"Turn my hair purple," I demand to Tonks, pointing at my own head with the hand not holding a glass of gin and tonic.

The three of us – Tonks, Fleur, and I – are in the first-floor den of Grimmauld Place. After spending the last hour mixing and matching all of my new clothes into suitable sexy-but-not-slutty bar attire, we've migrated upstairs due to the overwhelming stench of hairspray which had refused to be ventilated from my basement bedroom.

"Why?" Tonks sniffs from her seat in a vast, velvet, burgundy armchair. She's reached over to the copper end table beside the chair in order to pour another two fingers of firewhiskey into her tumbler, "You've got very pretty hair."

"Eet eez true," Fleur mumbles from her seat on the floor next to the fireplace. She has been flipping through my phone's playlist trying to find something suitable for the last ten minutes. "Eet of course does not 'ave the strength and shine like the 'air of a veela," she sniffs, scrolling, "but eet eez a nice color, I suppose." She had insisted once we moved upstairs that it was now her turn to pick the music. While getting dressed, she seemed to be struggling to get as hype as I was during Mistah F.A.B.'s "Still Feelin' It," which is my go-to get-sexy song.

The French bombshell has kept relatively quiet since we apparated back to the front stoop of Grimmauld Place. Her only verbal contributions have been to wrinkle her nose and sigh as she held my clothes up to her more petite form, and to declare herself the newly crowned dictator of music. My sincere hope is, now that she's on her second glass of riesling, she'll start loosening the fuck up.

"That's lovely of you to say," I tell her. I'm standing near the open door to the den, in front of a handsome full-length, oak-trimmed mirror. I've chosen a simple ensemble of high-waisted black shorts, a hot pink spaghetti-strapped tank top, and a very sheer black, collared, long-sleeve blouse tucked into said shorts. The shorts make my average legs look long and cool, and I've chosen some open-toed black wedges which do not suck in the least. I've bedecked myself with a couple of bracelets in addition to my jewelry from earlier, also charmed for my protection. But I'd feel a lot better, I think, if I'm just a bit unrecognizable.

It wouldn't matter as much if I hadn't straight-up introduced myself to a Death Eater today. But, even though I fully intend to keep to muggle hang-out spots, having someone put two and two together by seeing me with Tonks, Fleur, and potentially other Weasleys, would be completely catastrophic to the agenda Krum and I will be attempting to accomplish in two nights. Some things are just too important to fuck up for a night of drinking and dancing.

"I gotta start going incognito when I hang out with you Order weirdos," I elaborate. "I'm not sure how long I'm going to need to use whatever advantage Viktor and I gain, but I don't want to fuck it up."

Tonks stands from the chair and makes her way across the dark rug to stand behind me. She's wearing some strategically-torn jean shorts along with my bedazzled, camouflage-colored, long-sleeved tee. She pulls out her wand and makes eye contact with me in the mirror. "You're thinking ahead," she mutters and grins ruefully, "I'm feeling better about it already." With a wordless spell, she curls the tips of my hair along her wand like a curling iron, and lavender coloring begins creeping its way up to my roots.

"Zis eez 'opeless!" Fleur suddenly exclaims, "I do not recognize any of zis musique!" With a petulant toss of her hair, she clicks the shuffle button and flops the phone back onto the floor. As she rises, wineglass in hand, Sean Paul's "Get Busy" starts pumping through my speakers and she pauses, listening. Her eyes narrow and she lifts her glass to her lips as she considers the song. Her hips sway just slightly in my gauzy, light pink romper, her nude wedges locked in place on the floor. "Zis weel do," I hear her sniff.

"There-," Tonks reclaims my attention in the mirror, "-done." I assess my appearance; I look a bit like a Rainbow Brite doll. Fleur folds herself delicately onto the thick rug beside a coffee table in the center of the room and begins expertly shuffling a deck of cards I had scrounged from atop the mantle.

I grin at Tonks in thanks. "I look a bit like that annoying preteen in Sailor Moon," I tell her.

"Non," Fleur snaps from her position a few feet away. Her glass clinks as she sets it back down on the table, her focus on the cards, "Chibiusa's 'air eez more peenk."

Um, excuse me?

I pirouette slowly away from the mirror in order to face the French woman. Tonks is flopping back down into her previous chair, situated near a corner of the coffee table. I slowly step my way toward them both until I'm very close to Fleur.

Swiftly dropping to my knees beside her, bringing my face only inches from her face, I open my eyes wide and struggle to keep my voice even, "Been watching a lot of anime, have you, Fleur?"

Her eyes widen and a blush mars her cheeks. She glances over at me with a suspicious look, and I wiggle my eyebrows at her. "Tuxedo mask," I fan my face, "Hoo boy." Her eyes narrow, and I mutter quickly, "If only Bill were into cosplay, amiright?"

"Eet eez none of your business!" she shoves at me, nearly spilling my drink. I can't help it, I'm laughing in her damn face.

"What?" Tonks yells over my laughter and Fleur's continued huffs of irritation, "What is anime? What's so funny?'

"Eet eez an extremely sophisticated-," Fleur begins, but I interrupt her with a wail, "It's- it's… it's cartoons!" I have to wipe my eyes at this point, because Fleur looks as though I've insulted not only her, but each and every one of her extremely volatile veela ancestors.

Still giggling, I sit up more securely – still on the floor – but I grin at her good-naturedly. "Remind me to show you 'Attack on Titan' later," my smile widens as her haughty face becomes interested despite herself, "I've got some episodes downloaded on my phone. I think you'll really like it."

"I've got to be more drunk than this," Tonks suddenly announces. The woman must have an amazing tolerance for liquor; she's definitely on her third class of firewhiskey. "If you lot are expecting me to walk into a muggle club and act like I intend to dance," she points a finger between Fleur and I, warningly, "You better make certain that I'm good and sloshed."

I rise up off of the floor and make my way to the copper rolling bar situated behind an elegant, burgundy, velvet couch, which matches Tonks' chair. "We could watch zis show of Sjofn's," Fleur suggests coyly, "and continue drinking as we watch eet." I grab the bottle of gin, the only truly recognizable liquor outside of the firewhiskey which Tonks has already commandeered. "What?" Tonks wrinkles her nose at Fleur, "And drink every time a couple of cartoon characters snog? I don't think so."

Fleur swings her stunning hair over her shoulder arrogantly, "Bill theenks eet eez a most romantic show." She sniffs, "He would drink weeth me and watch eet."

I snatch a spare tumbler from the top of the rolling bar and make my way back around the couch to the coffee table. "Bill-," Tonks clips out in an authoritative tone, "-is what we in the British wizarding community would refer to as whipped-"

Before Fleur can retort, her mouth is already open in an angry 'O', I smack the empty tumbler hard in the middle of the coffee table. Folding myself back down onto the carpet indian-style, I place the gin beside it with more reverence.

In a rush, I inform them, "Unfortunately 'Attack on Titan' isn't a very suitable drinking show unless you would like to have hallucinations of monsters with fucked up, tic-tac teeth. BUT-," I continue more brightly, "We can still play games. What should we play?"

Tonks looks puzzled and snaps out, "Can we play the how-the-fuck-do-you-plan-to-stay-alive-in-Malfoy-Manor game? Because I have a feeling you won't win."

"No," I smile sweetly at her, "I mean like a card game. Or a shitty, girly bonding game."

"Oooh," Fleur bounces excitedly and snatches back up the cards and begins to shuffle, "We could play ze game of 'Unicorns and Trolls'." Tonks is already nodding. "That's a good one," she mumbles.

I furrow my brow irritatedly and say, "So I don't fucking know that game. What about 'Kings'? Do witches and wizards play 'Kings'?"

Both of them are already shaking their heads. Fuck.

" 'Fair or Foul'?" Tonks suggests. "It's where you try to guess if the person telling a story about something they've done is lying or not." I nod slowly, sipping my drink, but Fleur shakes her head in a negative.

"Well we have to play games," I tell them, exasperatedly. "It's the whole part of the pregaming process. The linguistics fairy will come and curse us with ugly men and bathroom faux-pas if we do not honor her with games."

I squint my eyes at each of them, and reach forward with exaggerated slow motion. I pour a shot of gin into the empty tumbler, and say very seriously, "We're going to play a game..." Tonks looks like she's about to interrupt so I whip my new 'wand' out of my pocket and gesture at her threateningly. She raises a hand palm-up in surrender, and I continue, "…A VERY DANGEROUS GAME..."

Fleur's silver eyebrows shoot up on her face while she sucks away at the remnants of her glass of wine.

As though performing a hand dance, I sashay my wrist and twirl each of my five fingers upwards until they're standing at attention. "The loser-," I hiss in a low voice, dropping each finger one by one to illustrate how one loses, "-takes the shot." I incline my head to the tumbler of gin on the table.

Fleur wrinkles her nose at it, but a slow, mischievous smile creeps up on Tonks' face.

"The game is called…," I pause for effect, and take the tumbler of my remaining mixed drink and gulp it down in one go. Slamming my now empty-glass onto the table, I finish, "…Never. Have. I. Ever."

Approximately one hour later, I'm face-down in the carpet, one of my hands is bandaged, and I'm screaming with laughter.

No, I am not sober.

"H-h-how…?" I can't even manage a sentence. I'm clutching my side and gasping for air. My face hurts.

Beside me, Fleur is faring no better. Her ladylike tinkling laughter keeps getting punctuated with spectacularly unladylike snorts. "Eet eez-," she breaks into guffaws again, "- so funny-"

"It is not," Tonks snaps at us from her new position on the floor. She's lying down, her arm covering her eyes in shame. She had taken the most recent shot as hers was the final finger to fall – we're on like round 5, I believe. But unfortunately…

"How-," I gasp, my eyes streaming, "-did you confuse the word threesome, for treehouse?"

"I'M FUCKING DRUNK, I DON'T KNOW," Tonks wails from her prone position on the floor as Fleur deals with renewed hiccups of laughter.

It had been my turn, and my confession had been "Never have I ever had a threesome." But then, to my and Fleur's extreme shock, Tonks had suddenly dropped her finger (indicating for all intents and purposes, that she had, in fact, had a threesome) and taken the shot in the middle of the table.

"Does Remus know?" I gasp out, essentially crying, "Is he comfortable with your adventurous past?" I duck as Tonks' wand suddenly whips into view, and a hole is blasted out of the wall next to the mantle a few feet behind me. I laugh harder.

"D-d-deedn't you k-know?" Fleur begins saying to me. She is slumped, holding her stomach with her legs splayed wide in front of her. "Eet w-was his idea in zee first place," She falls back shrieking, her hair like a tidal wave falling onto the carpet. She must have cast a wordless shield charm between herself and Tonks, because another blast ricochets and takes a chip out of one of the feet of the sofa.

I start massaging my aching cheeks. "Oh my god," I moan, "I think I'm going to pee my pants."

"As much as I would love to have that visual seared into my brain-," a chortling voice says from the doorway somewhere above me.

"-it would be a shame to ruin such a lovely ensemble," a second voice finishes. I lift myself up onto my hands and knees and am met with the sobering vision of Fred, George, Bill, Lupin, Harry, and Hermione standing in the doorframe of the den. "Did you find them?" I hear Ron calling from somewhere in the hall.

Shit. Where's Sirius?

I peer between the gaps in their legs, trying to spot his garish motorcycle boots.

They're not garish, I admonish myself. They're hot.

"Hullo, all...," Tonks sighs, as though resolved to her fate. "Bill," Fleur shrieks, sitting up quickly and bounding onto her now-stockinged feet. She practically throws herself across the room at her fiancé, landing like a chimpanzee ballerina into his open arms.

"Bill-," she starts very seriously, staring up into his handsome face, "-eef I said I want your body now, would you 'old eet against me?" She snorts at her own joke and buries her face in his chest. Ignoring his extremely startled look, she lifts her head again suddenly to whip it around, and points a threatening finger in my direction. "Play him ze song!" she cries.

"No," Tonks declares, sitting up onto her knees a little unsteadily. "You made us play that bloody song about five times in a damn row-"

"Fleur I swear to god-," I mumble out from between several locks of my now-lavender hair, "-if you make me listen to more of my own god damn Britney Spears music, I'm going to scream."

"Feeneeee…" she whines.

"What's wrong with your hand, Fin?" Harry interrupts Fleur. His face is almost exaggeratedly concerned, and I get the distinct impression he may be feeling a bit guilty for shouting at me earlier in Diagon Alley. I feel my stomach warm at the sight of him, Hermione, and Ron (who has squeezed his way in to stand next to Hermione). They're such good kids…

My hand?

"Oh, fuck," I exclaim, struggling to sit up onto my knees. I smile at everyone in the doorway. "It was so totally insane," I start babbling, "I don't even know how to explain it. We had no idea – I mean we never thought-"

"Just show them," Tonks says, and she pushes the decanter of firewhiskey towards me. "Yeah, yeah," I giggle to myself. But Fleur starts shrieking from her relative cocoon in Bill's embrace. "Non!" she cries, her beautiful face contorted in horror, "Do not do zat again! I weel not 'elp you zis time!"

Fred and George move closer to me out of curiosity, wide smiles on their matching faces. Lupin is frowning at Tonks, who's pulled her wand out but is grinning at me encouragingly.

I pour a small helping of firewhiskey into the now-empty tumbler. "Ready?" I ask Tonks under my breath. "Yeah," she says back, as she sits up and leans toward me, wand prepared.

I dip the tip of my finger into the tumbler. The second my skin touches the liquid, flames erupt from the point of contact. I whip my finger out of the glass, yelling my head off.

Fuck, this hurts.

Fleur is shrieking, Fred and George are yelling in alarm, Lupin is bellowing. Ron, Harry, and Hermione are screaming nearly in harmony, and Tonks, despite her preparation, is wordlessly yelling and staring at my hand.

Which is still on fire.

"Aguamenti!" Tonks finally cries, and the pain disappears. The bandages on my hand are singed, and my one finger is a bit re-burnt, but god dammit if I can't stop laughing. "It's… it's like-," I hiccup through my giggles, tears of mirth and pain stinging my eyes. "It's like everything-," I hold my side, which is aching, "-everything in this fucking universe is trying to kill me."

Tonks' shoulders are shaking with unexpressed laughter, which I know she's holding in because Lupin is straight-up glaring at her. Fred and George are huffing out reluctant soft chuckles of their own, but Harry, Ron, and Hermione look shell-shocked.

"I think you might be mad, Fin," Ron mumbles to me. I look up at him – from my position on the floor it's a long as shit way to look. "Don't make me curse you, Weasel," I whip my 'wand' out and brandish it at him. "Jesus you're like a skyscraper," I mutter.

Harry snorts, despite his better judgement. Even Hermione looks marginally less like she would like to have me committed.

"Zat was not as bad as last time," Fleur disentangles herself from Bill and pads over towards me to put her shoes back on, "I thought you were going to 'ave your 'air set on fire last time."

My attention has been diverted by George, who's begun conjuring fresh, not-wet bandages onto my injured hand. Tonks sighs and says rather defensively to Remus, "It's true. That went really rather well, considering." He doesn't do anything but continue to watch us disapprovingly, his mouth set in a grim line.

Tonks sighs again, she's a pretty relaxed drunk. Turning to face my side of the table she addresses the twins, "Well, are you lot coming then? I told your mother we owe you a drink."

George finishes the bandage with a flourish and grins at me. Fred gives a solemn nod of his head and responds, "Well at this point I feel we would be downright negligent to not act as chaperones to what promises to be a memorable evening."

"You may want to leave that thing at home, though," George nods to my shitty wand, "You'll put someone's eye out."

This is once again unreasonably funny to me. I genuinely am beginning to worry about wetting myself, and it's a problem. Grinning along with me, George extends a hand to help me up, and I take it gratefully. From the doorway I hear Bill clear his throat. "Fleur?" he calls over to his fiancé where she's adjusting her left shoe, "Could I have a word? In the hallway?"

Fleur's face becomes confused, but she straightens – swaying a bit – in order to follow Bill out into the hall. Everyone is quiet for a moment, Ron and Hermione exchange puzzled looks.

Before I can open my mouth to ask the million dollar question, Sirius suddenly strides into the room with a speed that has my heart in my throat immediately. He's breathing heavily, like he had run to reach us, and his hair is windswept from his face.

Dear god. So fucking hot.

In my inebriated state I am unable to keep myself from justifiably scanning him top to toe. Why are the douche-y ones always the most attractive?

"Why are the douche-y ones always the most attractive?" I hear myself mutter. Goddammit.

Harry, somewhere behind me, gives an audible choke of laughter. Fred pats my arm sympathetically.

Sirius pauses a couple of steps into the room; he looks around surreptitiously and takes in the scene. I can only guess what he's seeing: three rather tipsy young women, playing cards strewn all over the other side of the room (Fleur gets pissy when she loses), and a distinct depletion of his alcohol supply. I have no idea where his mood is at anymore. His opinion of me has only taken a downward turn since our motorcycle ride.

Ah, it clicks for me now. He had to ride his bike back, that's why he's late.

Deciding to play it cool, I hoist my black leather slouchy purse off of the floor and onto my shoulder. This must illustrate takeoff, because Tonks starts to struggle up onto her sandaled feet. Before she's even fully risen, however, Sirius suddenly snaps, "What the fuck happened to her hand?"

I wince. Can we maybe just skip this part so I can go dance?

"Do you want us to show you?" Tonks quips, fully standing. I can't help but grin at her – I think that's a great idea. I go to reach for the tumbler of firewhiskey on the table, but to my chagrin all of the kids behind me yell, "NO," in unison.

I flinch and laugh as Lupin snatches the tumbler before I can get to it and downs it in one go.

"Your drink of choice-," I turn back to Sirius, my smile cooling a little, "-appears to be slightly lethal to people like myself."

One of his eyebrows quirks up and he says, "Muggles, you mean?"

I stiffen, feeling suddenly defensive. Hermione clears her throat uncomfortably behind me.

Sirius sighs, and deflates a little. His arms are crossed at his chest. "Fin," he starts in a much softer tone, "Look, can we talk? Please?"

I almost comply from the tone of his voice alone. Him being sweet to me is my new kryptonite, and if he ever so chose to turn on the charm like he had earlier today, my panties would literally be on the floor. But through my tipsy, needy haze I consider what it is he would want to talk about. It will probably be any number of combinations of how a) I'm a muggle, b) How I'm going to end up dead or worse due to being a muggle, c) Why both (a) and (b) imply that I should not be accompanying Krum to a Death Eater Party in two days, or d) All of the above.

Before I've even completed my thought process I'm shaking my head vigorously in a negative. No bueno. No, thank you. No talking necessary.

I'm staring resolutely at the floor, away from the scary, sexy aura that encompasses Sirius Black, but I can hear his voice harden. "Finnie," he practically growls, "Just listen to what I have to say."

I continue to shake my head, my lavender mass of hair fluttering around me. I re-secure my already-secured purse and start to head towards the door, intending to skirt around him. "We're actually just leaving," I say firmly. Fred and George haven't moved with me for some reason, but Tonks has. She's rounding the table, stepping over Lupin who is now seated on the couch, following my cue.

Sirius takes a step directly into my prospective path, bringing him right into my personal bubble. His "let's just talk" reasonable and calm approach has completely burned off, leaving him shaking with a fury that had clearly been just below the surface this whole time.

"You will listen-," he thunders softly, "-because you wormed your way into our lives, and made us care about you. You owe us to listen to me."

This makes me stop. For one thing, he's in my damn way (and extremely close, and radiating heat, and still smelling so. Damn. Good. What. The. Fuck.). For another thing, his words are both slightly insulting – I didn't worm my way anywhere, I was fucking birdnapped – and really, really sweet.

I try to squelch down the anger I feel at him domineering over me like this. Normally, this would be extremely hot, but when it has to do with me being "lesser-than" for being a muggle, it's difficult not to feel completely insulted. "Sirius," I say in a calm voice, he stiffens just slightly for some reason, "I can appreciate that you've all welcomed me as you have, but I'm here to do a job-"

"I don't give a fuck what you promised to Dumbledore," he hisses. My eyes finally snap up to meet his silver ones. They're flashing with anger and some riotous emotion I can't identify, "None of us give a fuck what you had to promise him." Everyone else in the room is shifting uncomfortably. Harry has begun to approach us slowly from behind, and I'm getting the feeling like this was definitely the topic of choice at their dinner.

I feel my teeth grit. This would be so much fucking easier if they just knew about all of it. They'd know I'm not a fucking pushover, that I'm powerful in my own right. And they'd know that I have every fucking reason to be here, that by being here I'm essentially saving the people who matter the most to me.

Assuming Dumbledore isn't completely full of shit.

I wince in my head. I'm taking that chance. They are worth that chance.

"Finnie," Sirius continues, seeming exasperated with my lack of response, "You cannot go to this Death Eater meeting. You. Will. Die."

Modest Mouse's "Education" starts blasting through my speakers, the phone still shuffling songs.

Exhaling a frustrated gust of air out my nose, I try hitting him with a dose of reason. "Did it ever occur to you-," I know I sound clipped and irritated, "-that everyone in this fucking room is taking the same risk?" I look over my shoulder to give Harry a poignant look in particular. "I'm a fucking adult!" I announce to the room at large, "I get to decide what I think is worth risking my life." Everyone looks between Sirius and I with unreadable expressions. I catch Ron glancing sideways at Hermione with what appears to be an 'I-told-you-so' look.

"And you-," I turn back to Sirius with a healthy glare, "-don't have the right to tell me-," I punctuate each word with a stab to one of his cushy pectorals,"-that. I'm. wrong."

"What about Sam?" He suddenly bellows at me, his pissed-off face now holding a hint of desperation. My heart freezes mid-beat, and I feel like I've been punched in the gut. "Don't you fucking want to see him again? Or your mom? Why the fuck do I have to even say this to you?" He takes a step back from me in a mixture of exasperation and disgust.

I feel like I'm choking on spit and fury, but I know in reality it's tears. They're in the backs of my eyes, illustrating my grief and resentment. I sway on the spot, dumbfounded.

He can't possibly understand all that he just spat at me in his anger, but holy shit.

What. A. Douche.

I genuinely consider slapping him, but ultimately I'm worried that the black smoky devil living in my chest will burst out and take over if given the opportunity. Instead, I carefully recompose my face into a cool mask. "We're leaving now," I tell him coldly, "Don't wait up. I'll be interviewing alternative places to sleep tonight." Sirius looks like I've struck him. Serves him right.

I shoulder past his frozen form and stride purposefully into the hallway. As I near the foyer, and the exit, I hear the raised voices of Bill and Fleur.

"I think it would be a better idea if you came back to The Burrow tonight, you're clearly drunk," Bill's voice is more authoritative than I've ever heard it before.

"Zat eez ze point!" Fleur snaps back, clearly not having it, "I am 'aving fun weeth my friends, Bill."

To my surprise, Bill scoffs just slightly, "Darling, you barely know these women." Fleur's mouth snaps shut, and he adds unnecessarily, "I would hardly call them your friends."

I sweep into the room, aiming a glare at Bill. They've both stopped their conversation suddenly upon seeing me, and I notice that Fleur looks close to tears. I aim my trajectory so that as I pass them, still determined to exit, I scoop her up into the crook of my arm. "Don't wait up, Bill," I aim over my shoulder, Fleur stumbling to match my stride.

Next thing I know, the petite Frenchwoman and I are greeted with a blast of warm summer air, successfully out the front door. I don't necessarily hear Tonks, Fred, or George behind us just yet.

But, fuck it, they'll catch up.