Two days.
Two whole days have come and gone without any inkling of an attack in Hogsmeade. And if Guinevere has to drink one more damn butterbeer at The Three Broomsticks, she's going to lose it.
Monday was uneventful. Tuesday was even more uneventful. Now it's Wednesday, and she's beginning to think that this rumor about a Death Eater attack is nothing but a rumor.
She checks the ridiculously intricate grandfather clock resting against the wall across from her and groans. She still has another hour until either Sirius or Remus are set to take her place and she can just wander around Zonko's or Honeyduke's for five hours.
It's not that Marlene and Dorcas aren't good company, but spending nearly all of her week with them is enough to make her want to take a day to herself in her flat; just her and Stevie Wonder, cuddled up on the couch with some episodes of Soul Train.
"Try not to look too devastated about having to hang out with us," Dorcas jokes, leaning her shoulder into Marlene's.
Guinevere rolls her eyes and grabs the butterbeer out of Dorcas's hands, taking a gulp. Dorcas opens her mouth to protest, but Guinevere shoots her a glare.
"I need this right now."
Dorcas narrows her eyes and begins to say something no doubt snappish, but stops short when Marlene rests a delicate hand on her arm. Her shoulders deflate and she seems to, for once in her life, have nothing more to say.
Guinevere wonders how Marlene always seems to know exactly what to do to calm Dorcas down, more so than Alice and Lily and herself combined. A single word or a soft touch from the blonde can make the normally argumentative and brash girl melt.
They balance each other out perfectly.
"How's decorating the flat going?" Marlene asks, deftly changing the subject.
Guinevere winces. She swore to them when she first moved in that she would make the place look more like she was living there and less like she was just passing through. Now, after over two months there, it still looks abysmal.
"Um… It's… going."
Dorcas snorts.
"The sink counter still has mold in the grout?" she assumes
Guinevere scowls.
"No, I took care of that," she insists. "We just haven't gotten around to… y'know… the decorative stuff. We're both so busy and we figure as long as we have a bed, a couch, a fridge, and each other, then we're good, right? What else is there to want?"
Dorcas and Marlene exchange secretive smiles. Guinevere can't even begin to imagine why, so she doesn't attempt to. Those two have their own code.
"How very domesticated," Dorcas coos.
Guinevere sputters, trying to think of a rebuttal. There's many words she could use to describe Sirius Black, but "domesticated" is not one of them. And she can't imagine ever thinking of him like that.
"You're worse than Mrs. Potter," she scolds. "Sirius and I have only been dating for eight months. Stop acting like we're married."
Marlene gives her a smile, a far away, dreamy kind of look in her eyes.
"I don't think the length of time you're with someone matters, Guin," she says. "When you really, truly love someone, you know. Whether it's two years into the relationship or two months, there's a time when you find yourself imagining a life with them and realizing… That's it. That's the only future you can imagine for yourself."
Dorcas bumps her shoulder against Marlene's with a soft smile. It's times like these when Guinevere thinks about something her mother once said, about how some people have been on this earth before. If that's true, then Marlene is one of those people.
"Enough about me and Sirius. What about Alice and Frank? Did she tell you whether or not she picked out a wedding date?"
Dorcas and Marlene groan in unison.
Alice and her longtime boyfriend, Frank Longbottom, have been engaged since June. Unlike James and Lily, who had a virtually nonexistent engagement period, Frank and Alice aren't diving headfirst into marriage.
"Frank's mum wants them to have a "real" ceremony," Dorcas scoffs. "And you know Alice. She's too shy to tell her to sod off."
"Well I should hope she doesn't tell her future mother-in-law to sod off," Marlene gasps.
Guinevere zones out while her friends argue over what Alice's course of action should be, deciding instead to scan the area. She's already done so what feels like hundreds of times in the past few hours, but another glance over couldn't hurt.
After all, it's not like they're going anywhere anytime soon.
The Three Broomsticks is having a relatively slow day. Without Hogwarts students swarming the place, it feels oddly empty. Guinevere has never seen it this way. She's only ever visited as a Hogwarts student, never as a spy.
The two things are so distinctively different that she can almost forget she only graduated a few months before.
Her eyes keep coming back to a couple who have been cuddled up at the bar for the past half hour. The girl's face is buried in the man's shoulder, their sides pressed up against each other. Her body shakes with laughter. Their butterbeers are barely touched. It seems like any other normal date.
Guinevere can't even remember the last time she and Sirius went on a "normal" date.
They're both so busy these days that they've begun to consider sleeping in the same bed at the same time as a kind of date. They probably haven't actually gone out alone together since they were still in Hogwarts.
Maybe after all this is over, they can come here and be as care free as that couple at the bar.
She finally tears her eyes away from the couple and keeps scanning the area. There's mostly just older wizards taking their lunch break and a few alcoholics who she's seen every day this week.
She scrutinizes the first head of non-grey hair she sees.
It belongs to a tall, lanky man who stands with his back turned to her. He's facing the bar, just… standing. He's making no move to take a seat or order something from the bartender. His posture is stiff. Altogether, he looks out of place. All of Guinevere's natural and learned instincts are telling her that he's someone to keep an eye on.
When he turns around, pressing his back against the bar, she becomes sure of it.
The pale blue eyes, the light blond hair tied up in a braid, the harsh features; it's Corban Yaxley. He was a Slytherin and a year ahead of her, but that doesn't mean that she didn't unfortunately run into him a few times. Each time, he was ruder than the last.
It was no shock to her or anyone else that he turned out to be a Death Eater.
Before she can alert Marlene or Dorcas, Yaxley's eyes lock on hers. The intensive training she was forced to endure under Moody goes right out of the window as she stares right back at him. He holds her gaze for a few tense seconds before smirking.
Their cover is blown and its all her fault.
She breaks eye contact with him and looks over at Marlene and Dorcas, trying to remain as calm as possible. Panicking would only heighten his suspicion.
The two girls are bickering over whether or not it would be a good idea to get a cat when Guinevere cuts in.
"Guys, it's happening."
Discussion at the table immediately ceases. Neither girl looks around to verify Guinevere's claim, which she is grateful for. They don't want to make it even more obvious that they know his plans.
"Should we get the others?" Marlene asks in a whisper.
"Not our people," Dorcas responds. "But the… other people."
Aurors. She's talking about the aurors stationed around Hogsmeade.
"I'll go get them," Guinevere volunteers. Maybe if she leaves, Yaxley will think she just recognized him from their school years and became uncomfortable at his presence.
Dorcas and Marlene make no arguments as Guinevere stands up out of her seat. A shout of "Confringo!" from behind her, followed by a deafening crash, makes her fall back into her chair.
She turns her head towards the bar and finds all the bottles smashed and dripping onto the floor while the bartender cowers in fear. To her shock, Yaxley isn't the only one with his wand out. He's now flanked by Avery and Bellatrix Lestrange, Sirius's lovely cousin. Unlike Avery and Yaxley, who wear haughty smirks, Bellatrix's mouth is twisted into what Guinevere guesses could be called a smile.
And just like that, chaos erupts in The Three Broomsticks.
People scream and make a mad dash for the exit, trampling each other on their way out. Mixed in with the sounds of screams and feet scuffling is shouts of "Confringo!" and "Expulso!", followed by more glasses shattering and some thuds that Guinevere can only pray are not bodies dropping.
This is the first time something has actually happened while she was working for the Order, and she's already in way over her head.
"What do we do?" she shouts to her friends. "We aren't supposed to make a scene!"
Marlene looks as frightened as Guinevere feels as she clutches onto Dorcas's arm. It's a morbid kind of comfort to Guinevere, knowing she isn't alone in her fear. She's not the only one who feels like an ill-prepared child suddenly thrust into an adult's war.
Dorcas, however, doesn't look scared in the least. No, she looks enraged.
"Marls, you take on Avery," she commands. "Guin, you go for Yaxley. I've got Lestrange. We just need to hold them off until the others get here. It's too late not to make a scene!"
Guinevere tries to swallow her fear for the time being.
It's just until the aurors come, she reminds herself. There's so much commotion, they have to be coming soon.
Dorcas and Marlene leap into action, darting from the table to go duel with their respective targets. Guinevere, however, stays put.
She knows her own skills, and dueling is not one of them. The thought of being the direct cause of harm to anybody, even a Death Eater, is abhorrent to her. But one thing she can do is disarming spells. They're useful while still being able to accommodate her pacifist nature.
Now if only Yaxley would stay still long enough for her to cast it…
"Expelliarmus!" she yells, knocking the wand out of his grip. It clatters to the floor, rolling in her direction. Guinevere and Yaxley look up at the same time, narrowing their eyes at each other. She can see the challenge behind his eyes.
I dare you to go for that wand, his gaze seems to say.
They dive for it at the same time, their heads bumping together. Guinevere feels a splitting headache coming on, but the adrenaline pumping through her veins is enough to help her power through it. She reaches out and wraps her fingers around the tip of the wand, while Yaxley grips onto the end. A vicious game of tug-of-war ensues.
Guinevere can't tell if her hands are sweating because of nerves or the physical exertion. Either way, her grip on the wand is tenuous.
It doesn't take long for Yaxley to rip it out of her hands, causing her to fall forward. They scramble up to their feet at the same time. The quick motion has Guinevere battling dizziness. Stars float in and out of her vision.
Yaxley screams a curse at her. She blocks it just as quickly.
His face twists up into a sneer as he barks out another one. Again, she blocks. It's one of the only things she knows how to do properly, and she refuses to fling a curse back at him. If she has her way, this war will never reduce her to uttering curses at other human beings.
As his frustration builds, his curses become more frequent, escalating in their violence. Each time, Guinevere blocks and takes a step back. It doesn't take her long to figure out his strategy. He's backing her into a corner of the bar, slowly, but surely. She racks her mind, trying to remember any methods she learned for blocking a curse from a short distance.
Nothing.
"Locomotor wibbly!"
She blocks.
"Sectumsempra!"
She blocks.
"Reducto!"
She blocks.
A gleam of pure hatred enters his eyes, paralyzing Guinevere for a quick second. She's experienced enough hatred to last her two lifetimes, but never before has she seen a look so cold.
Murder. That's the only way to describe it. She sees murder in his eyes.
He raises his wand high.
"Avada—,"
"Expelliamus!"
Yaxley is thrown against the wall like a rag doll. The relief is so great that it causes Guinevere to collapse to the floor. She doesn't know who casted that spell, and she doesn't care.
He was about to cast the killing curse. There's no way to block that.
She was about to die.
A hard lump forms in her throat when she utters those words in her mind.
She was about to die.
She was seconds away from death.
When she becomes aware of her surroundings again, she finds Sirius kneeling in front of her with tired eyes and a worried furrow to his brow. He's sweaty and a little beat up, but he's never looked so handsome to her as he does in that moment.
And to think that she could have left him behind…
"Guin? Guin, are you alright?"
He repeats the same phrase a few more times before Guinevere finds herself nodding robotically in response. He sighs in relief and grabs her by the arms, helping her up off the floor. Her legs feel as though they're about to give out, but he keeps his grip on her and rests his head on hers.
"Let's get out of here," Sirius murmurs against her hair.
Guinevere glances around the bar.
The place is in shambles.
Broken bottles line the floor from the bar all the way to the other side of the building. Tables are reduced to nothing but sharp wooden sticks, some covered in blood. Chairs are overturned or missing legs or both at the same time.
But none of that matters. All that matters is that Guinevere sees no dead bodies strewn across the floor. The Death Eaters didn't accomplish what they came here for.
She was able to do something right, at least.
"Where did they go?" she asks, gripping onto Sirius's shirt.
"Apparated out of here as soon as they realized they weren't gonna win, like the cowards they are. Remus and I ran here as soon as we heard all the screaming. The aurors weren't far behind."
At least Yaxley isn't going anywhere, she thinks smugly, looking at the Death Eater's unconscious form slumped against a wall.
A question nags at her from the back of her mind. She's ashamed to say she didn't think of it immediately.
"Where are Marlene and Dorcas? And Remus?"
"Outside talking with Moody," he reassures her. "But he gave me the okay to take you home without a debriefing first. You're no use to anyone when you're this out of it."
The words sting in a way she didn't expect. Something about his tone when he claimed she was of no use…
It wasn't in a playful way. Or even a soft, sympathetic way. She would even venture as far to say that he sounded annoyed.
She reaches for his hand, lacing their fingers together. She needs this, some sort of physical reassurance after what she just went through. She wants to know that this is real and she's still here. But most of all, she wants to know that Sirius doesn't blame her for anything.
He tenses up at the contact.
"Let's go," he repeats. "We have a lot to talk about when we get home."
Before Guinevere can ask what it is they have to talk about, Sirius apparates them away.
A/N: I'm sorry for the long delay between chapters, but I'm back at school and the spring semester is kicking my ass. I'm going to try to update as much as possible though, so don't worry! As always, reviews are always appreciated and thank you for reading!