Eva dropped the final ingredient into the cauldron and stirred it five times anticlockwise, sighing in relief as it turned into the cloudy grey that it was meant to. A ladle in addition to a glass appeared at the side of the cauldron as she did and she wasted no time in filling up the glass, knocking it back like one would a shot and wincing at the bitter taste. Time seemed to slow down as she waited for some sort of effect of the potion to take place, what felt like minutes was actually a second. After ten seconds of nothing Eva huffed in annoyance although she had no idea what was supposed to happen, she figured it was more than this. She took one step towards her glittery purple slimed robes and then promptly found herself on her knees clutching her stomach even though her head roared. A metal bucket appeared in front of her – just in time for her to grab and vomit into it. It wasn't the potion that had made a reappearance though, the liquid in the bucket seemed like it was made of liquid sunshine with rainbow rivers weaving through it. The bucket disappeared as quickly as it appeared, in its place a note was left.
Take the potion three times a week. You won't need the bucket next time.
Eva smiled taking the note as a sign that the potion had worked, not that surprised by the appearance of a note given all the things that had appeared during her seemingly short stay in this strangely wonderful room. Standing up from her crouching position on the floor she grabbed the spoiled robes and put them on over her not much better off shirt. At least they'd provide some warmth. The potion was now sitting in 10 beakers on the workbench, enough to last till the start of the next term. As she'd left her bag in the common room in her haste to escape the sniggers of her old friends, Eva decided to leave the potions here for the meantime and come back for them later.
Feeling like she didn't have any troubles outside those doors at the end of the room, Eva left her safe haven and was shocked to be greeted by sunlight streaming through one of the nearby windows. She ran to it, looking out at the sun she guessed that it was probably the middle of breakfast.
"Blast." Eva muttered to herself, rubbing the surprisingly small amount of tiredness from her face. "I'll just leave Apparition early to go get changed into something less stained." She reasoned with herself as she sprinted towards the end of the corridor, not quite stopping in time before she skid into a suit of armour. She stood up in record speed and tried to put the pieces back together before realising the head was missing. "Accio Helmet." She muttered with the flick of her wand, almost landing on her arse again when the helmet seemingly came flying out of the wall. Putting the final piece on the suit, Eva cautiously crept forward to the spot of wall that the helmet had come from. She put an arm out to feel the wall and gasped when it went straight through it. Stepping forward again, Eva stepped through the wall and found herself at the top of a staircase. Already late for breakfast, Eva decided to risk going down the column of stairs, hoping it would spit her out in front of the Great Hall.
She was almost correct. It took her to the top of the steps outside the Great Hall, so close enough. She started taking the stairs two at a time heading towards the din of students eating their breakfast, about halfway down she heard her name called out by a familiar voice.
"Eva!" She looked up to see Cole sprinting towards her, with Urquhart close behind him. She found herself engulfed in a hug from the two boys before she had even reached the bottom. "Where the bloody hell have you been?" Cole asked at the same time Urquhart questioned "What the hell happened to your robes?"
"Prank courtesy of James and Roxy." Eva muttered before stepping back from the hug, looking at Cole strangely. "In the Gryffindor Common Room." She lied. "Where else would I have been?"
Urquhart put a hand on her shoulder and looked at her seriously. "Eva you've been missing for six days."
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
Roxy stared at the food on the table, not even bothering to load it onto her plate. James was in a similar state, not able to bring himself to scoff down the delicious looking treats that lay on his plate.
"Maybe we went too far." Roxy whispered for the tenth time since they'd sat down. James just nodded in response. They had been riddled with guilt ever since the alarm was raised that Eva hadn't turned up for classes on the Thursday and that nobody in the castle had seen even a hair of her.
Scorpius was beside himself with worry, promising himself that if he ever saw his twin again that he would apologise profusely and never be mean or ignore her ever again. He was currently sat with his siblings and his parents at the end of the Slytherin table closest to the staff table. None of them were eating either. Hermione kept on tearing up as she thought of her eldest girl, her head turned into Draco's shoulder – who was not doing much better in keeping the tears at bay. Both Hermione and Draco had refused to leave the school until Eva had been found, leaving Nikki with Lucius and Narcissa as they searched. After the first day of searching to no avail, Harry and Ginny Potter had stormed into the Gryffindor Common Room – both with two different missions. Ginny with the intent to scold her eldest child and Harry with the goal to grab the Marauders Map from his son's undoubtedly messy (and possibly stinky) trunk. But she wasn't on the map and the Room of Requirement wasn't opening – most likely destroyed from the fiendfyre during the destruction of a Horcrux. Harry had left that afternoon, heading to the ministry to start an official investigation into the disappearance of Evangeline Malfoy. Ginny had stayed for the night before returning home to pick Lily up from the Burrow.
A voice cleared behind the Malfoys, causing the children to raise their heads and the parents to whip their heads around.
"Apparently you've been looking for me for nearly a week." Eva said by way of greeting her distraught family.
Hermione burst into tears and jumped up, nearly suffocating Eva with the strength of her hug. Draco quickly joined the hug followed by the two younger twins. Scorpius had quickly rounded the table however hovered in the background, unsure whether Eva was angry with him or not. After a couple minutes of family weeping Draco finally turned to the two boys who had been standing behind his daughter.
"Where did you find her?" He asked, his voice hoarse.
"We didn't," Urquhart supplied, "We only spotted her while she was on her way here."
"Eva, where were you?" Hermione asked, having listened to the conversation behind her.
Eva looked at her parents and felt this sense of unease when contemplating telling them about the room that appeared to her. "Nowhere out of the ordinary," Eva calmly, "I went for a walk Wednesday evening, finished it well after curfew, passed out on my bed and woke up late for breakfast." She motioned to the sparkles covering her uniform, "Hence why I'm still covered in this goop."
"But Darling that doesn't take into account all the days you've been missing." Hermione said softly.
"Not my fault." Eva shrugged, "That's what happened. I thought it was Thursday until I ran into Cole and Stephan." She supplied, finally adding an element of truth to her story.
"I'm guessing that that's the slime left over from James and Roxy's prank." Draco said in a disapproving tone, glancing at Scorpius out of the corner of his eyes knowing that the two Gryffindors had not been alone in the many pranks he and Hermione had recently heard about.
"Ten points to Slytherin." Eva responded by way of confirmation.
"It makes no sense though." Scorpius spoke for the first time that morning, "If you'd been in your bed the entire time, someone would have seen you. It was one of the first places everyone looked." He paused before continuing in an amused tone, "I know Harry is blind but he's not that blind."
Eva's eyes snapped to Scorpius, causing him to dropped the amused smirk and swallow guiltily. She cocked her head to the side and looked her twin up and down. Her eyes gave no emotion away, it was the blankest expression that Scorpius had ever seen her direct at him and it scared him. Even when she was furious at him or upset with him and was trying to mask her feelings, her eyes had always betrayed her true emotional state.
Scorpius gulped. This did not bode well for him. "I'm so s-" Scorpius started to apologise but was interrupted by his Gryffindor partners in crime, Eva's head whipping around away from Scorpius, as they sprinted over towards them.
Neither Gryffindor had noticed Eva walk in nor had they glanced up at the commotion caused by the group hug, both of their eyes downcast with shame. Roxy had however looked up however when she had been hit by what felt like a sudden furiously cold wave, causing her to shiver violently. It was then that she'd noticed Eva standing with her parents, one of Hermione's arms still wrapped around her. Poking her cousin in the side, both of them had jumped up at record speed to see her.
"Eva!" James shouted again in relief. Both of them had their arms wide open in preparation for a big hug. Eva however slashed her wand down quickly and a blue wall formed between them, causing them to crash into it and land on their arses just in front of her.
"Potter, Weasley." She greeted cooly as she looked down on them.
They quickly got back to their feet, eyes flickering with hurt at the blue shimmer still in front of them. "We're sorry." Roxy started.
"So so so fu- flippin' sorry, Eva." James added, eyes flickering to Hermione at his near slip up.
"We took it too far, way too far." Roxy continued. "We were hurt that you didn't tell us, that you didn't tell me. Hurt that you were leaving us and to be a little honest I was a little jealous that you were speeding ahead and leaving me in the dust."
James nodded, "But that's no excuse for us to have been taking everything out on you instead of talking things through. We were so worried when you disappeared and we're so unimaginably sorry that it took that to happen for us to stop, we shouldn't have started in the first place. We definitely won't be doing it to you again." James finished, with Roxy nodding in agreement.
Eva continued to look at them blankly, as she had been throughout their apology. "Good for you." Was all she said before she turned back to her parents. Draco was looking unimpressed at the two behind her. "I'm sorry for making you worry." Giving her mother another hug.
"But-" James started but Draco, Cole and Stephen all shot him a chilling glare, shutting him up quickly.
"We're just glad that you're here now." Hermione cupped Eva's face in her hands. "We love you so much, Eva. Even if you feel like everyone is against you, your father and I will always be here for you - even if it's your siblings who are being right gits." She pressed a kiss to Eva's forehead before grasping her hands. "I should probably let Harry and Ginny know that you're alright. I'll see you at Christmas, darling." Giving Eva's hands a squeeze, she walked passed James and Roxy towards the exit without even sparing them a glance. The two of them sighed before walking back to their table.
Draco took his daughter into his arms for a few moments before bending to look at her closely. "When did you start occluding?" He asked her quietly.
"I don't know what you mean." Eva replied, her brows drawn in in confusion.
Draco sighed and pulled her into another hug. "You don't have to hide from us Eva. We love you so so much." He murmured into her hair before leaning down to whisper in her ear. "Give them hell."
Eva grinned up at him, the first expression showing any emotion he'd seen from her that morning. Draco let her go, patting the others on the head before walking out of the Great Hall all the while glaring at the Gryffindor table.
Eva turned to Cole and Stephen, and threw her arms around them to steer them towards the middle of the table, "So apparently I haven't eaten in a week."
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
I know! Sorry sorry I'm so late... several years late. If you couldn't tell, I tend to write when I'm depressed (this story especially). I'd been put on antidepressants a couple of years ago which seemed to help but also meant I didn't really feel a need to write.
I actually wrote this chapter like a year ago when I was having a wobble but wanted to write a couple of the following chapters too before I posted this one so I could be semi regular... that didn't happen but I finally gave in and posted regardless.
I'm gonna try to write the next couple chapters without wobbling! Even if its years (hopefully it wont be anymore) I will always finish the story so y'all know what happens
