This chapter lightens up a bit. I figure this fic at 30 plus chapters and I can't keep up the intensity of the last chapter all through. A lot of you are hinting (or blatantly stating) that Ted and Andy should be getting together about now. I could write you a thesis about why I don't think they're ready yet, but I won't bore you with that. Don't worry, there will eventually be plenty of romantic fluff between them, just let it unfold, and be patient.

This chapter- Andy learns about jealousy, Bella considers her future and gets inspired, and Ted makes an adorably misguided attempt to do the right thing….

Chapter 16- Misguided

Mother and Father decided that if I couldn't be trusted to know who it was proper to associate with, I simply wouldn't be allowed to associate with anyone, and so I was strictly isolated for the rest of the holiday, seeing no one but Bella and Narcissa. The day before we were to go back to school I was called into Father's study. He informed me that they had just barely decided against taking me out of school entirely, but if he heard so much as a whisper of me associating with mudbloods at Hogwarts, I would be brought home immediately. He then proceeded to deliver a blistering lecture on family honor, and just in case I wasn't taking him seriously enough, underlining his more important points with mild but well-placed hexes. All in all, I was delighted when we got on the train to go back to Hogwarts.

Sirius immediately headed off to find his friends, and Reggie tagged along with him despite his annoyance. If anyone had a holiday as bad as me, it was Reg. He had seen me through the windows of Fortescue's talking to Ted, and had gone straight to find Mother. That had broken a sort of unspoken code between us. Our fights were ours, but going to Mother was a betrayal. He hadn't said a word to me, and I didn't particularly want to hear his reasoning. It was obvious he was miserable, but I was still feeling a little too keenly my long, boring holiday and the sting of Father's reprimands to try to make up with him.

I sat with Bella for awhile, while Simon Flint attempted to impress her with descriptions of his Quidditch prowess. She had little interest in Quidditch, and even less in his rather mediocre Quidditch skills, but she had apparently decided to indulge him for the moment, which usually just meant she was bored. He clearly couldn't believe his luck that the oldest Black girl had suddenly decided to notice him, but he was blissfully unaware of a few important facts. First, that Rodolphus could and would hex him into oblivion for even thinking he had a chance with Bella. And second, that Bella's charm and good humor would last only as long as her interest, which was usually just a few days. She played with boys like a cat plays with mice. Not that she wasn't entirely devoted to Rodolphus, but this was something different in her mind, it was just entertainment.

I quickly grew tired of watching him try to impress her, and of watching her at least make a slight attempt to seem interested, and went to find better company, which I quickly did a few seconds later as I ran into Marlene coming out of another compartment.

"Hey Andy, I was just going to find the sweets trolley, come on."

I followed her along the corridor as she talked about the holiday and asked about mine, to which I made some vague response about it being fine. Family conflicts were not to be discussed, even with good friends, and I trusted Ted's discretion on the matter. Besides, I rather wanted to forget the whole holiday, and would much rather talk about the upcoming term as we caught up with the woman selling sweets and bought licorice wands. We were heading back to her compartment when I chanced to glance in a compartment, and saw the girl I didn't know but definitely didn't like, the pretty blond Ravenclaw girl. Ted was sitting across from her, but leaning forward with his elbows on his knees as though she was saying something absolutely riveting. I felt irritation rush through me.

"Who is that girl anyway?" I snapped. Marlene followed my gaze.

"Who? Oh, that's Helen Carmichael. She's in my dorm. Quiet, but most of her friends are Gryffindors. She's nice."

"Well he certainly seems to think so," I muttered.

Marlene raised an eyebrow. "Well, yes, I imagine so, since they're going out."

"What?" I sputtered. "Since when?"

"Just before Christmas, I think," she said promptly. "Might I ask why you're so worried about it?"

"I'm not. I just…didn't know that," I replied unconvincingly.

"Right, because you normally concern yourself in the romantic affairs of various Ravenclaws?"

"She's not even that pretty," I said nastily.

"Retract those claws, girl," she said, seeming to find it terribly amusing, and tugged on my arm to make me move back to the compartment she had been sitting in. "She's perfectly nice looking and you know it. But again, why do you care?"

"I don't care," I replied, throwing myself down on the seat irritably. "I'm just commenting."

Marlene, her own romantic disasters notwithstanding, was always rather adept at reading people, even me, and perhaps she realized that although I would eventually need a push on that particular topic, it wasn't the time. She settled for giving me a smug little smile and a totally insincere "whatever you say Andy."

Professor Radix smiled at me as he came into class, and I smiled back, knowing I was by far his favorite. He was the sort of man who had a deep and truly brilliant understanding of numbers and formulae, but very limited grasp of social skills. He liked me especially because I was the only Slytherin girl to take on the class, because I was pretty and polite, and because I was unusually determined to do well. It seemed to delight him that a Black girl, who was certainly not dependent on grades for future stability, actually wanted to learn arithmancy just for the sake of mastering a complicated subject. Or possibly for the sake of pride, he hardly cared so long as I worked hard in his class. I really was the teacher's pet Ted mocked me mercilessly for being, but I thought Professor Radix was sweet.

The final bell rang and I wondered where Ted was, for it wasn't like him to be late, especially to the first class of the term. But as I turned to look around at the door, I saw that he was there, but sitting several rows behind me with Spencer Callahan. It seemed odd, I had never gotten the impression they were particularly good friends, and even stranger that he hadn't even spoken to me when he came in. I tried to catch his eye, but with no luck, he seemed to be making a point of not looking my direction, focused on Professor Radix with suspicious concentration.

I intended to corner him after class, but he was gone as soon as the bell rang, and over the next few days it became pretty clear he was avoiding me, and not just in class. He never studied in the library or the Great Hall, where I could talk to him, and in class it seemed he made a point of being surrounded by friends.

I was completely thrown off by his behavior; he had always been the one who made an effort to be friends with me. I wondered if he was mad at me about the nasty things that Mother had said to him, but that didn't really make sense. He'd surely heard worse…Hell, he'd heard worse from me…and he wasn't the type to blame me for something Mother said. Besides, if he expected anything different from Druella Black he wasn't as smart as I gave him credit for.

While I didn't see Ted at all, it seemed that the girl, Helen Carmichael, was everywhere. Logically I knew she wasn't around any more than she had ever been, it was just that now I was losing no opportunity to glare at her. Apparently most of her friends were Gryffindors and so Sirius proved a valuable source of information, and didn't give me the sort of superior, amused look that Marlene did. From him I learned that she was from Liverpool, and a half-blood. Her Mother was a writer for The Daily Prophet, and her father, a muggle, had some job neither Sirius or I understood. I had no particular use for this information, but I still felt like I needed to know about the girl.

It wasn't until the next week I finally managed to corner him alone in the corridor outside the potions classroom. He had apparently stayed after to speak to Slughorn, and nearly ran into me as soon as he stepped out of the classroom.

"Oh, hey," he said vaguely and tried to pass me as though it was nothing. I grabbed his arm.

"What's going on?"

"Going on?" he repeated, not looking at me, but at my hand on his arm.

"Why are you avoiding me?"

"I'm not," he said, still not looking at me.

"Then why aren't you sitting by me in Arithmancy?" I said, grabbing the first example that came to mind.

"Ah…well, I figured I should sit with Spence as we study together a lot, you know, being in the same house and all…" he said, not very convincingly.

I crossed my arms. "Are you sure you want to stick with that story Ted?"

He ran a hand through his hair nervously. "Look, I have to get to my next class. Later, Black."

He turned before I could stop him and left like there was a dragon after him.

Since when did he call me by my surname?

With nothing to draw me out to the library, I took to studying more in the Slytherin common room, and spending more time than ever with Bella. After our fight I had expected her to punish me as she always did by withdrawing and turning cold. It turned out to be the opposite, I felt like we were closer than ever. Now I see it how intensely careful we were then, trying as hard as we could to not push each other away. The fight over Christmas, as brief as it had been, had changed our relationship, and we were desperately pretending it hadn't.

It was a Friday night and we both probably could have, and should have, had better things to do, but I was angry over having been so summarily dismissed by Ted, and Bella seemed to have her own problems. While I was curled up in the corner of the couch, she was sprawled out taking the rest of it, her feet lying my lap. She was scowling- the kind of scowl that suggested she had a particularly confusing problem, not the kind that said she was angry and someone was about to be on the receiving end of a very uncomfortable series of hexes. This was accompanied every few minutes by a deep, despondent sigh. I let this go on for a few minutes before I finally said something.

"Something you'd like to share, Bella?"

The response to this was another heavy sigh.

"Is that your entire comment?" I responded pleasantly.

"Yes…well, no…I don't know…"

It was my turn to sigh. "Well, I'm glad we had this little talk. It's really cleared things up for me."

She cracked a smile for the first time. "I'm just trying to figure some things out."

"What things?"

"Fifth years have to do this thing where they advise you on…jobs and things."

I shrugged. "You're not going to have a job."

In some ways, when it came to women, the wizarding world was more progressive than its muggle counterpart. Magic was a great equalizer. There had been many female Ministers of Magic, and none of us would have batted an eye to see another one, and yet it was simply understood that wealthy, pureblood women did not have jobs. It had always seemed to me a great waste of talent, for Mother and her friends couldn't have always been as shallow and silly as they seemed now. There must have been a time they were like Bella and Cissy and I, strong and smart, and maybe it was just a lack of purpose that changed them.

That would never do for Bella, for she hated nothing more than being bored and ignored, and yet I felt like her future was so set in stone that even I knew what it would be. She would marry Rodolphus, and in that she was lucky, for he was exactly what Mother and Father wanted for their oldest daughter. Bella would not submit easily to a marriage she didn't want, but I knew she wanted him. And yet she would never submit to the kind of life Mother had, and for the first time I wondered what she would do. What I would do.

It surprised me not only that Bella was giving this any thought, but that she was old enough to be taking her O.W.L.s that spring. Technically, she could leave school after that, although I knew Mother and Father wouldn't allow it and she wouldn't want to. I felt somehow shocked by how old we were suddenly.

"No, I know, but what am I going to do?"

"I don't think this looks good on me," Narcissa said thoughtfully, holding up a light blue robe with silver detailing.

I rolled my eyes. "Don't fish for compliments Cissy, everything looks good on you."

That was apparently what Narcissa had been hoping to hear, for she gave her reflection a satisfied smile, and the mirror sighed in appreciation of her beauty. We were in the dressing room at Gladrags, Hogsmeade's trendy new robe shop, looking for lighter new clothes for the recently warm weather. Despite exemplary behavior that term, Bella was still not allowed to go to Hogsmeade, the punishment for the previous term still in effect. Going to Hogsmeade with Narcissa meant shopping, and since I was in a bad mood and disinclined to have any other company, I joined her. This involved trying on robes she thought would compliment me, and naturally a certain amount of stroking her ego, but she was in a cheerful mood and easy to be around.

While she pranced around, I was slouching on one of their cushioned footstools, while Cissy tried to cheer me up by pointing out robes in colors that would look good on me. Finally to appease her, I tried on robes in a dark sapphire color, which were very pretty on me. Cissy gave me an appreciative glance and then frowned at herself in the mirror. "Too big. I wonder if they have a smaller size."

"I'll go check," I told her, picking up my skirt and walking in bare feet out to the front of the shop, where a harried looking young girl was trying to help ten people at once. I considered the chances of her getting to me in less than twenty minutes, estimated they weren't good, and went to look for Cissy's new size on my own. I was walking back with my arms full of light blue robes when I ran into Ted. I stopped dead, and there was a long and unbearably awkward silence. His eyes swept over the dress robes I was wearing, and I felt a flash of deep and fairly vindictive satisfaction that I looked particularly good, which was apparent by his slightly open-mouthed stare.

I took a deep breath, without even knowing what I was going to say. I didn't know if I was going to berate him for being unfair to me or beg to know exactly what I had done. I had no idea if I planned to accuse him or tell him that I actually missed him. As it happened, I didn't get to say anything. While I was trying to put together words, he bit his lip as thought fighting a difficult internal battle, and the turned quickly and left the store, and I was too shocked to say anything. I stood there clutching the robes until Narcissa called out plaintively to ask what was taking so long. For the rest of the afternoon she cast worried looks at me, but said nothing.

I felt Ted's sudden dismissal so strongly because it was unexpected and I didn't understand it, but I don't think anyone else even noticed, because when you really came down to it, we didn't spend time together very often outside of class. If you asked anyone else at Hogwarts, they wouldn't have even said we were friends, and so nobody but me noticed that we suddenly weren't anymore. Pride prevented me talking about it, even to Marlene or Sirius, because that would mean admitting I cared.

Sirius sought me out on one of the first week-ends it was warm enough to sit outside. I found it rather odd because I knew he didn't intend to study, and certainly not on a Saturday, so I could only assume he wanted to talk. It took him a few comments on the weather and classes before he got to the point.

"Listen, Andy. Reggie…he feels really bad," he began, with a little sideways look to see how I was going to take the sudden introduction of that subject. I didn't know what was going on with Ted, but I was pretty sure it was related to his first meeting of my Mother over the holidays, and that, to me, was indirectly Regulus's fault. I knew what my Mother was like, and I thought Ted was being an idiot about whatever he was so angry about, but I also thought none of it would have happened if Reggie hadn't felt like he ought to go running to Mother.

"I'm not really concerned about Reggie's feelings," I said sharply.

"Look, I wasn't too thrilled with him either, but…hell, he's my brother. You of all people ought to get that."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

He looked surprised by the tone of my voice, but went on.

"There are some people… some people you'll forgive anything."

I knew he meant Bella, but I shook my head. "Not yet, Sirius."

"Okay. I'll accept that," he said quietly, with surprising gravity, and then lay back in the grass with his hands folded behind his head.

"Where are your friends?" I asked him, as seeing him without his partners-in-crime was unusual.

He shrugged. "James has Quidditch, and Remus was feeling a little…under the weather. And Peter is afraid of you."

"Afraid?" I repeated. "Of me?"

"Well, of Slytherins really. That, and he can't form a sentence around pretty girls."

I smiled at him at the implied compliment, but it seemed to remind him of something, and he sat up suddenly. "You're friends with Marlene McKinnon, aren't you?"

"Yes…" I answered hesitantly, wondering where this was going.

"Good friends?" he pressed.

"I suppose…"

He nodded, as if that was all he needed to know. "She's a cheeky sort, isn't she?"

I closed my book, finally giving him my full attention. "She can be. What makes you say that?"

"She jinxed me in the corridor outside the Charms classroom," he said, and I tried, and failed to keep from laughing, and thought of Professor Langlais's comment about magical versions of hair-pulling.

"Why?"

"Oh, nothing really, I was hassling some little Ravenclaw. I wasn't actually going to do anything to him." He shrugged. "She's rather pretty though, for being in Ravenclaw and all. They're mostly trolls."

"Sirius!"

"She's not going out with anyone, is she?"

"No," I told him. "But honey, she's not like most of the girls you date. If you expect her to spend all her time engaged in the adoration of Sirius Black, she'll eat you alive."

He raised an eyebrow, and I congratulated myself at my skill as a matchmaker. Sirius would never walk away from a challenge.

"Are you trying to burn holes into the back of her head?" Marlene inquired pleasantly. "Because I imagine Helen Carmichael isn't the only one who's noticed that death glare, and if you keep on like that people are going to think you're jealous."

I quickly pulled my eyes back to my homework. I had, in fact, been glaring at the Ravenclaw girl across the Great Hall, because I had decided I didn't like her, despite the fact that I had never actually spoken to her. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"She thinks you've got it in for her."

"That's ridiculous. I don't care in the slightest."

"Whatever you say."

She had perfected a way of agreeing with me without actually agreeing with me, and it drove me crazy.

"I don't."

"Okay."

"Marlene, I'm serious."

"Yup."

I sighed and closed my book, and turned the tables on her neatly. "So you jinxed Sirius the other day? Why's that?"

She muttered something about he was bugging one of the kids in her house.

"And he's never done that before. So why suddenly are you the protector of first years?" When she didn't answer immediately, I added, "He called you cheeky."

She smiled, and then frowned. "Is that good?"

"I really have no idea."

Since I was not naturally a morning person, and I usually studied much later than my roommates, I was almost always the last in our room to get up, and it usually took more than one attempt by Adrienne or Shannon to get me out of bed. Half the time I was the last one in the room because I told them to go on to breakfast without me. I was finishing up brushing my hair one morning when the door opened, and I assumed it was one of them coming back for something forgotten, until Bella swept in.

"I'm just returning your cloak," she announced. "I borrowed it."

"Thanks for asking," I replied. I was in bad mood anyway, as it was early, and a gray, rainy day. Rain was pattering against the window and even the fire in the room wasn't entirely dissipating the cold.

She made a face at me in the mirror. "I brought it back, didn't I? You were asleep, and I needed to borrow it."

"Why? You have your own cloak."

"Only my school one. I needed one that didn't advertise that I was still in school."

Several things occurred to me at once. She was far too cheerful and conversational to have just gotten up, for she was less of a morning person than I was. I turned to look at her, and she was stretching the cloak over the foot of my bed so it would dry. She was wet herself, hair hanging in damp curls down her back, and wearing a plain sweater and skirt rather than her uniform. There were dark circles under her eyes, and she did look tired, but her cheeks were flushed and her eyes bright. I glanced from her to the rain striking against the window.

"You've been out…all night?"

She collapsed on Annabelle's bed and flashed me a smile. "I'm not going to class. If anyone asks I'm sick. I need to get some sleep."

"Where were you?"

She rose, and came over and took the brush out of my hand, and started tugging it through her wet hair, but didn't answer me.

"For Merlin's sake Bellatrix, are you trying to get expelled? Is that what you want?" I exploded. She turned to stare at me, some of the bright color fading from her cheeks. "Do you have any idea how close they came to expelling you last term? It was only Dumbledore intervening on your behalf that stopped it. Do you really think they're going to give you another chance if you get caught sneaking out?"

"I had to," she said, her voice quiet and restrained, but intense.

"Why?"

"Because I'm not going to be like Mother," she said, almost violently, slamming down the hairbrush and crashing a small perfume bottle on my dresser to the floor. It shattered into glittering shards and the scent of lavender wafted up. "I'm not going to turn out like that. I had to know it would never be like that, I would never be that unhappy."

"Rodolphus," I said dully, anger slipping away as I sat down on my bed, facing her. "You went to see him."

She nodded slightly, as though that was an afterthought. "Yes, because he needed to know…and I realized Andy, it's not for us, that life Mother has! We were born into the perfect time! We don't have to be proper, pureblood ladies, we can do more."

She scared me then, a little, for she had gone from the languishing deep sighs to this almost manic state literally overnight. She spun, skirt swirling and her dark hair flying. "He's always said I can be a queen, but I don't want to Andy, I want to be a warrior. I want to do something- something important, and I will." She grabbed my shoulders, and though she meant to shake me. "The world is ours. We're strong and powerful, and we have the purest blood in the wizarding world. We're exactly what he wants Andy. We can take the world apart."

"He?" I repeated, and this time I realized she was no longer talking about Rodolphus.

She only smiled, but I felt like she wasn't even really seeing me anymore.

As exams drew closer, the Slytherin common room became a dangerous place. It only made sense that in the house known for ambition, scores on O.W.Ls and N.E.W.Ts were given great importance. They could lead to your choice of N.E.W.T classes, and your scores on those exams could determine what kind of job you had. Few in Slytherin actually needed a job, but pride dictated they should do whatever they chose. Ambition and entitlement went hand-in-hand in Slytherin. So as the older students prepared for exams, anyone who so much as looked wrong would find themselves hexed. Even Bella could be found studying, for although no one doubted she was talented when it came to performing spells, there was a written portion to the tests as well.

Although my own were less important, we all had exams, and so I withdrew to the library to avoid the tension and do my own studying. No matter what else was going on in my life, and that term there was a lot, I still managed to keep my grades up. But it had been a lot more fun when I had been competing with someone, and it was hard to claim I was competing with Ted when he was ignoring me.

As I was considering this, not even really seeing the notes for my potions exam the next day, the object of my musing walked past, apparently not even seeing me, and looking like he was heading back to his dorm. In a moment of frustration, I jumped up and stopped him.

"Wait-"

He looked as though I had cornered him, but then avoided my eyes again by glancing at his watch.

"Hey, it's really late, I need to get-"

He tried to pass me, and possessed by an anger I rarely allowed to show, I grabbed the back of his robes.

"Don't you dare walk away from me," I hissed.

It was the first time he saw the side of me that made me a Black and a Slytherin. He looked shocked, taking a step back from me, but he stopped. It was very late, and the library was mostly empty- I didn't bother to keep my voice down.

"You owe me, at the very least, an explanation."

"For what?" he said tightly, looking over my shoulder.

"Look at me, Ted," I snapped, and he finally did, reluctantly. "You've been avoiding me and ignoring me all term. Don't waste my time saying you haven't," I added as he started to speak. "I at least deserve a reason, because I don't know what I did."

"You didn't do anything Andy," he said quietly, and I felt slightly better just because he used my name. "I just thought…well, you're obviously better off if I leave you alone. So I was."

Whatever I had been expecting, that wasn't even close, and I couldn't say anything more articulate than "What?"

"You were honest," he said in a resigned voice. "From first year you told me that you'd get in trouble for being friends with me. I guess I thought you were exaggerating, or trying to sound pretentious, or…just being an arrogant Slytherin. The point is, obviously I should have believed you. I had no idea…"

"Ted-"

"I never meant for you to get in trouble," he went on intently, cutting me off. "It was pretty obvious from that slap," he winced slightly, "that your parents mean business. And we shouldn't be friends if you're going to get hurt by it. So I'm leaving you alone."

"And my opinion on that is irrelevant?"

That shocked him. He just blinked at me as I went on. "My Mother was angry, but she didn't really hurt me, and there weren't the kind of dire consequences you're imagining."

"Sirius said if you're caught talking to muggle-borns your parents threatened to take you out of Hogwarts."

"My parents threaten to take me out of Hogwarts if I used the wrong fork at dinner. It's their standard threat of choice. Honestly, let me deal with my family. I understand them…well, not always, but I'm used to them."

"I just think you're better off-"

He cut off abruptly because I put my hand over his mouth to shut him up. His eyes went wide over my hand.

"Why don't you let me have a say in what's best for me." I took a deep breath, trying to be calm. "If you're going to let my parents tell you what to do, then I over-estimated you."

He pulled my hand away with a surprisingly strong grip. "That's a cheap shot Andy, I was trying to do what was easiest for you."

"By ignoring me all term and not telling me why?"

He turned away from me briefly, and then shoved his hands in his pockets. "I'm sorry," he said simply.

I had no idea what to say to that, I had expected another argument, not an apology. I say down heavily on one of the library chairs.

"Oh. Well. Thanks." I looked at my hands for a moment, and then back up at him. "Can we be friends again?"

He smiled. "Of course."

What do y'all think of Helena Bonham Carter to be Bella in Movie 5? I think she can do totally batshit crazy wonderfully! I so hope Movie 5 lives up to my expectations for Sirius and Bella...it will be so sad if I'm disappointed.