AN: WHOOPS it's been about a monthish since I posted, hasn't it been? I'm sorry! Really! I've had to read three books for school and they were kind of monopolizing my time and my brain and I just didn't have the thought space to work on this until literally a couple days ago and then I got back into the swing of writing. So this chapter picks up just before Christmas holiday, and does not quite cover the entire Christmas holiday, though I don't think there's much more holiday action I really want to write about next chapter. I left this on what I feel like is a pretty big cliffhanger, but idk, my perception of tension buildup is a bit jacked because I already know what's supposed to happen, so feel free to let me know if I actually pulled it off or not.

Also, shoutout to my friend honorary-marauder-1 for getting the music from Chicago epically stuck in my head!

A couple days before they were to leave for Christmas holiday, Marina noticed Annie was worried. It wasn't very obvious, but she picked up on little irregularities: she didn't comment on Gideon's sloppily-tied tie, she forgot to poke Marina out of her head before Professor Raleigh caught her daydreaming in Defense, and one evening in the common room she watched Annie's eyes scan the same page four times, and it wasn't even a textbook, which would have made some sense. Knowing Annie was preoccupied with something—and it was a bad something because when Annie got quiet her eyebrows knitted together and she looked like she was sucking part of her cheek in between her teeth while she frowned—was, in turn, worrying Marina. She didn't like seeing her friend upset. So, when they were packing the afternoon before they were to leave for the Express, while Artemis and Lark were conveniently out of the dormitory, Marina asked her about it, carefully making sure her tone was gentle.

"Is there something bothering you, Annie?"

Annie sighed, and paired another two socks. "I'm worried about how my parents are going to be when I get home. I still can't get over that feeling from the end of summer I had, like they don't like my being a witch," she confessed, her voice much heavier than it usually was, though she spoke with the same confidence she usually had.

Even though Annie hadn't hesitated now that Marina had asked, she'd kept her fears to herself. Marina thought back to the beginning of the year, remembering now how Annie had been quiet and forlorn on the train. The goal right now was to comfort Annie, though, not discuss the possible legitimacy of her concerns.

"It's alright. They're your parents; how could they not accept you? You've done nothing to be upset or ashamed or guilty about," Marina stated, punctuating her assertion by dropping Maia's cat treats into her trunk. "I'll write to you, okay?" Annie's parents refused to buy her an owl, so she always had to wait on Marina or Quincy to write to her first, which meant Marina would definitely have to write to Annie so that Annie would be able to tell Marina if something was wrong.

The very next morning, Annie started up the usual routine, making sure Marina and Artemis were awake so they could do all their last-minute packing of their toiletries or what-have-you. The Hogwarts Express would be leaving at 11:00, so at least they had a few more hours in the morning than they usually had. At about 7:10 or 7:15, the three girls had a very quiet discussion on whether or not they should wake Lark like usual or let her sleep another hour or two. Annie was for waking her up because breakfast would not be served in the Great Hall after 8:30, but Marina was for letting her sleep, and Artemis could see both sides of the debate. They compromised by returning to wake her after they finished breakfast, and escaped the den of the slumbering beast before they accidentally roused her too early.

Unfortunately, the trio took too long to decide, because who should be lurking on the landing between the common room and the exit but Alfred Smith and another of the boys in their year, Irving Chatterley. "Good morning, Marina, Artemis, Annie," Alfred called when the girls came to a stop at the bottom of the stairs. "Heading to breakfast?"

"Don't want to miss the gingerbread scones," Artemis replied. Annie nudged Marina to follow Artemis towards the door.

"We'll join you, then! Irving and I were waiting for the others, but they seem to be running late this morning." Alfred sauntered over, reaching the door before Artemis and opening it with a dramatic flourish. Marina rolled her eyes.

"You know, actually, I'll wait for Evan and Xavier, Alf," Irving said, hanging back by the door to the common room. He casually poked through the stuff on the Ravenclaw lost-and-found table. Marina wondered if anyone had lost anything interesting recently. "We did say we'd meet them up here, after all."

"See you at in the Great Hall then," Alfred said, and again gestured for the girls to step out of Ravenclaw Tower.

It was terrible, the walk through the castle. Alfred was smart, and he knew it, and he liked to show off and talk about himself a lot, which he did that morning. Apparently, Annie wasn't the only morning person in Ravenclaw, because how else could Alfred be so bloody chipper and prepared to flaunt his endless odd facts before breakfast? Really, Alfred was hard to stand during the day, but in the morning when Marina was still not really truly fully awake, he was horrifying. She'd never known a more pompous braggart, and they had Slughorn teaching them potions for two hours twice a week. When they came to the Grand Staircase and Marina spotted Peter Pettigrew and his friends a flight down from them, she had to restrain herself from laughing in relief.

"Oh, look, there's Peter, and I've just remembered I need to ask him about that thing and I need Annie and Artemis to come with me," she said quickly, interrupting Alfred's explanation of the history of Italian protective spell tradition and its similarities to the British tradition.

Annie caught on immediately and with a short "That was an extremely boring lecture, Alfred" she flew down the steps, Marina following after and grabbing Artemis's hand to pull her along too. The girls pulled up short just behind the boys, not being quiet at all, causing the four younger Gryffindors to turn and give them very confused looks.

"We're escaping the human equivalent of History of Magic but more full of himself," Annie declared, "and it would be lovely if you could pretend to be very interested in talking to us."

James and Sirius shared a quick look before James threw his arms out and donned a wide grin. "Merlin's beard, we haven't spoken in ages!" he said loudly.

"I don't believe we've met," Sirius said, bowing to Artemis. "We simply don't see you Ravenclaws enough!"

"And Peter, you see the most of Marina here out of all four of us, I can't believe you haven't told us she's growing her hair out!" James exclaimed, throwing his arm around Peter's shoulders and looking slightly offended, because sure, why not, of course he, an elven-year-old boy, would notice her hair had gotten marginally longer since they met almost two months ago.

Marina saw Remus sigh and shake his head fondly, glance back up towards Alfred, and then tug the back of James's shirt to start walking again down the stairs. James and Sirius carried on with their theatrics almost the entire way to the Great Hall, at which point Marina made a split-second decision to sit at the Gryffindor table for breakfast this morning. Like usual, the Gryffindors raised no eyebrows, made room for the newcomers at the table. Annie made introductions to the present students they knew for Artemis, who had never joined Marina or Annie at the Gryffindor table as she'd never had cause to before. This morning, though, they sat between the second and first years, as a result of being brought to the table by the first year boys.

"Thank you for that," Marina said. Alfred had just walked into the Great Hall, perplexedly looking at the second year-less Ravenclaw table before sitting down by himself.

"No trouble at all! That Smith bloke's a pain to be stuck around," James answered, buttering a slice of toast.

The general conversation broke up and turned to various topics, most of them Christmas-related, and Marina was glad to see that Artemis looked to be enjoying herself as much as Artemis ever did enjoy herself, despite her previous rage against their Quidditch team. Her thoughts started to run away, then, and she tuned out the chatter around her. Being with Artemis and Sirius at the same time brought up her thoughts on her family past again, and she wondered if she'd ever know. The wedding was in just over a week; maybe someone would make a speech and tell stories about her parents as kids, or an old relative would start off on a tangent about lineage and ancestors and whatnot. Wait—ancestors and lineage. Her mum was a Slytherin, and she knew her family were all stuffy purebloods, but were they prejudiced purebloods? Was that why her mum didn't keep in contact with any of her family anymore? Was it because she had a child with her father—someone who wasn't a pureblood? Marina knew her papa's mother was a muggle and his father was a wizard, and she sort of felt like she'd heard that her grandpapa was actually muggleborn, or something like that. Maybe her mum was disowned for being a blood traitor.

Annie's foot connected with the side of Marina's shin, and she blinked away her thoughts. "Hm, sorry?"

"I said you're a girl, right?" James repeated, a hopeful look on his face.

Marina blinked again. "Well…last time I checked, yes. Why?"

James ran a hand through his hair, causing it to stick up in more directions than before. "Would you want someone to do a big romantic gesture for you?" he asked.

"Aren't you eleven? Bit young for big romantic gestures, isn't it?" she asked.

"That's what I told him," Annie commented.

"I'm twelve and I want nothing to do with it," Sirius piped.

"Told you, James," Remus said.

"What's this?" Artemis asked.

"I fancy that girl, Lily Evans," James stated, hooking his thumb in the direction of a cute girl with long red hair a bit farther down the table.

Artemis leaned forward to see down the table. "It'll never happen," she said with finality. "She's a redhead."

Peter furrowed his brow, confused. "What does that have to do with anything?"

With a solemn shake of her head, Artemis answered, "He's too good for her."

—

"Happy birthday, darling!" Bobbie caught her daughter up in a hug as soon as Marina reached her on the platform. Maia made an unhappy noise at being squished. "I'm sorry your papa and I didn't send anything for you through the post, but we thought it would be better to wait until you came home to give you your present. And anyway, you still have to pick it out for yourself."

When she arrived home, her papa had a similar greeting for her, sweeping her up off the ground and spinning around in the entryway of the house, nearly knocking Marina's feet into the umbrella stand. Her birthday had been almost a week ago, on 12 December, and she was now officially thirteen years old. A proper teenager, if you will. That evening her papa cooked fondue Savoyarde, a favorite meal of Marina's, and after dinner he brought out a beautiful birthday cake, thirteen candles burning above three layers of chocolately goodness. Her mum promised to take her to Flourish and Blott's soon, because she owed her five books as a birthday gift. Marina thought it was a lovely birthday celebration, and definitely worth waiting for.

After that first day of holiday, Marina mainly cozied up in the sitting room to soak up the Christmas decorations, the warmth of the fire, and stay away from getting swept up in the wedding plans. Bobbie was, at the moment, on the phone with a muggle florist, negotiating...something. It was moments like these when Marina thought her mother was at her best: directing, multitasking, strategizing, orchestrating. Bobbie was a force to be reckoned with, certainly, and it was amazing how she could handle all of it without much stress. Marina also had some homework she needed to do, and the sitting room was a good place to do it.

By the third day of holiday, Marina hadn't left the house or spoken to any of her friends, which was difficult to deal with when she saw her friends' faces every single day. She wrote up a letter to Annie, just the general stuff, like how was she and what her family's plans for Christmas were and was she enjoying not going to classes and all of that. The parchment scroll she forced to fold into a proper shape for a letter and sealed the string in the wax before popping into the kitchen to find the family owl.

When Marina entered the kitchen, her mum had a dress form stood on the table with a light pink, silky gown draped over it, and was staring intently at it with her arms crossed and her eyes narrowed. Quietly, so as not to break her mum's concentration, Marina tied the letter to their owl's foot and sent him off to Annie's. She figured now would maybe be a good time to go see if Quincy wanted to hang out, and took all of four steps towards the coat closet in the hall before her mum grabbed the sleeve of her sweater and pulled her back to the kitchen.

"Oh no no no, I need you for just a few minutes before you go away again," Bobbie stated, and turned back to the dress. "What do you think of this one?"

Marina considered the dress. It was certainly pretty, if a bit flouncy. It had a high neck and big bell sleeves and a hem that reached the floor—well, the table. "Um, I suppose it's pretty. Why? What about it?"

Bobbie twirled the dress around to start unbuttoning the long line of tiny gold buttons down the back. "You're a bit young to be a bridesmaid, but I wouldn't want it any other way, you see. I think this would be your bridesmaid dress if you want." Marina watched her mum slip the dress off the form and shake it straight again. "Here, dear, why don't you try it on?"

So instead of going over to Quincy's house, Marina modeled the dress for her mum, who decided that, yes, this dress did look very good on her daughter, and, yes, she did definitely want Marina as her bridesmaid because she was too old to be a flower girl anyway.

Annie's reply came back the next day, giving a report of nothing the matter at her home. She said that so far, her family maybe was a little distant, but Annie assumed that was because they hadn't seen each other for months. While that didn't quite sit right with Marina, because after months and months her parents weren't distant at all, but she figured she shouldn't try to pry and accidentally upset Annie in the process. Additionally, Marina got to see Quincy for a bit a few days before Christmas, and they talked about their assignments and Quidditch and James Potter's fancying Lily Evans. Apparently James was very much not ashamed of it and tried to get the poor girl to notice him every chance he could.

"You're kidding—in the middle of class?"

"That's what I heard, anyway, yeah."

"So you're saying that not only can James Potter fold a perfect origami swan, he also tried to send his love note to Lily right under Raleigh's nose, knowing that Raleigh had a cold that week?"

"Yes, that's what I'm saying. I'm actually sort of impressed—"

"Lily did something like rip the note up, didn't she?"

"Oh, of course. She's worse about wanting to learn than you Ravenclaws are, even. She only acknowledged it after Potter landed the thing right in front of her, and then she crumpled his beautiful origami work and went right back to taking notes. That's what Marlene told me, anyhow."

They were sitting in Quincy's sitting room, eating the screw-up Christmas sugar cookies his mum rejected. Marina watched a shower of crumbs fall onto the couch from Quincy's burnt star-shaped treat and remembered her thought from months ago.

"Speaking of fancying girls, do you fancy Annie?" she asked.

The crumb shower became a crumb geyser as Quincy suddenly coughed on his mouthful of biscuit, spewing crumbs as far as the coffee table. He flushed red, enough to be obvious against his dark skin, and Marina would have laughed if not for the very real possibility that she may have just killed her friend by causing him to choke. Thankfully, Quincy got ahold of himself and swallowed properly, took a drink of water from his glass, set it back down next to its coaster (but not on the coaster because he's just an idiot boy who knows nothing about good manners or preserving the varnish on lovely wooden coffee tables), and spent about an eternity opening and closing his mouth like a fish.

At last, he managed to stammer, "No, I—I don't—she's not—I'm not—…"

Right, sure. Marina rolled her eyes. Merlin help her because boys were completely useless and she happened to be best friends with one. Still, Quincy clearly was not ready to admit what was so painfully obvious, so Marina supposed she'd let the matter drop and maybe they could revisit this another time.

Christmas came and went, but it was a bit overshadowed by the impending wedding. Blessedly, all the preparations now seemed to be taken care of, aside from a rehearsal dinner for the wedding party to practice the entire ceremony, and then they had to visit both the wedding and the reception venues one last time the day before the wedding so they could plan out exactly how they'd decorate the following morning before the late-afternoon wedding. Marina watched her mum have a final fitting for her dress, and to Marina's shock, Bobbie began crying, standing in her wedding dress in front of the full-length mirror. She'd almost never seen her mum cry.

It was a beautiful ceremony, of course, all soft pink and gold and white, with pretty blue flowers everywhere, and wearing the bridesmaid dress wasn't so bad because it made her parents happy. Her papa cried, some of her mum's friends cried, and her grandpapa cried while her grandmaman fed him patterned handkerchief after patterned handkerchief (Bobbie herself did not even tear up—now the crying at her fitting made sense). But then Marina had to stand in a line with the rest of the wedding party and greet all the guests, and it was absolutely terrible because she had to introduce herself to everyone who came, and at first she only said "I'm Marina" because she wasn't sure what her last name was supposed to be now, but then some extended family someone-or-other who must've been well into his hundreds said "Who are you?" over and over until Marina finally said "I'm the bride and groom's daughter" and then he nodded and smiled and moved on down the line. So then she said "I'm Marina, the bride and groom's daughter," or just "I'm the daughter of the couple" or something like that and it was ridiculous, especially when some of them didn't even say their names back. Marina didn't even bother trying to remember all of their names, really. But it was all worth it because she'd never seen her parents quite so happy, and at least she could sit by Quincy at the reception. Still, no one said anything in any speeches about anything relating much to anyone's past, and Marina's burning curiosity was becoming unbearable. She'd break down and start being rude and asking questions soon if no one offered any answers to her unspoken questions, she knew.

The reception was in full swing, dancing, music, all that jazz, and it was late, and Marina was getting tired. She'd yawned twice already, both of which Quincy had caught. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the door crack open, and a woman slipped into the room, unnoticed by anyone, it seemed. The woman stood near the door, seemingly lost, and Marina couldn't shake the feeling that she looked familiar.

"Quin, you see that woman near the door?" she asked, bumping her friend with her shoulder to get his attention.

Quincy looked around, eyes narrowed. "No, I can't see the door at all." Marina tugged him over sideways so he could see from where she was sitting. "Oh, that woman with the curly blonde hair?"

"Yes. Does she look familiar to you?"

He was quiet a moment, apparently thinking. "Uh…no, I don't think I know her from anywhere…" He trailed off then, and Marina could hear some sort of a realization in his voice. Suddenly, Quincy sat upright again, faster than Marina had anticipated, and he hit her in the nose with his elbow. "Mina, doesn't—"

"Ow!" Her hands flew up to her nose, and she scowled at Quincy.

"Sorry, I'm sorry—but Mina, doesn't she sort of look like your mum? Like, a lot like your mum?"

Marina took a second look at the woman, who now seemed to be scanning the room for someone. Now that Quincy had pointed it out, she did look like a curlier-haired, rounder-faced, brown-eyed version of her mum. Before she'd even realized she'd done it, Marina stood up from her chair, sending it scraping on the floor behind her, not that anyone else could hear it. She told Quincy she'd be back, and then she weaved around chatting and dancing adults much taller than she was to get to this woman who just might be related to her mum.

"Excuse me," Marina said, coming to stand to the side of the woman, who she could see was now wearing a rather fine fur coat. "What's your name?"

"Bertie Minchum," the woman said, barely even glancing at Marina. "What's yours, sweetheart?"

"Marina Stewart-Lautrec, although that might change yet," Marina answered. "Um, are you looking for someone?"

Bertie Minchum snorted. "Your name might change yet, what's that supposed to mean?" And then she froze. And then she turned her attention fully to Marina. "Sorry, what did you say your last name was?"

"Stewart-Lautrec, except it might change considering my mum and papa just got married earlier today, you know." Marina was getting a little impatient. This Bertie obviously knew something, but what?

"How old are you, Marina?" Bertie bit her lip, eyes flicking upward for a fraction of a second. "Twelve? No, you'd be thirteen by now, wouldn't you be?"

"I just turned thirteen a couple weeks ago, yeah. Why? Are you related to my mum?"

"You're mum's Bobbie, isn't she?"

"Why?" Marina had to restrain herself form stamping her foot and settled for frowning.

"Sweetheart, your mum's my sister and I'm your aunt and I haven't spoken to her in about fourteen years, so if you know where she is right now—"

"Gigi?"

Marina looked past the woman who was apparently her aunt to see her mum, a hand at her chest, and Theo holding her free hand. Someone tapped Marina's shoulder, making her almost jump out of her skin, and she spun around, scowling at Quincy for scaring her. While her mum and aunt hugged and babbled incomplete phrases at each other, Marina whispered the whole exchange to Quincy, who stared at her with his jaw hanging in response.

"I guess you'll get some answers after all, Mina," he said once he collected his wits again.

"I guess I will."