"Scorpius, will you please say something?" Atria pleaded. He hadn't spoken to her or looked at her. "I get that you're mad, but can we talk about this?" She struggled to keep up with his quick pace.

"Scorpius…" She groaned and he suddenly spun around, almost knocking her over.

"You don't get it! Maybe if you had told us, Rose wouldn't be in this situation right now." He seethed. "I don't care who your family is, I'm certainly not one to judge, but you lied and you lied. And now, Rose is trapped in a house that you describe as a 'death trap'."

"Rose is my friend too! I never thought this would happen!" Atria snapped back. It wasn't as if she planned for this to happen. Several people in the hall looked at them.

"You didn't think of anything apparently!" Scorpius shook his head. "You were only concerned with keeping your secret, you never thought about how this would affect us."

Atria exhaled, her temper deflating slightly. "I was afraid."

Scorpius looked so disappointed in her. "Did you really think we would judge you?"

"It wasn't about being judged. Even if you were completely fine with it, there would still be the association and I didn't want that. I didn't want any connection with my family."

"Because of your selfishness, Rose is gone."

Atria inhaled sharply. "This is not my fault!"

"If you don't feel guilty, then you don't love her like I do!" Scorpius shouted.

Atria huffed, "Of course I love you, you git! I do feel guilty! Do you think I don't wake up in the middle of the night seeing all the faces of people my family has killed?" Atria yelled. "Because I do! It haunts me and I wish that I could change it but I can't. Don't pretend that you know what I'm going through, because you don't! My mother murdered my father and you have no idea what she made me do!" Atria yanked up her sleeve revealing her Dark Mark.

"Has that always been there?"

"I kept it hidden!" Atria seethed, not bothering to wipe away her tears. "It hurts like hell having it forced on you! I was eleven and I didn't want it." Atria breathed heavily, halfway to hyperventilating.

"I don't think you're a bad person. I wish you had told us."

"I didn't want to talk about it, I didn't want to think about it. Do you know what's going to happen to me?" Atria demanded and Scorpius sputtered. "I'm probably going to be sent to Azkaban. And I knew that would happen, so I wasn't just going to share it with the world!"

"You're not going to Azkaban." Scorpius said. "Harry won't let that happen."

"He won't have a choice. But I suspect you're right."

Scorpius said nothing and then frowned. "What do you mean?" He asked suspiciously.

"My mother became obsessed with her cause. She wanted me to be an amazing witch. I'm scared of what she'll do when she finds out I'm with the good guys now."

"Atria, you can't be serious-"

"You don't know what she's like. She used the cruciatus curse on me once because I couldn't do a spell. She said it was 'for motivation'."

"How could she do that? You were a child!"

Atria smirked, "Killing really does change a person. Look, I'm sorry that I lied to you. But if you think I don't understand the severity of the situation, you're dead wrong. I understand better than anyone."

"You don't think your mum would kill Rose?"

"I think she's going to try and kill me. There's been a part of me that doesn't want to believe my mother is evil, but I can't ignore it anymore. Just promise me something? Promise me… that you'll tell Rose how sorry I am." Atria choked on her last breath.

Scorpius shook his head. "Tell her yourself."

"Scor, please. I need you to do this for me."

"You're not going to die."

"Then I'll be in prison."

Scorpius's eyes flared, "We're not going to let that happen." He said vigorously. Atria choked out a laugh, tears clogging in her throat.

She sniffed, "A minute ago you were yelling at me."

"Just because I don't like you right now, doesn't mean I won't always love you." Scorpius pulled her into a hug and Atria didn't realize until that very moment how much she needed this. She just needed to feel someone's arms wrapped around her, holding her like they were never going to let go. She only wished it was Albus. "He'll come around." Scorpius said into Atria's blue hair.

Atria pulled back with a sad smile. He always knew what she was thinking. "Maybe. He's… he didn't seem upset. More like… disappointed and that was ten times worse. It was as if I could see myself falling apart in his eyes. He thinks of me differently."

"It's a lot to take in." Scorpius gripped her shoulders. "But he will come around. And you need to be here when he does. Does he know that you're leaving and not planning on coming home?"

"He said he needed time," Atria looked off at nothing.

"He doesn't have time according to you."

"Stop making me seem like a martyr." Atria snapped.

Scorpius glared at her. "Then stop trying desperately to end your future. Promise me that you'll try and come home."

"Scor-"

"Promise me." He demanded.

"I'm about to see my mother for the first time in years. She's probably going to hate me, everyone else hates me too, and I'm not sure if I can deal with all this." Atria admittedly weakly.

"Your family loves you."

"Which family?" Atria retorted.

"All of us."

Scorpius and Atria looked at Draco Malfoy in surprise. Astoria was standing next to him, clutching her hands together.

"We're family too." Astoria agreed with her husband. "Harry Potter still cares about you. So do your friends."

Suddenly, Atria was feeling to vulnerable for her comfort. She cleared her throat and racked her brain for a subject change.

"When are we leaving?"

Draco frowned at her obvious attempt to draw attention away from herself. "At twelve o'clock." Atria nodded.

"Is it that late?" Scorpius sounded surprised.

"The attack happened around one in the morning. It's now about nine o'clock." Draco looked at his watch.

Scorpius immediately went back to attack mode. "Why aren't we leaving sooner? Three hours is too long, who knows what could happen by the time we arrive-"

"Scorpius," Atria cut him off. "There's still so much we need to plan."

"Like what? A portkey is being arranged to take us to the area around your house-"

"It's so much more complicated than that." Atria shook her head.

Draco frowned. "What do you mean?"

"There's a barrier that we have to cross. We're going to land just outside of that barrier. Once we cross the barrier, then we have to get through the gate and that's the tricky part. I'm going to open the gate, but we have to get everybody through without any casualties."

"Casualties from going through the gate?" Astoria repeated nervously.

"Castel Lestrange is like an evil version of Hogwarts. The house is alive and ever changing. If it senses danger, it will attack."

"And you lived here?" Scorpius raised his eyebrows.

"Not permanently. We lived there for three years until my father died. After that we only went back once, when I was thirteen. I got used to it." Atria shrugged. She even remembered being happy living in Castel Lestrange with her parents. They were lightly involved with some pureblood activists, but a majority of their time was spent together, as a family. But in the last year, her father moved forward with his plans to bring back pureblood superiority.

The ironic thing that neither her mother or her father knew, was that technically Isis and Atria weren't purebloods. Tom Riddle had been a half blood. Of course, that was hardly a defense.

No, I'm not a pureblood, you see, my grandfather, Voldemort, wasn't technically a pureblood, he was just a power hungry mass murdered.

"And we're not even sure Rose is here?"

"I can't imagine where else my mother would take her. Of course, it's been four years since I've been on the inside, but still…" Atria was convinced that Rose was at Castel Lestrange. There wasn't much logic behind her thinking, because her mother could have easily move on, but something told Atria that's where Rose was. Or maybe that was just hopeful thinking. She wanted it to be that easy.

"You both should get something to eat." Draco said.

Scorpius ran a hand through his hair. "This is not how I imagined spending Christmas morning. Hospital food instead of roasted duck."

Atria made a face. "Duck?"

"That's what was on the menu for tonight."

"Suddenly I'm hungry for hospital food." Atria muttered and Scorpius laughed and then let out a pained groan. He rubbed his chest slowly.

"Come on, you need to sit down."

Once at the cafeteria, Atria and Scorpius sat down at a table in the back. It hadn't escaped Atria that, even though Harry had taken the cuffs off of her, there were two Aurors following her around. They were currently observing her from the other side of the cafeteria.

"Atria… Atria!"

She jerked away from the platinum blonde prat shouting her name.

"Merlin, what?" She snapped.

"I called your name four times before you answered." He said.

"Did you need something?" She glared at him.

"Why didn't you and Al tell us that you are together?"

Atria looked at him dryly. "Seriously? That's what you care about right now?"

"You're planning on abandoning him, forcing him to live a life of regret wondering what could have been if only you hadn't been scared of the future." Scorpius retorted and Atria punched his arm. "Hey, I'm injured!"

She rolled her eyes. "I'm not scared."

"So you're not using this mission as an excuse to hide from Albus's reaction to your little secret?"

Atria's eye twitched. "No."

"I just want to make sure I have all my facts straight."

She shot him a deadly look. All things considered it probably wasn't the best plan to go around looking like she wanted to kill someone.

"I mean, I understand why you couldn't tell his parents, but why did you hide it from us?" Despite Scorpius's cocky tone, he looked a bit hurt.

"Because we thought you guys would find it weird. And after so much time hating each other, it was weird for us as well. We just wanted to figure things out."

"And you were scared."

"Not really."

"You weren't scared of admitting you were wrong about him?"

"He was wrong about me too!" Atria snapped defensively. It wasn't as if Al had been a ray of sunshine to her.

"Yes, but Albus admits his mistakes. You have issues apologizing."

"I've apologized like… three times in the last twelve hours alone."

"If you think about it, that's not nearly enough."

"I don't want to talk about my relationship with Albus."

Scorpius was silent. Atria inhaled a breath of relief- "Are you going to tell him you're leaving?" Atria exhaled in frustration.

"He said needs time. He doesn't want to see me now."

"His feelings might change if he knew-"

"Scorpius," Atria growled and he pulled back, looking slightly afraid. "Do you not understand that I'm trying not to think about it? Do you think it doesn't kill me that these next few hours might be my last free ones or my last period? I can't," Her voice cracked, "I can't think about Albus right now. I needed to come forward to save Rose, but if I start thinking about all the things I'm losing… I won't be able to get through this. So please, just shut up and sit quietly." She hissed, the back of her throat burning.

Scorpius looked down at his hands folded on the table. "I want you to know that we're going to fight for you."

Atria's vision got blurry and she quickly used to hair as a blue shield. "Well… thank you. These last few years… they have been a real pleasure."

"I have to tell you something." Scorpius blurted and then he turned pink.

Atria raised her eyebrows. "You have a secret too?"

"A big one."

"Sweetheart, I just told the world that I am granddaughter of Bellatrix Lestrange and that my mother is the one who has been orchestrating the most recent Death Eater attacks. I don't think you can top that." Atria chuckled.

"I'm in love with Rose."

Atria's hand froze on the way up to brushing a piece of hair out of her face.

"I stand corrected."

Scorpius looked at her nervously. "What?" He stuttered.

"You have managed to top my secret!" Atria's eyes were wide and her mouth was open. "When the bloody hell did this happen? Merlin, this explains so much! All the hours spent on 'Head Duties', you panicking and-" Atria simply shook her head. "So this is what you two have been doing in your Head dormitories…"

"Atria."

"What?" She giggled.

"Rose, doesn't… actually… know." He cringed. Atria stopped doing a happy dance.

She stared Scorpius in the eyes. "What you mean 'she doesn't know'?" Atria hissed.

"I never said anything!" Scorpius whispered harshly.

Atria palmed her forehead. "Well, now we absolutely have to get her back! And then you can confess your feelings and get married…" Atria's heart dipped. Scorpius and Rose would get their happy ending, but would she and Al?

"Attie, Rose probably doesn't even feel the same way. You know Rose… she's so focused on her studies, she doesn't even notice me."

Atria scoffed, "She notices you."

"As a friend."

Atria pressed her lips together. True, Rose had never shown an inclination of romantic feelings for Scor, but that didn't mean they weren't there.

"You have to tell her how you feel." Atria urged.

Scorpius looked extremely pained and in a cracked voice said, "All I can think about is how I might have missed my chance. If she's gone… she'll have died never knowing how I felt about her."

"That's not going to happen." Atria said in a deadly voice. "If my mother has hurt Rose…"

"Atria…"

"No! I don't care if she's my mother. She hasn't been here for me. Even when we were together she wasn't there for me. She was cruel and… I hope she dies!" Scorpius gasped. Atria knew it was harsh, but thinking of everything her mother had put her through and everything her mum had done since escaping Azkaban.

The only way this was going to end was with her mother in hell. And if Atria had to drag her down… that was fine with her.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Amanda went back to James's room after the Auror meeting began. They were going to discuss how they would get into Castel Lestrange… Atria's house.

When Amanda had gone with Scorpius to find Atria, she wasn't sure how she would feel about seeing her friend. But then she had seen that horrible Alvarez, and even Scorpius, attacking Atria and her instincts kicked in. Atria was the buy guy in this situation.

In fact, she had probably just saved Rose's life by coming forward, even though the consequences would be bad. It was clear that Alvarez wanted to pin some blame on Atria, if nothing else because they Ministry would need someone to blame for their failure to stop the Death Eaters. Atria was an obvious target, but they didn't actually have anything on her.

Amanda was confident that Harry wouldn't let Atria be locked up. She certainly wouldn't be sent to Azkaban for simply having a crappy family.

James was back in bed, with his leg propped up under a pillow. He perked up when he saw her. "How did it go?"

"Well, Atria thinks Rose is in her family home. The Aurors are preparing a mission that will be leaving soon. And before you ask, no, you can't go."

James folded his arms. "Why not?"

"You can barely walk."

"And Scorpius?"

"Is apparently well enough to go. And there is nothing anyone could do to stop him."

James huffed, "That's hardly fair!" He cried indignantly. Amanda slumped into a chair, not having the strength to stand and listen to his rant. "I'm her cousin and Atria is practically my little sister! Are you going?"

"No. And it's not just about whether or not you can walk. Atria said it was extremely dangerous for non-purebloods."

"What is?"

"Her house. I supposed it's been spelled to keep certain people out. It really doesn't sound like a pleasant place."

"And we're just supposed to sit here?"

"Yes. We'll be waiting for them when they get back." Amanda closed her eyes.

"You mean if they get back."

She opened her eyes to glare at him. "No, when they get back, we'll be here." She said forcefully. "Sometimes you have to know when to let someone else take charge. I trust that Atria knows what's best."

James didn't say anything for a while.

Just when Amanda was about to fall completely asleep James whispered, "Get in bed with me. You looked exhausted." She didn't even bother to open her eyes.

"I was just about to fall asleep." She mumbled.

"Just come here, it'll be easier to fall asleep."

Amanda was about to kill him. Her mind had been completely at peace, or at least tired enough to convince itself of that, but James just had to keep talking. "Sleeping next to you will not make it easier."

"A bed is more comfortable than a chair."

"James," Amanda snapped. "Why can't you just be quiet for two seconds?" She hissed and sat up straight. James stared at her with wide eyes as she stood up. "I should go anyways. My parents will be worried about me."

"You're leaving?" James said incredulously.

Amanda marched towards the door. "Yes, I'll be back in a few hours, but right now I just need to change and get a few bloody hours of sleep without you hassling me!" She slammed the door on the way out.

With the harsh sound, Amanda's anger deflated a bit. They were all strung tight and she felt guilty about snapping at James like that. Still, she was in no mood to deal with his constant antics and jokes.

So far within the last twelve hours, she had met Jack's parents, danced to horribly stuffy music in uncomfortable high heels, nearly been killed, watched her friends nearly get killed, learned that Rose is missing and Atria's mum is responsible for everything horrible that's happened in the last year, and… she was still wearing her bloody, ripped dress from the ball.

Merry Christmas.