AN: I know, I know I am literally the most terrible updater ever I am very sorry, pls forgive me.

Chapter Twenty-Three
Of Returning and Unwanted Touches

29 years ago

Jozlyn Daviau had always been close with her sister. She'd expected that Celina would have replied to her letter by now, but she'd been planning on visiting her parents' home soon anyway, so it wasn't that much of a problem to find out for herself.

"Mum, Dad; I'm home!" She called as she let herself in, clutching a small overnight bag.

"What are you doing here?" Came her mother's voice from the kitchen. Jozlyn frowned at the slight edge of hostility in her voice.

"Thought I'd surprise you. I already ate so don't worry about tea. Is Cee-Cee home?"

"Celina doesn't live here anymore." Eugene spat. Jozlyn whirled to face him, shock coating her features. Her father looked as if he had aged years in the last two months; using a stick to support his weight but his back was as straight and proud as ever. Jozlyn had taken more after her mother; not possessing the proud streak that had caused Eugene and Celina to butt heads on more than one occasion. Unlike her mother however, Jozlyn was not very pretty, but she was more intelligent. Jozlyn had always been the only one Celina told all her secrets to; she was too scornful of their mother for her slightly ditzy nature and almost always angry at their father.

"What?!"

"She ran off with that Blackwood boy."

"Luca?"

"You knew about him?" Bernadette's betrayed voice came out of the kitchen before she did. Her mother's eyes were red and puffy suggesting it was mainly Eugene who was not ready to forgive Celina. Jozlyn sighed internally. She loved her sister to pieces, but it was always drama with her.

"I've never met him. But I knew they were together."

"More than we did then." Bernadette sniffed.

"He turned up and proposed to her without asking my permission-"

"She's engaged?!" Jozlyn squealed, happiness temporarily taking over the unease.

"Married. Or so his father informed me." Jozlyn faltered.

"She didn't invite us to the wedding?"

"Because your father told her she had to choose between the two of us!" Bernadette finally exploded. Eugene looked at her sharply. "I don't know what came over me but I couldn't stop him and now we'll never see her again!" She wailed.

"Mum I think you're being a bit dramatic-"

"No she's not." Eugene said, finality in his tone.

"What?"

"She's a Blackwood now." Bernadette flinched, as if he'd reminded her of something. "There's no getting her back."

"Are you actually fucking with me right now?"

"Jozlyn!" Her mother scolded.

"You're disowning Celina because she fell in love with a bloke who, by the sounds of it, is nothing like his father?"

"It doesn't matter about Luca. Roland wants her to stay with them." Eugene said.

"You're not even going to try and get her back? Talk to her? What is wrong with you?! She's your daughter!" Eugene stared hard into Bernadette's eyes as he answered his eldest child's question, making her listen.

"No she isn't." Bernadette gasped, a sob working its way up her throat, tears building up in her eyes. Jozlyn felt like she'd been punched in the stomach.

"You're insane." She spat. She hadn't even put her bag down. "Fucking crazy. I'm going to find her. Make sure she's ok. Send me a letter when you've come to your fucking senses." She whirled out of the house again, but her thoughts were the real tornado. Her sister had been given an impossible choice, and she'd only chosen Luca because he hadn't been the one who made her choose. She had some words for her sister when she found her, namely why the hell she hadn't been invited to her wedding, but she was going to find her. They were family. It didn't matter how long it took.

Lydjah walked into the Great Hall for breakfast stifling a yawn as she gazed blearily down the Ravenclaw table. She followed her gaze to her usual space only to find someone else sitting there.

"Hey Lyd-Jah." Jayna grinned. Lydjah blinked rapidly a few times and studied her best friend. It hadn't been long enough for there to be an extreme change in Jayna… And yet. She hadn't put back on the weight she'd lost, or completely lost the smudged purple shadows under her eyes but there was more life in her eyes than there had been in ages. She didn't look quite so haunted anymore; still scared, but open to the idea that she had more freedom than her grandfather's cage of terror had initially allowed her. If Lydjah didn't hate therapists with a passion to rival an exploding supernova she might have asked for her details.

Lydjah wasn't a hugging person, but she grabbed Jayna's hand and held onto it tightly. "It helped?"

"Yes." And really, that was all that needed to be said.

"Blackwood? Shit Sam; Blackwood's back! Where did you go? How was it? Do you feel better? I was going to plan something for your welcome back party goddamn it Blackwood." Unless you were James Potter apparently.

James and Sam had sped straight over to the two of them. Sam was watching James prattle with some amusement as she cast an assessing look at Jayna much like Lydjah's. What she saw was enough to bring a smile to her face as Jayna attempted to answer James' flurry of questions.

"You ignored all my letters." James said finally, pouting. Jayna shrugged, apologetic. "Well whatever. I'm sure you're more worried about your schoolwork."

"I'll catch up over the weekend." Jayna confirmed.

"Jayna!" Jayna looked over her shoulder to see Isla Odell waving from the Gryffindor table. "Are you alright now? Your fit scared the hell out of me. I'm glad to see you're back! Our Magical Theory class has been very grim with only three and a half of us." Jayna looked at Lydjah who merely raised her eyebrows, indicating that yes, she had not attended all of her lessons and no, she didn't care.

"Thanks." Jayna called back, smiling.

"Hey." Scorpius had made it over with the other second-years. His quick glance over his friend was much subtler than anyone else's, and the only sign that he was relieved was the loosening of his tensed shoulders.

"Jayna?" Lien got the Ravenclaw's attention perhaps because her voice sounded so small and unsure.

"Yeah?" Jayna asked, giving a small smile to the younger girl. Lien pulled out a wrapped rectangular-shaped present. Jayna quirked a look of bemusement but Lien only gestured to the present. Jayna opened it with careful hands, unsurprised to find a book; Throne of Glass.

"I think you should read this." There was a quiet edge behind Lien's words, as if she knew how little Jayna had thought about books since the fits had started. Jayna, ignoring Sam's snort of disbelief, raised the book to her nose and breathed in the scent of new pages. The smell soothed her in a way she hadn't realised she'd missed.

"Thank you."

Flying is just falling with style

"I'm ready. Promise." Jayna smiled, cutting across all of her friends' concern over going back to the Trials. "Can't be scarier than up here." She said, pointing to her head. Lydjah snorted.

Eventually even James stopped fretting, and the eight of them wandered into the Secret room. Only half of them had their wands out.

The door swung shut and they were plunged into pitch black. Jayna opened her mouth to suggest Lumos and then the floor dropped out from under their feet.

A terrified scream was ripped from most of their mouths as they plummeted through the darkness.

"Aresto Momentum!" Sam yelled wildly, and the eight of them jerked as they suddenly hung, suspended magically in the air. "I can't hold this for long!" Sam said, strained.

"Spongify!" Lien reacted, pointing her wand down to the depths below them. Sam's spell failed, and they fell again, too filled with adrenaline to do much more than squeeze their eyes shut as they hit the ground-

And bounced, once, twice, and then came to a standstill. Jayna and Lydjah dug their fingers into the floor beneath them, trying to reign in their panicked breaths.

"Is everyone alright?" James croaked, his throat raw from yelling. A resounding chorus of uncertain 'yeah's answered him, and he recognised everyone's voices in the melee. Sam staggered up on shaky legs to stumble to the wall where the door should be. She found the doorknob after several heart-stopping moments and threw it open, spilling light into the room. The others were quick to crawl over to her across the still bouncy floor, but as soon as they were out lay down again, willing their heart rate to decrease to the point where they didn't feel like vomiting their terror.

"Guess the Guardian got bored of the easy trials." Albus said eventually, and the others began to giggle, only semi-hysterically.

Jayna watched with interest as Emma Lacey, the Head Girl, made her way up to the podium at the front of the Great Hall.

"Before you begin eating, I believe the Head Girl would like to speak with you all." Professor Vector said, turning the hall quiet by her third word, despite not raising her voice beyond usual conversation level. Her presence just commanded attention.

Emma made her way up, the only sign of her nervousness in how she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear before speaking. "Good evening. I promise this won't take long. I'm here to tell you about a new idea the Prefects and I are implementing into the curriculum." She took a calming breath. "Those of you who are in my year group may remember how, in our first year, a second-year Ravenclaw took their own life because of the pressure and lack of support they felt about coming out as non-binary. Their name was Kylac Renyolds, and they were wonderful. I miss them.

"I know the Wizarding community is small, and that most of you will never struggle with your gender identity. However, I do not think that is an excuse to let the small population of people who do identify as a gender different to one they were born with, live in a culture that is woefully undereducated about these issues. The Wizarding world may wish to keep up with their old ways, and that's fine when it's lighting and architecture, but when it starts to endanger people's lives it clearly becomes something we need to change.

"Though I personally am inspired by Kylac, I know there are many people out there struggling with sexual or romantic orientations as well as gender identity, and many wizarding folk, especially those who have no contact with the Muggle world, may not even know that what they're feeling is normal. On top of the fact that the Wizarding world has so far failed in giving any kind of sex education," she was smiling slightly now, "I don't know if Purebloods have some sort of right of passage where the parents sit them down on their seventeeth birthday and have the talk with them, but I do know it would be a whole lot easier if everyone was educated equally, so that everyone remains safe when they're having fun." A few wolf-whistles were let out among the laughter, the loudest from Emma's boyfriend, Killian. "Anyway, in light of all this, the next week of classes will be off-timetable, non-uniform but still mandatory classes that focus of the issues I've spoken about. Tomorrow at breakfast you will be given your timetables for the next week. I aim for it to be a bit of fun, as well as educational, and we would all really appreciate it if you would try and participate as much as possible. Thank you for listening, you're all very welcome to tuck into your meals now." The students clapped politely as she made her way down, already beginning excited conversations as they helped themselves to the food that had recently appeared.

"No homework for a week!" James sang, throwing his arms around Jayna and Lydjah as they walked out of the Great Hall, burrowing his way into the middle of them, Sam sauntering after him. Jayna jumped in surprise, swatting at his arm, but stopped as soon as she saw the look on Lydjah's face.

"Get off." She hissed, glaring at James' offending arm slung round her friend's shoulders. James took his arm away with raised eyebrows.

"Lyds?" Jayna asked gently. Lydjah blinked rapidly.

"I'm fine."

"Did you have a vision? Oooooh what was it?" James asked, practically bouncing. Lydjah shook her head.

"I just don't like people touching my neck." She said with a smile, but there was an edge to her voice that wasn't usually present.

"Like this?" Sam said, her voice teasing as she reached to latch her hand on Lydjah's neck.

"Petrificus Totalus!" Sam was face first on the floor before any of them could do much more than blink at Jayna's spell.

"What the fuck Blackwood?!" James screeched, casting the counter-curse on his best friend as soon as he'd finished.

"Sam I'm sorry for jinxing you but Lydjah said no." Jayna said firmly, ignoring him. Lydjah rested a gentle hand on Jayna's arm. Sam got to her feet warily but her eyes were spitting fire.

"It was a bit of fun, Merlin." She pointed out angrily. "Who the fuck just has uncomfortable areas?"

"Me for one." Jayna snarled back. "I hate people touching my hair without permission."

"Afraid someone's going to mess up your perfect hairdo?" Sam snorted.

Wand at her throat and hands in her hair yanking her head back, pinching her nose until she was forced to open her mouth, the potion choking its way down her throat and then-

"Afraid I'll have another flashback memory like the last one where someone yanked my hair back and forced me to drink some kind of mind-control potion and maybe in that memory he'll make me do something a whole lot worse than burn scorch marks into my skin." Sam flinched back and paled. Lydjah cast a sharp look at her friend.

"But- But that's different Blackwood, you know, you've been through… Stuff." James said weakly, mussing up his own hair self-consciously.

"We've all been through stuff James." Lydjah said tiredly. James looked at her, clearly expecting an explanation but Lydjah didn't give him one. "Are you alright Sam?"

"Grand." Sam said sarcastically, gesturing to her head where a small lump was forming. Jayna winced but Sam shrugged it off with a roll of her eyes.

"Next time you jinx me Jayna I'll give you a black eye." She promised.

"Fair enough." Jayna said eventually.