Sixth year started out dully with nothing exciting happening, which seemed to be okay for most of the students. These days excitement and action were not exactly a thing people hoped for. Messalina got long letters detailing Fabian and Gideon's early supervised cases as training aurors, including an especially odd one where a man was found dead of no known natural causes or muggle weapons or known wizarding spells. Just dead. Five year old Charlie was sending her almost illegible letters with photographs of all the different creatures he saw.

She had received at least ten pictures of Bear which she promptly sent back, demanding that she needed Charlie's signature on them as proof that he had been the one who had taken them. She got them back quickly, each with what she supposed was Charlie's scrawled out name. It reminded her of her own writing and she placed the moving pictures above her nightstand. Madeline Shatter told her that she needed to take them down because the runt was so ugly that she feared her eyes would burn out of her head. Messalina vowed to do something about it and the next day another ten pictures of her dog and Charlie were on the wall. She soon had photos of Bill and Charlie giving Bear a bath and for the first time since first year she felt terribly homesick. She figured that she might have taken them down if not for the fact that that would mean Shatter would win and if there was one thing for certain she would never let that privileged brat get the pleasure.

She loved her family to the point that she wasn't sure it was possible to adore them more. She loved being with her brothers but she merely enjoyed being with the Marauders. She often felt like a fifth wheel as they joked about past pranks and memories. Messalina did not in any way expect to be included in every little detail of their lives but she did believe that she deserved to know some aspects of their private lives that everyone else didn't know.

She was currently sitting in the library doing homework for the first time since she was eleven, the twins having been banned after somehow knocking down a bookcase which promptly knocked down all the other bookcases in its row. The Marauders were off doing whatever the hell they normally did and Messalina felt pangs of loneliness beginning to ascend upon her.

She was trying to keep busy, sticking her nose in a book whenever she was alone. She needed to get to Egypt soon, and she was planning on taking her family out of the anxious hell hole that England was becoming. They could fight and help internationally, apparating from Cairo to London within moments or flooing or using a port key. She needed to keep Mr. and Mrs. Prewett away, and keep their spirits up as they aged. The pair were no longer spring chickens, they were both closer to sixty than fifty and though they said they could fight, Messalina had seen the amount of potions they had to take to remain in the shape they were in. No, she wanted to evacuate her family even if it was an unnecessary action.

The thought of her family dying was too much for her to handle and for a moment she wondered what exactly she would do if they did leave her behind. She supposed she would go insane or throw herself into the fighting so much that she would join them soon enough. She wasn't stupid enough to believe that she would go out in a rain of curses or die nobly, she just needed to be with people who loved her all the time and as time had begun to show there wasn't anyone at Hogwarts that was like that to her or for her. Remus was the closest thing she had to love in Scotland, but she wasn't sure what love was supposed to feel like. If it was like it was in the movies then that meant that she should have butterflies in her stomach at the sight of him and want to spend every waking moment with him. It wasn't like that and aside from Mr. and Mrs. Prewett, Molly and Arthur, Messalina knew no one else who was in that sort of love.

"Lucien, mind if we sit? There's nowhere else," Graham Pucey's voice dragged her from her dismal thoughts and she slapped the stoic look on, the one her parents had been so sure that she and her cousin Antonin knew to use so well. Graham flinched from the look, he had seen that look that same fucking look on most of his housemates for the past five years. He and Lucien were now on awkward speaking terms, in Transfiguration they would make small talk but that was it. Messalina's emotionless eyes looked behind him where John Higgs was standing with his arm around his bubbly Hufflepuff muggleborn girlfriend.

Messalina slammed her Charms book, shoving it roughly into her fraying bag. She brushed the hair from her stony brown eyes and stood up, almost eye-level with Pucey. She continued their small battle of wits before he looked away and she inwardly smirked before exiting the library. She walked straight through a gaggle of chattering Hufflepuff girls, almost deaf to their indigent cries.

She moved slowly to the Gryffindor Common Room, anger surging through her for reasons she didn't know. It was a new feeling, the sudden surges of anger, loneliness and fear. Sometimes in a combination of two or three, other times a very strong sense of one of them often overwhelming her to the point that wanted to surround herself in people and schoolwork. But people drained her and left her annoyed and schoolwork merely drug her mind back to that place. The dark place that told her that she needed to go home or be surrounded by those who loved her and wanted the best for her. She had only been at school for a week and a half, 14 more before she got to see her brothers and be surrounded by her family.

"Missing the blood traitors are you Lucien?" A voice called out suddenly and Messalina turned slightly to see her handsome cousin sneering at him from a group of brawny Slytherins.

"Almost as much as you're going to miss all of Marcus' money when the Ministry realizes what he's been using his money and status for," Messalina smirked when she saw the crack in the sneer when she addressed her father by his first name and nearly giggled when she watched her cousin's face become twisted with fury. "Bye bye now."

She waved at them as she walked away and broke into a grin when she heard Antonin boiling over with anger and barking at third year to get away from him.

She moved swiftly up to her room after spitting the password at the Fat Lady, suddenly wanting nothing more than to be with her family. Pulling out her parchment, Messalina drew her curtains around her bed and whispered Lumos, her wand light making it light enough to see everything.

Dearest Fabian and Gideon,

School is not the same without you both and everyday I wish that you were back here with me or I'm out there with you guys. Actually doing something not just learning stupid shit that I'll never be able to use. When will I ever need to know how to turn an owl into a pair of opera glasses. I've never even been to the fucking opera in all my years and I never intend on going to one, so don't get excited and buy me tickets or anything. How are Molly and the kids? I got a letter from Mum and Dad the other day saying that everyone is doing fine but I know they just don't want me to worry. How is Bill's fever has it truly gone down?

I miss you more than I can ever explain and its only 14 weeks until I can see your skinny arses again. The first Hogsmeade trip is November 12th and if you could both come it would mean the world to me.

Yours,

Lina

"Messalina?" Lily Evans' voice called and Messalina stuck her head out of her bed. The redhead smiled slightly and pointed down the stairs. "Remus is looking for you."

"Thanks Lily," Messalina put on a fake smile and hurried down the stairs. She didn't even stop to think how her heart fluttered more than usual, it had become normal whenever she was with Remus. Only recently had it seemed overshadowed with loneliness.

The Marauders were lying across the couches, Remus working on homework and the other three ending a game of Exploding Snap. There were a few boxes of chocolates lying out and Messalina felt a smile tug on her lips when she saw Remus eat a chocolate frog. She didn't feel the same exhilaration as she had when she had confronted the Slytherins but there was a little something.

Remus turned around when he heard her approaching and closed his book, shoving it into his bag. "Hey Lina, we're going up to our room before dinner do you want to come?"

She nodded more out of habit than anything and she laughed hollowly when a card exploded, singing one of Sirius' perfectly bushy eyebrows. She was too preoccupied with trying to act normally to see the look of concern her boyfriend gave her.

The five of them went up the stairs, talking about Quidditch and how Benjy was going to be having a meeting soon about it. James and Sirius began to toss a kid-size quaffle around the room, Peter beginning to work on his Charms homework and Remus and Messalina sat down on his bed. He had already put pictures up of him over the summer, one of them laughing, one of them kissing, and a couple of him with a a large black dog, a rat, and a stag.

"Where'd you take these?" She asked picking up one of them.

"What oh nowhere Lina, those are nothing really-"

"What are they Remus?" She asked again but he just spat out a reply.

"Hey Prongs, why do you got to make things so hard?" Sirius laughed and James just threw the quaffle harder at him.

"Man up Padfoot! Hey Wormtail you want to get in on this?" Messalina stared down at the picture for a moment and Remus thought that he could see the gears in her mind moving.

"You complete and utter arse!" She shrieked, throwing herself off the bed as though she had been electrocuted. The quaffle hit James in the face and he fell backwards on the bed but sat straight back up. "How dare you lie to me!"

"Lina listen to me-" Remus scrambled off the bed and he stood in front of her as her eyes began to fill with tears.

"How could you lie to me?" She asked him softly.

"It's not a big deal Lina-"

"Then why didn't you tell me?" She snapped and when he just looked down she scoffed before storming down the stairs. She made it all the way up to her room and onto her bed before she began to sob uncontrollably.