not a fear but a memory. Clara quivered as the professors and Keela dragged her to the Great Hall, murmuring to each other over her head as she stared numbly down at the worn floors. Her father's trial and subsequent release had been a nightmare to her, something that her parents refused to speak of.
Deep within her, a hatred rumbled to life. Something that Clara had kept tightly shut. Her father's ragged words echoed in her ears, pleading like a beggar from his knees. All because of a name - such a simple thing.
And deeper than that was the thought - that mad, wild thought. Perhaps… perhaps they were right. Perhaps her blood was a little bad. Something had soured from all those years of inbreeding and dark magic.
"Drink this, darling." Clara's head whipped around as the portly form of Professor Sprout barreled towards her, shoving a steaming cup of cocoa into her hands.
They had led her into the Great Hall where all of the tables had been removed and a pile of sleeping bags had been stacked against the far wall. All of the houses had gathered, milling about in whispering packs while others trickled in - those unlucky enough to have gone to bed without supper.
"Sirius Black…" a Ravenclaw was hissing, her face weasely and pinched as she skittered past the corner that Clara was in. The name made her itch, crawling under her very skin. Blacks and Lestranges - it was too close a jump to her name. Clara looked away, blushing for some strange reason.
"Drink, drink, drink," Professor Sprout commanded, tapping at the cup that Clara was clutching with a stern glance. The silver-haired witch took a small sip, her smile forced.
"Are you alright?" Keela bit out when Professor Sprout was finally satisfied with the amount that Clara had drunk.
Clara didn't answer for a moment, catching the flickering waves of Fred and George's hair as they made their way through the sea of Gryffindors like torches through the dark. Across the hall, in their own little corner was the whole of Hufflepuff, a few already doing roll call and checking for any injuries. The liquid burned as it made its way down my throat.
"The professors at Beauxbaton told us about dementors," she finally rasped out, her skin blanched of all color, her eyes dull. "They force you to relive your worst memory - the lowest part of your entire life. They suck you down into the mud and they keep you there in the darkness with all of those horrid, hideous emotions-"
Clara's voice broke, tears burning her eyes as Keela's face softened. Her father was the strongest man that she had known and to have seen him forced to his knees - Clara turned into Keela's arms, shaking. What had followed her father's arrest was silence. Her mother refused to speak about what had happened to him and so they had gone about their everyday lives in silence, a gaping hole swallowing up any of the joy that they had experienced before.
Just then Professor Dumbledore's voice boomed through the hall, his face tight beneath the white mass of his beard. "The teachers and I need to conduct a thorough search of the castle." At each end of the hall, Professor McGonagall and Flitwick worked swiftly to close all doors. Professor Sprout had already made her way out of the area some time ago, her face uncharacteristically solemn. "I'm afraid that, for your own safety, you will have to spend the night here. I want the Perfects to stand guard over the entrances to the Hall and I am leaving the Head Boy and Girl in charge. Any disturbance should be reported to me immediately."
Across the hall, the Hufflepuff Prefect had begun to take a detailed role call, the older students looking after the smaller ones while the other houses broke into excited murmuring. Bits and pieces of conversation reached the huddle of girls in their corners, the news of Sirius Black's arrival at Hogwarts, traveling quickly.
Dumbledore moved to exit before pausing. "Oh yes, you'll be needing…"
With a wave of his wand, the tables and benches in the main hall slammed into the walls, making the windows shudder with the force. All along the wall plush, purple sleeping bags appeared along with a mountain of pillows before Dumbledore hurried from the room with the other teachers following closely behind.
"EVERYONE GRAB A BAG AND SET UP CAMP!" One of the Ravenclaw prefects hollered, a look of supreme anxiety tightening her face and making the end of her sentence spike up another octave.
"Well, I guess that's that," Keela grumbled.
"I heard that Delphine is related to him." Clara stilled as the two Ravenclaws passed her, their heads bent as they shot suspicious glances to the small group that her cousin was huddled with. Her back was tense, her posture defensive as she stared around the hall in open contempt. "Do you think she could have let him in?"
Clara stiffened, her heart dropping. Keela's arms tightened around her shoulder as Delphine's head swiveled in their direction, her eyes narrowing on the two girls. Coutures like her more seedy relatives were the topic of rumors - certainly - however when faced with a pit of scared Hogwarts students whispering accusations, it becomes a lot less flattering.
"She had to have." A Gryffindor boy had loped over, his voice holding a silent disdain as he glared across the room at the rigid beauty.
"He had to have someone to let him on the ground," another Ravenclaw chirped.
Nearly half of the students assembled into the hall were now staring at the gaggle of Slytherins that had formed around Delphine.
Molly rushed over from her place across the hall, finally catching sight of the pair of Hufflepuff girls crammed up against the far corner of the hall.
"Just admit it!" someone across the hall suddenly burst and Clara flinched back like the words were hurled at her. Delphine's lips thinned for a moment before curling up defiantly. The girl had faced hatred often enough to know that those who were yelling it responded adversely to the idea of mockery.
"Stop that!" one of the prefects started feebly, drowned out by the roar of the crowd as they circled the Slytherin girl, dancing around her like animals waiting for a moment to attack.
"How'd you get him in?" another boy yelled and Clara felt something wild and raw beat to life inside of her.
Keela pulled her closer, her arms tightening around the French witch as she watched her skin blanch three shades lighter. "This isn't good."
"Where is he?" a girl yelled.
"Someone needs to stop this," Molly whispered nervously. Keela's arms around Clara were strong as she turned them deeper into the corner.
Across the hall, Clara caught sight of George and Fred, the latter pulling Angela behind him while the other searched frantically around the Great Hall for someone. A small bit away, Harry and Ron and Hermione were huddled into a little group with Neville and a few others that she didn't recognize. All looked like they were bracing against a storm.
"Where are the teachers?"
"Tell us-" another boy started.
"STOP IT!" Clara shrieked, a burst of wind making the windows shiver in their frames, a few at the back shattering with enough force to make the shards whip across the enclosed space. Screams filled the hall, all of the students shaking as another flurry of wind whipped through the broken glass. One of the house ghosts jolted before rushing out of the hall. Something wild and consuming beat inside the French witch, something that made her skin burn and her eyes go hazy.
"Merlin's beard," Keela breathed, her eyes going wide as she stared down at the shivering girl in her arms. There was a glow in her tawny eyes that belied the sickened pallor of her skin, something that made the red-head draw back in fear.
More screams echoed around the hall as another window burst, sending glass raining down like snowflakes and Clara felt that anger inside of her flare once more before slowly flickering and then dying. The hall dimmed, flickering. Magic was a fickle master and sometimes it took what it wanted to take.
"I think-" Clara swayed, Keela's arms catching her before she could fall flat on her face.
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