Author's Note: Dear 2021, please don't feel obliged to take the awfulness that was 2020 as a challenge to beat. Kthx. On the bright side, this marks the end of year two! It only took me a year and a half to write it. This bodes well for the rest of the years. How some people manage to put out chapters every week escapes me. I am extremely jealous. The next couple of chapters should be out a little more quickly. I'm expecting both to be pretty short. At least in comparison to the past few chapters. As always, thank you all for your comments! You all are awesome. And I promise I'm nicer to Juvia in later chapters.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Unwell
She was tired.
That wasn't any surprise. She had been tired ever since she first set foot in Hogwarts this term. But it was different this time.
In the first five months, the exhaustion was a poison that stained her soul and spread to every limb, infecting every bone, every liter of blood, every stretch of muscle, weighing her down until her entire body became nothing more than lead and sludge. Nothing she tried could cure her of that poison. No amount of sleep could help her focus. No amount of rest could strengthen her weary limbs. It wasn't until the night in the forest did she begin to feel real again.
But then came the nightmares.
Whenever she closed her eyes, the nightmares found her. She laid awake each night, staring at the shadows dancing on the ceiling, knowing that if she just closed her eyes, she'd be back again. Back in the forest. Back amongst the blackened ash. Back in a nightmare that she could never wake herself from. It was only when her body had worn itself out, too weary to keep going, that she finally lost consciousness and found relief in a rest without dreams. It never lasted. Soon enough, she'd be woken by someone or something or the nightmares would find her once again.
She didn't know what to do. Except stay awake. They couldn't find her if she didn't sleep. And if she kept busy while she was awake, she wouldn't think of everything that had led to the nightmares. The more she studied, the more she practiced, the more she devoted herself to something - anything, the less time she had to remember the ash that scattered to the wind. It had the unintended benefit of improving her marks in all of her classes, at least, but she wasn't going to be able to keep it up.
She needed help.
Like she had every day for the past three weeks, Juvia stared at the Infirmary door. And like she had every day for the past three weeks, she couldn't convince herself to go inside.
Madame Porlyusica could help her. And she maybe even would, though that was far less certain. But, she'd also ask questions. Questions that Juvia was terrified of having to answer.
Every day, she pitted her exhaustion against her fear, and every day, her fear won out.
But she needed help.
Her exhaustion claiming victory for that present moment, she took the first few shaky steps to the door. Her hand hovered over the handle. She just needed to open the door.
She couldn't do it.
She turned and headed back down the hall.
What would she even say? What could she say that wouldn't arouse suspicion? Her rain hadn't stopped over the last few months. And if she went to Madame Porylusica and told her about her sleeping issues, that with the rain was bound to make the woman curious. Curious was bad. Curious could lead back to the forest. She just couldn't...
A wave of lightheadedness, one of many over the last week, stopped her from making it further down the hall. Juvia leaned against the wall until the moment passed and the world stood steady once more. Muttering a soft curse that Gajeel would have been proud of, she once more turned to the Infirmary door, making it as far as the handle again before her courage and desperation could carry her no further.
Three more times, the cycle continued, and it probably would have continued three more times except, as she turned once more from the door, an irritated voice from within called out, "Either enter or go back to your Common Room."
Starting with a small eep, Juvia turned back to the Infirmary. One last internal struggle in which desperation and exhaustion proved the victors, she opened the door and stepped inside.
Madame Porlyusica didn't pay her the slightest attention as she entered, bustling from one side of the room to another and never looking her way. Not that Juvia minded. Earning the dour matron's attention usually was rewarded with a whack over the head from her broom. As it was, Juvia was careful to remain out of striking range when she called out to the nurse.
"Madame Porlyusica?"
The woman didn't turn to her, busy rifling through a cabinet filled with little amber vials. "I've told you before, Miss Lockser, if you want to use the Infirmary to brew your potions, just do so. I can't be bothered to provide permission every other week. Just see that you stay out of the way."
"It's not that. Juvia -," she paused, trying to silence the little voice in her head that told her if she ran now, she could be out the door before Madame Porlyusica could reach her broom, "Juvia hasn't been sleeping well lately." The nurse finally looked away from her cupboard towards Juvia. "She was hoping you might have something -."
Whatever Juvia might have said was cut off by a thermometer jabbed into her mouth, or something that looked like one, anyways. She was well familiar with the magical device from her extended stay the year before, feeling the odd tingle as the spell it was enchanted with scanned her body. With a slight gagging cough, she tried to keep the thermometer in place while Madame Porlyusica forcefully tilted her chin upwards, critically examining her, moving Juvia's head from one side to another. She then yanked the thermometer out of Juvia's mouth, consulted the results and then tossed the instrument to the side, the item landing in the receptacle designated for it with such ease that Juvia wasn't sure if it was enchanted to do that or if Madame Porlyusica was just that practiced.
"Well, none of your vitals look off and you don't look visibly unwell. Have you had any other symptoms outside of not being able to sleep?" Juvia shook her head. "When did this all start?"
"A couple of weeks ago," she lied, wanting as little chance of her issue being tied to the night in the forest as possible.
"And what happened around then?"
"Nothing." At least that wasn't a lie. The last few weeks had been the same as the few weeks before that. "She thinks it's just stress because of the exams coming up."
"Hrm," was all the dour woman said in response.
"Juvia was wondering if there was anything you could prescribe to help her sleep."
The woman stared at her a moment, quiet and expression neutral, long enough that Juvia's glance flicked over to the broom in the corner, making sure it hadn't inched towards them in the silence. At length, the woman shook her head. "No. I don't hold with using potions to solve every ailment that's encountered. Particularly at your age and particularly for something as benign as exam stress. It sets up a dependency that you won't be able to manage in later life. Try some hot milk before bed," she offered as she returned to her vials.
Heart sinking and shoulders sagging, Juvia bit back the urge to cry. Tears might have been useful weapons in moving Professor Gildarts or Professor Warrod, but they would only serve to irritate Madame Porlyusica. She could try telling Madame Porlyusica that she had tried hot milk and lavender tea and even meditation - no easy feat at Hogwarts - and still nothing worked. But she was terrified of what questions might follow. So, instead, she merely said, "Yes, Madame Porlyusica." She then stood there silently, debating whether to just leave now, but a talk with Madame Porlyusica wasn't the only talk she had to have. And Gajeel would be irritated if she just turned away now.
"Is there something else, Miss Lockser?" the woman asked when Juvia hadn't stirred from her spot.
"Yes," the girl answered softly. "Is Headmaster Makarov available? She'd like to speak with him if he is."
The woman shut her medicine case, the cabinet locking itself as she did. "I dare say he is. He's here, and I've no doubt he's avoiding working. Come, then."
Juvia followed the nurse mutely as they left the Infirmary, down familiar halls and up familiar flights of stairs until they were at the gruesome gargoyle that stood guard over the Headmaster's tower. Madame Porlyusica said something to the statue, but Juvia hadn't heard it. The twisted visage of the statue was all that she could see and the pulsing of her heart all she could hear as the face seemed to morph into the snarling maw that haunted so many of her sleepless nights. Gray's voice ringing in her head, screaming for her to run, she took a trembling step back.
She shut her eyes tight, trying to still the frantic beating of her heart with little success. She only opened them again when a heavy thud announced that the fearsome guardian had been safely sealed away and the click of Madame Porlyusica's boots against the steps signaled she was being left behind. She trotted after the dour woman up the ever spiraling stairwell. When they reached the landing, Madame Porlyusica entered without bothering to knock. "The girl wants a word." Juvia peered around the door frame and into the office, the headmaster sitting cross-legged on his desk as usual.
"Ah, Miss Lockser! Come in, come in!" he said with an enthusiasm that she was sure was at least partly due to the bottle on the table beside him.
Madame Porlyusica seemed to notice the bottle as well, scowling at the small man. "Behave, you oaf, or I'm spiking your heart tonic with a laxative."
The diminutive headmaster either hadn't heard the threat or didn't give much credence to it, dismissing his scowling deputy headmistress with a cheerful wave. With a roll of her eyes, she swept past Juvia and began the long descent out of the tower.
When the woman disappeared around the corner, Juvia stepped into the chamber.
"Welcome, my girl." He smiled at her. "I had wondered when I'd be seeing you. I would have sent for you earlier, but I didn't want to press you if you didn't want assistance. I take it your spell isn't working."
"No," she replied quietly. "She hasn't been able to cast the spell successfully for the past couple of months."
"Well, let's see it," he said as he hopped off the desk. She retrieved her wand from her robe and executed the ineffective spell once more while Headmaster Makarov circled around her, studying her posture and motion as the spell faltered. "Well, I see nothing wrong in either your wand work or your incantation. Given the challenges last year with the memory component, I'm inclined to think the issue again. Has anything changed recently?"
"No, sir." Not a complete lie. The memory was effective that week as it was three months ago.
"Hrm. Odds are, then, that it's just not strong enough to deal with your present emotions. Surely you've made some new memories by now to try instead?"
Juvia bit back a laugh.
Yeah. She had memories.
Like nearly drowning in her first year.
Like nearly being killed by werewolves in her second year.
Like spending both years as a pariah.
She had plenty of memories. They just didn't happen to be good ones. But that wasn't his fault or even Hogwarts', so she didn't voice any of it. Little rain witches just didn't really fit in anywhere. What few good memories she did have just hadn't worked.
"Nothing's that helped," she replied.
"Hrm." He continued to circle her, looking thoughtful. "With the rest of the spell still performing as expected, there's not much I can assist with. At least with this spell. I'll research some alternatives."
"Alternatives?" she asked, unable to completely temper the rush of hope at the word, knowing full well disappointment was not only possible but likely.
"There are a few spells used in other parts of the world to encourage rainfall. I may be able to make modifications to the spell to instead discourage it. But I'll need to work with experts in the spells to ensure that it doesn't inadvertently destroy the natural rainfall cycle. In the meantime, continue trying with the current spell."
"What about...," she paused as Headmaster Makarov stopped in his pacing to peer at her curiously, her blood roaring in her ears and every impulse screaming to shut up. "What about a spell that alters her emotions. If the spell isn't working now because her negative emotions are too strong, then maybe a spell to -"
Headmaster Makarov was quick to shake his head. "Such spells are complex and dangerous. Not feeling fear sounds like a great idea until you walk into a dragon's jaws because you haven't sense enough to be afraid. And for a wizard, emotional imbalances can have disastrous effects on spells. Not everything can be or should be fixed with magic, my girl. You understand?"
"Yes, sir." Juvia cast her eyes down, fiddling with her teru teru bozu.
She wasn't sure what he was hoping for him to say.
Maybe that it was a simple, benign spell. Unable to do any harm. A last desperate hope at absolution.
That what happened in the forest was just a coincidence, nothing to do with her.
That she wasn't the monster she knew herself to be.
Gray was going to destroy Natsu when he got to the Common Room. Damn pink-haired bastard. Two hours of detention with Belno all because Natsu ratted him out as being the one who transformed Belno's quills to birds. Took two hours to catch them all again and return them to normal. And it was Natsu who dared him to do it in the first place. Ass.
He could turn Natsu into a bird. See how he liked it.
No, the dumbass would probably enjoy it.
A quill. That worked. Quills couldn't talk.
Of course, he didn't have the skill necessary to be able to pull off such a spell, but hey, a guy could plot.
So absorbed with said plotting, he nearly ran into Juvia as she rounded a corner into the hall. For a moment, both students stood silent, staring at each other. It was the closest he had been to the girl in months. He had suspected that she had been avoiding him for the first part of the year, but he was certain she was avoiding him ever since the night in the forest. Every class they shared, she was out the door before he could get a word in. Every glimpse of her in the halls was only that - a glimpse before she disappeared down some corridor. But now she stood just within reach, and he couldn't think or move. Juvia recovered first, and she darted off down the hall she had just emerged from.
As the last tresses of blue hair disappeared around the corner, Gray's brain finally started to function again. "Wait! Dammit." He started after her, breaking into a run. "Juvia, wait!" When he turned the corner, she was already halfway down the empty hall. How the hell was she that quick? She whipped around another hallway, disappearing from sight again. By the time he rounded the corner, he just caught sight of Juvia ducking into a girl's restroom.
He drew to a stop just outside the bathroom door, panting for air slightly, as he briefly debated following her in, restroom be damned. Of course, if Erza got wind of him going in there, he wasn't going to see the end of the school year.
Fine.
He'd wait. She wasn't getting away this time, girls' restroom or no. If he needed to sleep out in the hall until she came out again, that's what he was going to do. He was tired of her avoiding him like the plague. She was going to talk to him this time.
And he was going to say...
Okay, so he had no idea what he was going to say, but he was going to say something, dammit! He had to say something...
Like, how was she?
Stupid question.
She wasn't doing well. He could see that. She was falling asleep in class. True, it was during History of Magic and even Lucy nodded off in class from time to time, but even by History of Magic standards, it was getting to be a little extreme. One time, she started swaying back and forth at her desk slightly before face planting onto the desk, out cold. She would have hit the desk hard had Redfox not caught her, his hand beneath her forehead to prevent it from smacking into the surface. He didn't bother to wake her. He just set her head down onto the desk and then propped an open book in front of her. Judging by how Redfox handled the girl's sudden bout of narcolepsy, it seemed likely this wasn't a one-off occurrence. It certainly wasn't in History of Magic. He had seen her fall asleep at least a half-dozen times. Each time, Redfox just let her sleep until the girl began to twitch, her face contorted in pain or panic, at which point, he'd nudge her awake. It was clear she wasn't dealing with that night.
Not that he was doing much better.
He could still feel the way the forest crumbled beneath his touch, could still feel the chill on his skin in that place, that touch of death that wouldn't let him go. He shuddered and leaned with his back against the wall, something he had become prone to do over the last few months, the cold stone steady beneath his touch. It didn't crumple to ash. It wouldn't. Leaning his head back, he took long, deep breaths. He wasn't doing well.
And if he wasn't doing well, he didn't imagine she was either. Dreyar may have been a heartless bastard, able to shrug off this and whatever else, but she wasn't. The rain pouring buckets outside right then was evidence enough of that.
The creak of unoiled hinges beside him announced the blunette was emerging from her hideaway. She was peering down the hall away from him, apparently assuming he had passed by the restroom when chasing after her. She nearly jumped when he called out to her.
"There you are!" She spun around to face him, wide-eyed. "Look, we need to...," he paused as Juvia's pale face flushed bright red. "...what?"
"Gray, your clothes!" she squeaked, hands firmly placed over her eyes.
"What?" He glanced down and found that he was short of robe, tie and shirt. At least he still had his pants on. "Goddammit! Stay here," he ordered, pointing at the girl that peaked at him through her fingers.
He ran back down the corridor they had just emerged from, scanning the hall for the missing clothing. The shirt he found hanging from the corner of a portrait, briefly engaging in an argument with the subject of the portrait who lamented the manners of wizards nowadays. The tie he found looped around a sconce on the wall. The robe was nowhere to be found.
Ah, screw it. Who needed a robe?
He threw the shirt back on and dashed back to the restroom, but by the time he returned to where he left her, Juvia was long gone.
"Dammit!" he cursed, slamming a fist against the stone. With a sigh, he trudged back to the corridor to search for his robe.
The potion didn't seem difficult.
She chewed on her bottom lip as she flipped through several pages of brewing instructions. Nothing within the the pages seemed complicated. At only an hour or so to brew, she could make the potion in her dorm room while her dormmates were down at dinner. And the steps themselves were pretty standard. Even the incantation itself was basic.
The ingredients were the problem.
Lavendar. Flubberworm mucus. Valerian.
The lavendar and valerian weren't an issue. Professor Warrod would be happy to provide her with whatever she needed. He never asked questions. Mostly because he could never recall the answers later.
The Flubberworm mucus on the other hand... The only place she knew of where to get Flubberworm mucus was from Professor Precht, and he was far less trusting than Professor Warrod. He'd want to know what she was brewing. And if she told him she was trying to brew a Sleeping Draught, he'd want to know why. It wasn't a second year potion, so she couldn't claim it was prep for exams. Nor was the potion complex enough to satisfy Precht's notion of challenging her. Besides, he already had her working on an Aging Potion. And as much as she wanted to sleep, she wanted to avoid questions more.
She closed the book in her hands and returned it to the shelf before taking down the next text. She scanned its index, looking at the list of potions it contained. Not finding a decent candidate, she returned it as well. She ran her fingers over the spines of the few books left on the shelf. There weren't many. Most of the library had been picked clean by students preparing for their O.W.L.S. and N.E.W.T.S. and other exams. The only remaining books were largely for lower level potions - none of which were useful in solving her current dilemma.
She leaned against the bookcase and shut her eyes, the three hours of sleep she had gotten over the past few days not enough to keep her focused. There had to be something in this library to help her. A spell, a potion, some item, anything.
Over the past couple of weeks, she had scoured the library for something. A Sleeping Drought was the obvious choice, but every variation she could find had some sort of complication that ruled out her being able to brew it in secret.
One recipe required six hours to brew. She'd have to brew it in the Infirmary to brew it safely, and Madame Porlyusica was as trusting as Professor Precht.
Another recipe had ingredients she'd never heard of.
The latest recipe was the easiest variation she had found so far, but even that wouldn't work. Not if she wanted to avoid questions.
Outside of the Draught, though, she hadn't found much from the exam-ravaged library. There was still the Forbidden section to check, but even if she managed to sneak out a book with some viable charm or tonic, she was fairly sure Gajeel would murder her for messing with spells she had no business using. Of course, at that moment, being killed didn't sound all that bad. At least there were no nightmares when you died.
With another yawn, she made her way through the stacks to head down to the Common Room. Gajeel would be out of detention soon enough, and they'd catch up there before heading to the Phantom Lords meeting. She wasn't looking forward to tonight's lesson about binding spells, but Gajeel was insistent that such spells were essential for Aurors, and he didn't want to be late.
She hadn't made it fully past the stacks when she spotted Gray at one of the library tables. In a move that was almost natural to her by now, she ducked behind a shelf and then cautiously peered around the corner.
He hadn't seen her, focused on the book in front of him.
Relief washed over her. She didn't want to speak with him, to know for sure what he thought of her. Her imagination ran wild enough as it was since that night. She was sure he despised her now, now that he had time to think back on what she had done. Or feared her, at the very least. After all, she was afraid of herself. Why wouldn't he be too? The other two that knew didn't, but she wasn't sure that counted. Dreyar had been oddly... understanding. She supposed that was the best word of it. But he was also the son of a famed dark wizard, so he was bound to have seen or at least heard of worse. Gajeel had been angry - not for what she had done but for being dumb enough to let it happen at all. That hadn't lasted long, however, and he quickly settled back into his role of irritated defender, unwilling to assign any blame to her whatsoever.
Gray, though, had no dark wizard parent. He had no family legacy to look back on to render her actions benign in comparison. He saw her just as she was - she couldn't be anything but repulsive in his eyes. Better that she keep out of his way. How she was going to manage that for the next five years, she hadn't an idea, but she would try.
She just needed to sneak past him now, and she could continue on her five-year self-imposed banishment. Unfortunately, her body just wasn't complying.
It didn't really matter, though. Gray was completely absorbed in the work in front of him, oblivious to his blunette stalker. A quill in his teeth and his fingers fiddling with the knot of his tie, she doubted he was aware of anything other than the words in front of him, his midnight blue eyes scrolling back and forth over the contents of the page. A smile tugged at her lips, one of the first since the forest, one of the first since the start of the term. Everything from the way his brow furrowed to the way he crinkled his nose made those long familiar butterflies flutter in her stomach. It spread through her, bright and warm, like sunlight on her skin.
It didn't matter what he thought of her, did it?
Sure, he pitied her.
Maybe he feared her.
Maybe he even hated her.
But it didn't really matter. She still felt the same. That hadn't changed. She hadn't changed. Not in any important way. Maybe her memories weren't quite the same. Maybe they even caused her a bit of pain, but the emotion she felt back then, the one she had relied on every time she used her spell, hadn't. She didn't need the memory to feel that. She felt it every time he smiled.
She pulled her wand from her robe and let the warmth she felt seep through her fingers and into the wand. Doubling back through the stacks to a window well out of sight and hearing from Gray, she raised the wand. "Meteolojinx Recanto."
Without hesitation, the clouds parted, the Black Lake sparkling in the emerging light. Nearly overwhelmed with relief, she leaned against the window pane and smiled. She let herself linger there for a few minutes before her approaching class pulled her away. She still needed to get down to the dungeon in time to meet with Gajeel and possibly reassure him and maybe Dreyar that she hadn't done anything stupid to get the sunlight to return.
When she emerged from the stacks again, Gray was still heads down into his study. He never even looked up as she passed by him. Allowing herself one last glance and smile, she left him there and uttered a quiet thanks to the boy who had given her the sky.
"A moment, Miss Lockser."
Juvia winced, pausing as the rest of the class filed out of the dungeon classroom. Gajeel glanced at her, waiting for the blunette to wave him off with a small smile, before following after the rest of the students. When the last of the students had left and the dungeon door had shut close with a heavy thud, she approached the desk, Professor Precht finishing up some notes. She waited patiently for him to lay the quill down in front of him and look up at her, his hands folded neatly in front of him.
"How prepared are you for your approaching exams?" he asked.
Juvia stood quiet for a moment, not quite sure what she had expected him to say but fairly certain that it wasn't that. "Fine, she thinks," she replied slowly. "She's largely only concerned about her Astronomy exam. Professor Aquarius doesn't seem to like her very much. Or at least she doesn't seem to like her rain. Juvia's worried she might make the test harder for Juvia."
"That seems unlikely."
"Professor Aquarius seems the sort to hold a grudge."
"Oh, she most certainly is. I definitely wouldn't ask her for a favor any time soon. But she'll be fair. She was well-informed before you arrived that she would need to be creative in her teaching approaches for a while. I was more interested in your other exams - Charms, Transfiguration, Defense Against the Dark Arts. How are you faring in those?"
"Well, she thinks. Gajeel says she's ready. She trusts his opinion."
He nodded. "I've no reason to doubt his assessment. It aligns with what Gildarts and Belno have been telling me. According to them, you've made quite a recovery these last couple of months." Juvia tensed, not liking the direction the conversation was going. "Care to tell me what the catalyst was for that recovery?"
"Juvia just studied harder. Gajeel tutored her," she replied quietly.
For those unfamiliar with Professor Precht, her response seemed to have garnered no reaction. Juvia, however, was well-versed in dealing with the old professor by then, and he was quite obviously not impressed with her answer.
"Miss Lockser, at no point in the past year could your work ethic be described as lacking. I find it difficult to believe that your rather dramatic improvement is the result of you merely applying yourself to your studies for once. Particularly since your supposed tutor, Mister Redfox, has spent every waking moment for the past two months in class or detention, save for the five minutes each day he spends doing something to earn his next detention." He paused, she assumed waiting for her to give him a more plausible explanation. She couldn't give him one. At least not one she was willing to give. She merely stood silent, hoping her face didn't betray her fear. Professor Precht broke the silent stalemate first.
"I don't pretend to be highly perceptive to the changes in my students. Children change. It's the nature of being children. But there's been a clear difference in your manners and capabilities since the early part of the year and the last few months." Her stomach flipped, and her heart quickened in her chest. "Have you an explanation for that change?" She only shook her head, not willing to trust anything that emerged from her mouth. The old professor waited a few minutes, all the while the wretched carriage clock that she had fixed earlier in the year ticked away the silent seconds. By the time he chose to speak again, she had a pretty clear understanding of how it ended up with a shattered face to begin with. "The boy mentioned you have an interest in spells to temper or alter emotions as a means to manage your affliction."
For a few seconds, she forgot how to breathe, all the while the professor waited with a pause that Juvia was sure was explicitly designed to torture her.
"Where did you get the idea of such a spell?"
"Juvia just thought something like it might help, that's all," she replied, thoroughly impressed with herself that she managed to say the words at all and to say them in a detached, disinterested tone, if a little quiet. Lying was becoming something of a second nature as of late. The abbess wasn't likely to be pleased. Gajeel would be proud, though.
The professor, however, did not seem convinced, in spite of her recently attained proficiency with lying. "As you well know, Miss Lockser, I believe strongly that students should pursue education beyond what they learn in class. However, there is a concern about safety. While you should not be afraid to learn beyond what you've been taught in class, that is not an open invitation to become your own teacher. You are much too young and too inexperienced. There is far too much in this world that you're ill-prepared to deal with alone. If you wish to pursue extra-curricular studies, you shall do so only under the guidance and tutelage of one of the Hogwarts professors - be that myself, Gildarts, Belno, Jura or even the boy. Is that clear?"
"Yes, sir," she replied quietly.
"Good." He motioned to a bookcase on his left. "Moray's Potions of the Middle Ages and Selwyn's Healing Tinctures and Tonics."
Relieved at the change of topic, abrupt as it was, she fetched the two texts and returned to the desk, holding them out for Professor Precht. The old professor, however, merely shook his head. "You are to take those with you when you return to your island. You are to read them front to back before the end of the summer."
"You're giving Juvia homework over the break?" she asked with a narrowed glare at the Potions professor, temporarily forgetting her plan of shutting up and getting out of the dungeon as quickly as possible. Unmoved by Juvia's irritation, he replied, "Consider it in place of the detention you should be serving for whatever it is that you did that you're not owning up to. You'll take a test on the books when you return. Get a single question wrong, and I pair you with Dragneel for the school year. Understood?"
Juvia's brief and slight bit of bravery fled in an instant. "Yes, sir," she said with a gulp.
Professor Precht shooed her away with his usual wave of his hand. Juvia wasted no time, turning heel and darting out of the dungeon.
After a quick stop at the Slytherin dorms to safely stash away the two assigned texts among her other Inis Stoirm-bound possessions, Juvia headed to the Great Hall to meet up with Gajeel for lunch. She was looking forward to just getting through lunch. Herbology was next, which usually wasn't too taxing, and then she had History of Magic, and she was in desperate need for the rest that the class could provide. She felt rather guilty about using the class as a sedative, but she had little choice. While she was sleeping a little easier since she dispelled the rain again, it still wasn't enough to keep her going for long. She struggled to stifle another yawn. She just needed to get through lunch.
Except, when she opened the Great Hall doors, it rather seemed like lunch had been canceled.
This close to exams, the Great Hall should have been a small war zone. She should have been dodging errant spell casts and the occasional fistful of food, usually lobbed by Gryffindor or Slytherin at one another and occasionally joined by Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw when they inevitably got caught in the crossfire. There should have been shouting and laughing and panic attacks and just noise in general. Endless amounts of noise.
But when she entered the Great Hall, the hall was quiet. Well, quiet for Hogwarts. Students hunched over what looked to be newspapers and spoke in hushed voices between themselves. A palpable air of fear and dread hung over the students.
Even the professors at their table on the dais appeared agitated. Belno leaned close to Gildarts, talking animatedly to the unusually grim-looking Charms professor. Precht, who had somehow managed to beat her to the hall in the time it had taken her to store her books, stood beside Makarov's chair. He didn't look as disturbed as Gildarts and Belno, but he was listening carefully to what Makarov was saying and providing a quick word when apparently prompted. Out of all the professors, only Jose seemed unaffected, a paper set aside in front of him while he listened with detached interest to Jura.
Juvia studied his expression for a moment until she felt the weight of eyes on her. When she looked away from the table, multiple groups from each table stared at her. Whispering. Pointing. Her blood grown cold, she headed quickly to find her seat in the safety of Gajeel's shadow, fighting the urge to run, knowing full well that running would only attract attention.
With an audible sigh of relief, she reached the open seat between Gajeel and Dreyar and sat down quickly, ducking close to Gajeel. On a normal day, that would have been the point that Gajeel would have turned his red eye on whoever was bothering her, silently promising threats of violence if they didn't piss off, or if that didn't work, audible threats of violence if they didn't piss off. Gajeel, however, didn't even seem to notice she arrived. He had a paper in his hands, like just about everyone else, utterly absorbed in whatever had captured the hall's attention. She tried to read whatever it was on the paper but was only able to confirm it was an edition of The Daily Prophet before she became aware of some Slytherins beyond Gajeel staring. She shrank down in her seat to let the larger boy's form hide her away.
"Don't mind them," Dreyar said, sitting on the table - apparently Dreyars had some sort of vendetta against chairs - with his back to the rest of the tables and students in the hall. "It's not you. They've all been glaring daggers at me and Redfox for the past fifteen minutes. Turn around. You won't have to see them."
"What's going on?" she asked, trying to keep her voice low as though the act of speaking ran the risk of drawing even more attention her way.
"Here." He handed her the newspaper he held. "Take it. I've already read what little is there three times now."
Juvia took the offered edition. The paper was newly printed - she could still smell the ink. "Where did these come from?"
"Alors, from Ravenclaw. His father owns a newsagent. He had a flock of owls drop them off earlier. Been selling them for six sickles apiece since classes ended. He's making a packet."
Frowning, she studied the front page, most of which was taken up by a single headline. Attack on Gringotts! Attempted breach detected in high security vaults! "What's Gringotts?"
The look Dreyar gave her clearly translated to Ugghhh... Muggle-borns..., but he was good enough to not say it aloud to her. "It's a wizarding bank on Diagon Alley."
"Oh," she replied simply.
After a moment's pause, she reached out for Gajeel's robe and tugged on his sleeve. When he didn't respond immediately, she pulled harder and incessantly until the blood red eyes turned on her. The scowl on his face dissipated when he saw her. "Oh, hey, Raindrop. Precht leave ya in one piece?"
Juvia didn't reply to the question, instead motioning to the boy. He obediently leaned towards her. She cupped her hand over her mouth and whispered, though apparently not softly enough, "What's a bank?"
"Are you serious?" Dreyar said with a groan, cradling his face in his palm.
"If you want to talk about scripture or fish off the coast of western Ireland, Juvia is more than able to keep up. But outside of that and some basic arithmetic and writing, Juvia's education is lacking."
"I've changed my mind. We shouldn't send you back to your island. We should drop you in the middle of London and see how long you last. I give it two hours tops."
Juvia let Gajeel's non verbal and rather rude response suffice as a reply, turning back to Gajeel and waiting for an explanation.
"It's a place where people store money and valuables, Raindrop."
"You should probably explain what money is to her, Redfox."
Juvia turned to snap at Dreyar but a swift kick to her leg from Gajeel stopped her. Knowing well what that meant, she ducked quickly, covering her head. The apple lobbed by Gajeel whooshed over her head and nearly clipped Dreyar. It likely would have struck him, but Dreyar had been expecting retaliation and managed to avoid a direct blow. However, in his haste to dodge, he lost his balance and toppled onto the hall floor with a thud and muttered curse. His friends looked up from their own hushed conversations and received a dismissing wave from Dreyar as he pulled himself up.
Dreyar's fall also attracted the attention of a couple of nearby groups, much to Gajeel's displeasure. "Oi! Mind your own damn shit," he snarled. Though several years his senior, every last one of them was quick to turn away. Still grumbling, he opened his paper again and returned his focus to the story that continued on in one of the inside pages.
"Not much of interest in there, Redfox," Dreyar said as he took a seat again, opting to sit on the bench rather than the table this time around.
Gajeel merely grunted in response.
"Juvia still doesn't understand," she said after another look at the newspaper. "Why is everyone so worried? Juvia's never seen everyone this worked up before. Shouldn't a bank constantly be a target of thieves?"
"Gringotts is incredibly well guarded. Have to be one hell of an idiot to try to steal from it. And idiots don't usually make it past the lobby."
"And these thieves did?"
Dreyar nodded. "But that's not what's bothering everyone. This level in Gringotts has been attacked a half dozen times over the last century, though none were successful in actually getting into any of the vaults. The last attempt was five or so years ago. Irene Belserion attempted to break in. Greatest enchanter of her time or maybe even ever, but even she wasn't a match for Gringotts. She tried to break through the defenses, but something backfired, and suddenly no more Scarlet Despair."
"Belserion? That's Scarlet's mother, yeah?"
"Yeah."
She glanced over at the Gryffindor table, easily picking out the red-haired witch. She was surrounded by a dozen or so students, some Gryffindor, some not, all talking amongst themselves animatedly. One of the party, Heartfilia, spotted Juvia staring at them and glared back. Irritated, Juvia stuck out her tongue at the blonde and returned her focus back to the paper in front of her. Dreyar, noticing, gave her an inquiring look.
"Heartfilia," she grumbled a reply to the unspoken question.
"Ah." He glanced over at the Gryffindor table briefly. "Don't mind her. It's not personal. She's hunting Zerefs, and you and I just happen to be popular options."
Juvia scowled, well aware of the rumors. "So's Scarlet, though. And she's friends with Scarlet."
"Yeah, well, get sorted into the right House and you too can be absolved of the sins of your parents. Or the sin of not having any," he replied with more bitterness than she was used to hearing from the largely stoic boy.
"Doesn't hurt t' change yer name, either," Gajeel muttered, not lookup up from his paper, earning a short mirthless laugh from Dreyar.
Juvia studied the story on the page, not finding much in it. Nothing had been successfully taken and no one had been taken into custody or killed. It still didn't make sense. "You said it's been attacked several times?"
Dreyar nodded. "Every Zeref in the last century has tried to break into the vaults. None have ever succeeded. Belserion got the closest, but even she couldn't manage it."
"Ah, that's why everyone's upset. They think it's the next Zeref," Juvia said.
"No one's saying it out loud, really. Not even The Daily Prophet, though I imagine that's by order of the Ministry. Doubt they want to start a panic. But everyone assumes it's a new Zeref. The fact that no one was apprehended or killed in this attack isn't helping any."
"Too soon fer a new Zeref," Gajeel muttered.
"I don't think Zerefs give much a damn about timetables, Redfox."
"Yeah, but damn hard t' start a war when all yer soldiers are rottin' in Azkaban. Gotta wait fer new idiots t' replace the old."
"Least Lockser, Scarlet and I all have alibis. Should shut up some of the idiots."
Gajeel scowled. "Wouldn't count on it. Heard some idiot suggest Raindrop here changed inta a rain cloud and traveled down t' London that way. Apparently, it was rainin' when the bank was hit, and we all know it can't rain without Raindrop."
"Surprised you didn't pull out your wand," Dreyar said with a smirk.
"Too many witnesses," the boy replied. "I know where the dumbass stashes his smokes. I'll jinx one of 'em later."
Juvia held up her hand in front of her, studying it critically. "How would that even work?"
"Don't try to make sense of stupid, Lockser. You'll give yourself a headache."
"What were they even trying to steal from there?"
"I don't know. Allegedly, whatever it was, it was placed there by Mavis Vermillion last century."
"Mavis? The Gryffindor ghost?" Dreyar nodded. Juvia glanced over again at the Gryffindor table where the short shoeless ghost was peering over a student's shoulder at a newspaper. "Has anyone asked her?"
"Ha! Yeah - sixty Gryffindors in the last ten minutes, I'll wager," he replied. "I doubt she'd say anything. My father believed that my grandfather and Precht knew too, but they wouldn't tell him. I overhead my father talking about it with Belserion once, night before she died. She didn't even know what was inside, and she was about to go die for it."
"Idiots, the lot of 'em," Gajeel growled, tossing the paper onto the table. "Zeref or not, we ain't gonna figure it out sittin' here. Eat up, Raindrop, or we're gonna be late fer Herbology."
"Since when do you care about Herbology?" she asked.
"Since I realized plants don't stare," he said, casting a dark glare at the Hufflepuff table where another group was looking their way. Once they'd been spotted, they quickly went back to their whispering.
Grimacing, Juvia quickly assembled a plate and set to eating as quickly as she could while still maintaining some semblance of dignity. Gajeel didn't have much patience for dignity and was quite content to shovel food into his face. Juvia didn't mind her friend's lack of manners - at least when people stared, she could be fairly certain it wasn't at her. When Juvia had finally eaten enough to last until dinner, pushing her plate back, Gajeel grabbed a couple of sausage rolls and headed out of the Great Hall. Juvia followed close behind, the weight of several dozen stares following after them.
When they were walking down the corridor towards the greenhouses, Gajeel spoke, his words muffled a bit by the remnants of his last remaining sausage roll, "Yer gonna be on yer own in a couple of weeks back at yer island."
Juvia looked to the boy, his expression grim and tense. "Juvia has the abbess."
"She's what? Ninety?"
"She's barely seventy."
"Whatever," he said with a shrug of his shoulders. "She ain't gonna be much help. Ya need t' be careful. If this is the start of somethin'," the boy tensed at the thought, coming to a stop and Juvia pausing next to him, "ya need t' make sure yer safe. Ya know how t' fight. Make sure yer prepared. Keep yer wand close and yer hand on straight. And if some random asshole shows up teachin' ya a spell..."
"Yes, yes. She knows. Lesson learned. All people are assholes unless proven otherwise."
"No, all people are assholes," he said, looking down at her. "Full stop. Got it?"
"Got it."
"Good." He set his hand on her head, a now long familiar gesture that served as his best attempt at being comforting. She didn't bother to shake him off. Or try to, anyways - she was rarely successful at shaking him off. Besides, for once, she got the impression that it wasn't her he was trying to reassure.
"It'll be okay, Gajeel."
The boy sighed. "Yeah. Sure it will."