Disclaimer: Rowling owns it all. Sad, isn't it?
A/N: Ack. Writer's block is awful! You'd think that being off school would make it easier for me to write. Oh well – here's another chapter for you to (hopefully) enjoy! Many thanks to those of you who reviewed; you keep me going.
Of Cowards and HeroesChapter 10
Hogwarts, 1971"Marauders? They call themselves the Marauders?"
"I know, I know. They're just children, though…first-years are always strange."
"Yes, but Marauders? So very Gryffindor."
His companion smirked in agreement, and the two Ravenclaw seventh-years walked on, continuing to pick apart the latest 'prank' by the young group of Gryffindor first-years. Contrary to their relaxed attitudes as they sauntered along the hallway, they were deep enough in conversation that the shorter of the two went flying when a harassed looking brunette dropped her bags and books in front of them.
"Whoops," she said, grinning unapologetically at the taller boy, who'd managed to keep his balance. "Terribly sorry about that." She glanced over to where his friend was sitting up, rubbing his arm carefully. "Your friend appears to be hurt."
Michael Zabini stared down at the girl, who was quite calmly picking up her books as if dropping them right in front unsuspecting victims was an everyday occurrence. Suddenly, though, as he took in the rather obvious display of cleavage, he smiled, running a hand through his hair to make sure it was the way he wanted it.
"Zabini! Zabini – Michael! That twit just ran me over! Zabini, you prat, get over here!"
The girl smirked as he ignored the shouts of his friend yelling for help behind him, packing her books away neatly.
"That was quite…blatant, for a Slytherin, no?"
She merely got to her feet, smoothing her skirt down before straightening to look confidently at him. "Well, you tell me, Zabini…did it work?"
"…Black…Gabriella Black?"
"Yes, Zabini?"
He smiled at her, all thoughts of Gryffindor stupidity long gone from his mind. "Michael, Gabriella. Please call me Michael."
Hogwarts, October 6th, 1996
"Sorry, Nadia,"
Harry almost clapped a hand over his mouth in shock, mentally kicking himself for the words, but they'd just slipped out before his mind had even begun to catch up to recent events. At least, he thought, it was between classes; it wasn't as if the whole school was there to see him go crashing into Nadia Zabini.
"Er, well…no problem, Potter."
Harry breathed a sigh of relief. It was embarrassing enough that he had practically barrelled headfirst into the very pretty girl, but he found himself eternally grateful that she hadn't noticed his usage of –
"We haven't talked before, have we?
Harry felt his heart sink. "No…I don't think so."
"Then…er, how did you know my name?"
Harry's cheeks flushed red. "Well, you know," he mumbled. "Hermione knows everything."
He stood up slowly, wincing at the sharp pain in his ankle as he did so.
"Granger, eh?" Nadia smirked slightly before holding out an arm to him. "Well, fair's fair, Potter – you helped me out on the train, I'll help you out now."
"Thanks, but I'm fine."
"Really?" she asked him, and Harry, still thoroughly flushed, went even redder. "It doesn't look like you'll be able to walk on that."
Frowning slightly, he reluctantly took her arm, hobbling along beside her towards the infirmary. They were silent as they walked, Nadia apparently completely at ease with helping him, and Harry simply due to a lack of anything to say. He couldn't help stealing glances her way; the clear blue of her eyes that reminded him so very much of Sirius - he knew that now – focussed on the hallway before them. Even though he was limping, she was walking quite smoothly; slowly, but steadily, just like the steady, amused gaze she had now fixed on him.
"See something you like?" She chuckled slightly. "Did you really ask Granger who I was?"
Harry, who was growing angry at her incredibly nonchalant attitude, stopped short, yanking her back in the process. "Well, seeing as you practically ran me over on the train, yeah, I was wondering who you were."
He glared at her, pulling his arm out of hers before beginning to make his own way towards the infirmary. Behind him he heard her sigh, quickly followed by her footsteps as she caught up to him.
"Look, Potter, I was just checking to make sure you weren't going to go all dodgy on me like you did with Chang."
Too annoyed now to be properly embarrassed, Harry merely stared at her for a moment before taking the arm she'd re-offered. "I learnt my lesson there, thanks."
"Ah, yes, that didn't go too well, did it?" When Harry remained silent, she grinned wryly at him. "But I don't know what you saw in her in the first place."
Against his better judgement, Harry found himself reflecting her smile and echoing the sentiment. "I thought she was pretty," he shrugged.
"Chang? Well…I suppose you'd think that." Harry stiffened at that, slowing down ever so slightly until she shook her head and continued. "Just going on what I hear from Blaise."
They were silent once more after that, Harry not sure whether she had just insulted him or not. After a few minutes, though, the silence seemed to weigh heavily down on him, so much so that he found himself blurting out the first thing that came to mind.
"Blaise…he's your uncle, right?"
Nadia gave him a cool stare. "Are you sure you don't fancy me? You've certainly asked around quite a bit for a girl who just 'ran you over' the one time."
"Well, right now, I don't like you very much," Harry said loudly, thoroughly grateful for the appearance of the infirmary in the distance. "So, yeah, I think it's safe to say that there's about as much chance of me fancying you as there is of me fancying Malfoy."
Nadia, Harry noted with some satisfaction, snorted before quickly regaining her cool demeanour.
"Whatever strikes your fancy." She returned, her eyes betraying her face as they sparkled with a life that Harry had only fleetingly seen in Sirius's. "Or rather, whomever." Patting his arm gently, she smiled at him before pulling her arm out of his. "Well, it has been a pleasure, Potter. Now we're even."
"What?" Harry asked, belatedly realizing that they had already reached the infirmary. "Oh, right. Then…er…"
Nadia, however, had already walked off without so much as a backward glance, leaving a distinctly annoyed Harry to hobble towards the rapidly approaching Madam Pomfrey.
"What have you done now, Mr. Potter?" she began, and Harry began to relax as she started the all-too familiar ritual of fussing over him. Some things, he decided, were best not to think about, and Nadia Zabini was one of them.
London England, October 1996
One didn't dwell on certain things; at least, not until it was absolutely necessary, and now, Remus realized, was one of those times. He shook his head as he strolled along the dimly lit streets, trying to free it of the conversation that seemed to be playing itself out in his mind. It was bloody fifteen years ago! he told himself, but James's shaky voice and terrified look that day in the Three Broomsticks had suddenly come back to him earlier that night, robbing him of any decent chance at sleep. He'd obviously been trying to tell him about their decision to make Peter their secret-keeper; in hindsight, it was quite plain to see, but one particular phrase had stuck in his conscious.
'…there's been this whole mess with Lily…'
"Oi! Watch where you're going!"
Remus blushed and slowed; apologizing to the petite woman he'd ploughed down in his absent-mindedness. Yes, and then there was Cassandra, who had been…say it, Remus, just say it…murdered so soon after that awful Halloween. 'I'll take care of it' Peter had said, but Harry had survived, Voldemort left little more than a shadow of his former self, and so Peter had fled, along with most of the Deatheaters. Why, then, at a time when it would have made sense just to leave her alone, did someone bother to kill her?
But Cassandra had been trying to tell him something just before she died; he was sure of it. Remus frowned, valiantly trying to ignore the fact that he'd thrown her out of his flat just hours before her body was found, had physically removed her from his home when she'd mentioned Sirius. Of course…Sirius! She must have overheard something; walked in on a conversation that 'wasn't really happening', Remus thought, his chest tightening. She'd discovered his innocence; why else would they have killed her? Yes, that was it…and she tried to tell me, but I…didn't listen; and so she died, and Sirius stayed in Azkaban…
Overcome, Remus leaned against the wall of a nearby house; grateful for the shadows it afforded him as tears of guilt and pain ran down his face. It took him several minutes before he was able to move on, having convinced himself that he had been so incapacitated with grief that he couldn't have possibly done anything else. Feeling somewhat less heavy of heart, he began to make his way homewards, comforted by the knowledge that he'd solved the mystery surrounding Cassandra's death.
But still…there it was, in the back of his mind, waiting for him to lie down again, and then, in the stillness of the night, he'd hear the scared, confused voice of James Potter once more.
'…there's been this whole mess with Lily…'
Hamilton Canada, October 1996
Gabriella smiled as the smoke issuing from the end of her wand suddenly turned a vivid blue. Ah, there you are, Juliana…
"Augustus?"
"Madam Zabini?"
"Please tell Lucius that we may have located his aunt; I am sure he would want to be here for this."
She smirked at the look on the man's face, enjoying even more the scowl displaying on his face when he went to check the floating map-like screen stretched out and found, much to his evident displeasure, the small sparkling dot indicating a magical presence near the far-right corner.
"Did someone call my name?"
Gabriella turned, pleased, towards the newest inhabitant of the medium sized room. "It appears that Juliana is quite nearby; within a few hundred meters, I presume."
One silvery eyebrow arched elegantly at her announcement, the corner of Lucius's lips following it upwards in a smirk as she raised her wand to him. "Ah, the Investigo…I have always maintained, Gabriella, that Hogwarts is in no way necessary for the essentials of a proper education."
She flushed then, but held his gaze, too proud to return his jibe at the fact that she'd never finished school. Her spell was impressive, fine-tuning the locator spell that the five of them had cast upon their arrival in Canada; she took pleasure in the fact that Malfoy knew she had most likely saved them days of valuable time in searching with her own spell-casting
It was not long, in fact, before Gabriella, Pettigrew and Malfoy were making their way with barely concealed disdain through the parking lot of what appeared to be a rather large supermarket.
"Remind me again," Pettigrew began. "How exactly are we sure that this person is actually Mrs. Malfoy?"
Malfoy turned to him, the disgust evident on his face. "Potter, Pettigrew, she's a Potter. She is no longer a member of my family."
Gabriella found herself fighting back a smile at the momentary look of horror on the portly man's face before he managed to bring himself in check.
"Juliana Potter, then…how do we know that it is her?"
Malfoy remained silent; Gabriella sighed, but put her hand on Pettigrew's arm to pull him back slightly. "She was, however, born a Malfoy, and so, like all children born to…proper pureblood families, she was marked, with the Investigo. She should be the only one marked with it in this area."
"So…it has to be Juliana, then?"
She looked witheringly at him; this man was supposed to be the one running this mission… "I do believe that is what I said, yes."
"Gabriella?"
Malfoy was standing at the wide glass doors of the building, his arms held tightly at his sides as if in fear of catching a noxious disease lest anything non-magical so much as brushed him. Gabriella breathed a sigh of relief as Pettigrew excused himself to join Nott around the side of the store.
"Shall we, my dear?"
"Of course, Lucius."
As they entered, both unnerved by the doors sliding open as soon as they approached them, a compact silver car pulled up to the entrance. After kissing the driver, a dark-haired, visibly pregnant young woman got out, strolling leisurely towards the trolleys before selecting one and entering the supermarket.
Gabriella frowned; her wand was vibrating now; a sure sign that Juliana was very close by.
"Is it…?" Malfoy asked, his hand inside his robes and gripping what was obviously his own wand. He swivelled his head around, only catching a glimpse of a vaguely familiar looking young woman disappearing behind an aisle. Gabriella swung round to look in the direction he was staring.
"That's not…she's too young."
"Yes, of course; and Juliana has fair hair."
Gabriella frowned again. "She may very well have coloured it, Lucius; or be under a muggle glamour of some sort, even if she cannot use magic."
"Then we shall be guided by our magic, no?"
She smiled at him, straightening up and allowing her wand to point them in the correct direction.
"This way, Lucius."
The young woman gave a nervous laugh as her cell rang, smiling sheepishly at the slightly irritated looks she got from nearby customers.
"Hullo?"
"Déla? Baby, it's me…"
"James? Oh, hi…didn't you just drop me off?"
Gabriella smiled as they turned up an aisle selling various condiments, the wand directing them ever more insistently. Malfoy, however, still appeared to be rather puzzled.
"That girl, Gabriella…I'm sure I've seen her face before."
Both of them smirked as the voice of a young woman floated over from the aisle to their right.
"Yeah, baby…I'll pick it up…uh hunh…and…yeah…allright."
"Muggles."
Gabriella rolled her eyes at the look of revulsion on her companion's face.
"Oh…yes, yes, of course. Okay. Yes. So…I'll be out in another half-hour. Okay. I love you too."
Suddenly Gabriella felt her wand jerk to the right, pointing her straight through the stacked produce.
"Just up here…" she told Malfoy, who had now drawn his own wand. They quickly made their way to the end of the aisle, turning to the right once they reached the end.
Adéla sighed as she put her cell away, looking up at the store signs overhead. 'Right,' she thought. 'pasta sauce…oh, good, that's just right over in that aisle.' She smiled as she felt movement within her.
"Oh, you like the sound of that, do you?" Patting her rather rounded stomach lightly, made her way to the end of the aisle, chuckling to herself as the baby continued her feather-like kicks. "Sure, do the butterfly now, and go for the jackhammer at night when I want to sleep."
Still smiling, Adéla Zabini turned left towards aisle three. Smiling just as broadly, Gabriella Zabini stepped out of aisle 3 and turned right.
A/N: Evil, aren't I? Feel free to yell at me – you know I love reviews! Speaking of reviews…
power214063: Rebecca? Hm…I may do that, you know; she's really starting to sound like a Rebecca to me.
Nineida: See? I'm still going!
FroBoy: I dunno about soon…but I'm trying my best!
tweeny weeny: Erin will be in the baby's name for sure, whether or not it's Natalie Erin or Rebecca Erin, both of which I really like. Yeah, they'll meet up; but I guarantee you, you'll want to kill me when it happens.
XDragonxTearsx : Yeah…soon? Haha…well, if you all review and bug me, I'll update surprisingly fast.
Cherrysinger: Holidays, eh? I'm going on them soon myself; but I really hope to have this story finished by then (here's a hint; it'll all be over by Christmas 1996). Less confuzzling? Yes! Although I might have gone back to confusing territory with this one… smiles sheepishly …hope you like it though!
Swordsmistress: you're posting, eh? Hah – two chaps out already! Even though I've got the…er…big picture, believe me, I can't wait to see what happens next either.
Once more, everyone – review, even if its just to tell me I'm mean for pulling a cliffhanger - Laren