Chapter 21) Illegal Incantations

Selected Listening: We Can Free Each Other- James Newton Howard

Anastasia and Albus didn't talk after Bathilda left. They ate in silence, and as Anastasia got up to leave for the dorm, she looked at the aging wizard, now staring forlornly at his untouched plate.

"When do you think would be a good time, grandad…?" she asked hesitantly.

Albus looked up at her with a stern gaze that told her the answer might be never, but he answered more softly, as if he were angrier with himself than her.

"Not…right now…let me think about it. I need to…prepare some things," he said wistfully.

A few weeks later, Minerva held her over class time to talk to her individually.

"Albus has asked me to begin the process with you again—"

"What process?" she asked, straightening her messenger strap across her shoulder.

"Of becoming an animagus…" Minerva paused when she saw Anastasia's hesitation, "…after what happened on winter break, he's more convinced than ever that you need a fast getaway."

"But does that mean I'll have to keep a leaf under my tongue for a whole month again?" Anastasia hefted her heavy bag onto the desk beside her.

Minerva unwrapped her fingers from a vial containing an illness potion, and another holding a new mandrake leaf. Anastasia groaned exasperatedly.

"I can't start right this second," she argued. "I need to tell someone first." She thought about Draco and how confused he was going to be, getting sick again.

"If you tell someone, they'll know you knew ahead of time—" Minerva warned, "—that you're not actually ill. Besides, who is someone?" she questioned.

Anastasia was quiet.

"No one…I'll take it later…" she said, snatched the vials, and ran off.

She found who she was looking for while walking to charms.

"Draco," she said, catching him by the hood and pulling him back slightly from his gang of Slytherin boys including Zabini and Pershore. "I need to talk to you."

"On a first name basis with Dumblebrat, are you Malfoy?" Pershore, the other blonde Slytherin, jabbed.

Draco pulled out of her grasp and kept walking, but she kept pace.

"And why would I do that?" he asked without making eye contact.

Blaise scoffed and rolled his eyes. Anastasia took that as an insult and glared back briefly.

"It's quick, I promise," she said, hurt, realizing she had too easily waltzed into a school of piranhas. There was a reason they never spoke to each other in public. She had gotten too excited and crossed the line.

"Why would I want to talk to a goody-two-shoes gryffindork like you?" he asked bitingly.

"Fine! I won't tell you. You ignorant twat!" Anastasia yelled and stormed away.

In the bathroom, she took the potion to make herself sick. No one wanted to hear her voice anyway.

Over the next few days, she received a series of glares from a nearly silent Draco. He still managed to make nasty comments about people through his now-raspy voice. Anastasia didn't feel bad about not talking to him again. The glimmer of warmth she felt from him after the Christmas break had been depleted.

At the same time, monumental feud between Harry, Ron, and Hermione lasted well into February. Anastasia, having never really taken a side, spent her time split between the two. Or, when neither party could stop talking about how annoying the other was, she spent her time looking over prank products with Fred and George in the fifth-year boy's room. They had started a new tradition this year, of taking apart all the prank products they had received, seeing how they worked, and attempting to put them back together. Of course, that was only helpful for the more mechanical side of things. It told them little of the incantation being used.

"How do you think they get the scream inside a screaming yoyo?" Fred asked, taking a part the two halves and showing them to Anastasia. She squinted, and then wrote on her parchment.

I think it's a shrieking charm.

George peeked over her writing.

"Or it's a shrunken flock of Cornish pixies," he remarked jokingly.

Instead of laughing, Anastasia shook her head and smiled, continuing to dig through their pile.

"So, what's got your tongue this time?" Fred asked. He sat on the floor next to her and his trunk, one knee pulled up to his chest.

"Been snogging Malfoy again?" George teased, standing by the bed. Anastasia felt her face turn red as she grabbed her quill and angrily wrote

NEVER EVER EVER. Then, she crumpled it up and threw it at George's head. He dodged with a smirk.

"Well, it's good to know you've got some of your sense back," Fred said. "Even so, it's odd Madam Pomfrey can't do anything about it."

Anastasia shrugged nonchalantly and busied herself with prying open a menacing manticula trap.

It was the last day of practice when Harry ran sprinting onto the field.

"I've got it, I've got it!" he held his firebolt high above his head. Anastasia congratulated him, relieved that now there was some chance of him forgiving Hermione. Practice went stunningly, and Anastasia found herself taking a backseat for once. At the speed her Nimbus 2000 went, she couldn't come close to catching him for a replacement maneuver. She was glad someone else had the spotlight for the moment, and prayed that on Saturday, they wouldn't need her interference.

The sun shone beautifully on the day of the game Anastasia stood on the sidelines, watching the brooms zoom past her head. She kept watch for dementors from the sky, but she could barely see past the glare. Things were going well for Gryffindor team, and she felt that she wouldn't be getting any play time that day, so she sat down on the bench and took a deep breath of fresh air, gazing over the field.

And then she saw the oddest thing. Two tall dementors walking out from the field…from the locker rooms no less. They came and stood at the end of the goal post. There was something not right about them. They were clunky, and awkward.

Anastasia had to do something. Unable to speak, she waved her hands at Madam Hooch but might have only seemed excited for the game. She couldn't run onto the field to stop the dementors, it would cause Gryffindor to forfeit without the proper maneuver, but the dementors would surely make Harry faint.

"Harry Potter makes a mad dash for the snitch!" Lee called. Anastasia gasped. Harry was headed right for the dementors. She had to do something. She ran forward.

"Expena patenunm," Anastasia said, wand held out, but with an unclear spell, no light exploded from her wand tip. Instead, a great stag charged forth from the sky. Harry managed to cast a patronus and catch the snitch at the same time.

But the dementors didn't flinch back or fly away at the sight of the patronus, instead they toppled over on the ground. And as the winning catch was announced, the cloth covering one dementor fell aside, revealing a pile of Slytherins, including Draco.

As people rushed onto the field to cheer for Harry, Anastasia made a mad dash for the dementor fakes. Unable to speak, she glared furiously. The teachers approached soon after.

Draco tried to run, but tangled up with his friends, he kept falling over.

Minerva began reading them the rite act and taking points. Snape shook his head and covered his eyes while his students fumbled and tripped.

Fred grabbed Anastasia's shoulder and drug her back into the cheering crowd.

"Come on Stasia, we've got a party tonight!" George yelled. She found a place in between the twins. The other Gryffindors gathered around as they lifted Harry into the air.

As soon as they reached the castle, the twins dragged her aside.

"Up for a heist?" George asked.

"We're going to sneak in Honeydukes the back way," Fred explained. "They have a whole storeroom. It's closed on quidditch days so the owner can see the game."

Soon, Anastasia barely remembered Draco and his stupidity, as she ran through the secret entrance to Honeydukes grabbed as much as their arms could hold (Anastasia forfeited her leftover Christmas galleons to avoid stealing), and they ran back, where they were greeted like heroes.

By the end of the night, Harry had forgiven Hermione, and Ron half-so. The entire Gryffindor house had been stuffed with sweets and butterbeer to the point of passing out on the couches. They woke up only briefly to see Minerva in her nightdress shouting at them to go to bed.

Anastasia drug herself into a seated position on the couch from where she had fallen asleep on Fred's shoulder. Then, bleary-eyed, she wandered up to bed with the others.

Later that night and earlier in the morning, a piercing scream work them again. Ron's piercing scream. The girls ran up to the third-year boys' room. Minerva appeared again.

"Sirius Black!" Ron yelled. "He was here! He tried to stab me!"

All Sunday, the castle sat in lockdown. Ron, though physically fine, stayed in the hospital wing for shock. Students were not allowed to wander the halls unaccompanied. They passed the day playing exploding snap and drinking bottomless hot chocolate. When dinner was delivered to the common rooms by the house elves, Minerva announced Sirius Black still hadn't been found and they were lifting the lockdown.

"And Anastasia, you should come with me. Professor Dumbledore would like to see you," she said.

Anastasia looked back at her friends once before following Minerva obediently out the portrait hole. She stared at Minerva questioningly.

"Your father doesn't want anything," Minerva replied, and then smiled. "It's a full moon, and it has been exactly one month since you put that Mandrake leaf under your tongue. We're going to make a potion!"

Over Minerva's dining table in her apartment behind the classroom, Anastasia spat the Mandrake leaf into the vial, holding it up in the moon's light.

"Yes!" she yelled in victory. She plucked a lose hair from her head and dropped it behind the leaf. Minerva went into her cabinet and returned to the table with a microscope slide carrying a single droplet of water:

"Dew that has not seen light or been touched by human feet in seven days…" she let this slip into the vial as well. Anastasia took a deep breath, and rested her elbow on the table, attempting to still her shaking hand.

"Alright, what's left?" she asked, the glass fluttering underneath her fingertips. Minerva went back to her cabinet, and with a pair of tweezers retrieved what looked like a clear candy wrapper twirled into an ellipse.

"The chrysalis of a death-head hawk's moth…extremely rare…I had to talk to some special acquaintances to obtain this one…"

Anastasia took a deep breath and nodded. Minerva lifted the chrysalis up to the mouth of the vial.

A series of shudders came spiraling through Anastasia's body. They started as shudders and then became seizes, and the seizes were set ablaze. The vial fell and broke on the stone floor. Anastasia fell from the stool and landed beside the mess. She screamed as hellish flames coursed through her.

"Anastasia!" Minerva knelt and shook the girls' shoulders. Realizing she could do nothing, the professor readjusted her, so the girl's head lay on her knees. Minerva took her hands.

Anastasia couldn't gather the words to speak. She shrieked in pain, sealed her eyes shut, and squeezed a death grip on the professor's fingers.

"Anastasia, please! What's wrong?"

Anastasia knew there could only be one reason she felt this way without having done anything dangerous herself. The pain began to subside.

"Draco…" she squeezed out faintly.

As she said it, she realized, she wasn't sure if Minerva knew anything about the lifeline or how it worked. They had never discussed it before.

Someone pounded on the classroom door.

"Minerva!" A low voice shouted. Snape. "Black if you're in there…I swear I'll kill you—"

Minerva held Anastasia around the shoulders.

"Good heavens, I can't answer him…he could find out about—"

"Bombardom!" the classroom door blasted away.

Anastasia whimpered again. Having no other choice, Minerva lowered Anastasia to the ground and ran to her apartment door.

"What could I possibly do for you right now, Severus?" she asked very casually. "And why are you barging into my classroom this Sunday night?"

"I heard you scream! Where's Black?" Snape asked. "Are you hiding him?

"Heavens no…we searched the entire castle already, haven't we—excuse me!"

The heavy tread of Snape's shoes on the floor echoed toward Anastasia, and Minerva's boots behind him. He stopped again in the classroom.

"Black, where are you?"

"Severus, this is ridiculous—"

"It isn't! You always favored him and his little band of—"

"Obviously that time is over, Severus…and I don't play favorites. I let you read in class, didn't I? Now would you please get out of my chamber—"

But it was too late, Snape had already reached the door of the apartment. Anastasia lay in the middle of the floor in the puddle of shattered glass, pushing herself into a seated position. The pain had mostly stopped, although she spasms still moved through her arms. She stared up at him, tears welling.

Snape lowered his wand and assessed the situation. Minerva pushed past and knelt to Anastasia again, taking her arm and pulling her up. She waved her arm and the broken glass vanished from off the ground and Anastasia's skin.

Snape stared at the spasming girl, and then Minerva. "What happened?" he asked sternly.

"I-I'm not sure…" Minerva said.

"Where's Draco?" Anastasia demanded.

"I'm sure he's in his common room—" Minerva began.

"I sent him home for the evening at his parent's request. Why?" Snape asked with a suspicious expression.

"Please, you need to floo him. I think he might be hurt. Please!" she urged. Taken aback by her display of emotion, Snape's eyes widened. Minerva made nervous eye contact with him.

"The Malfoys have a history of not picking up when it's situationally inconvenient for them. I cannot promise anything…what makes you think he's injured?"

Anastasia trembled. Minerva placed a reassuring hand on her shoulders.

"Good heavens, you're freezing. Let's make you some tea," Minerva sat her back down at the table. "Hot toddy, Severus?"

"I'll pass."

"You need to relax…Black's got you—"

"I need to have my wits about me!" Snape drove his fist into the wood as he sat down. "Now I don't have time for this! What do you know?"

Anastasia looked into Snape's cold dark eyes and pulled a tartan blanket Minerva placed on her shoulders close to her chin. The teapot hovered and poured into two mugs. Minerva's had an extra pour of a different liquid.

"Draco's parents are filing for divorce…they've been looking for ways for him to keep his family wards…I found a book on the topic, so I gave it to him hoping it would help…"

Minerva's forehead creased and she sipped at her drink steadily. Snape's eyebrows raised.

"They're divorcing? Suppose they wanted to keep this skeleton in the closet too…who knows what spell they tried. The only way to trick a family wards contract is to rip someone's genes apart and stick them back together some other way. They're incredibly dangerous."

Anastasia panicked. Surely, it wasn't her fault that she'd given them the book.

"Will he be alright? Please! Go call."

Snape stared at her discerningly.

"Miss Dumbledore, am I right to assume your state of disarray is somehow correlated with his, and that's how you know of his family situation?"

Anastasia didn't know how to answer without giving herself away.

"Come now, Severus," Minerva interrupted. "Are you insinuating my student has some sort of psychic connection with yours? That's ridiculous."

"Don't play coy, Minerva. I've seen it in class," Snape argued.

"It doesn't matter!" Anastasia strained. "Please!"

Minerva stared concernedly at Anastasia.

Snape made a disgruntled cough, "I'll call and send word momentarily." He stepped towards the door. Before leaving he stopped to pick up what looked like the paper of a rice candy off the ground.

"In case you've forgotten, Minerva, training minors to become animagi is illegal…the punishment for which is-at minimum-a hefty fine for the minor…not the teacher." He set it on the table. The chrysalis, still intact. "Plus…who knows how that would affect…other ailments." he said casually and left.

Minerva had frozen, staring after him.

"Do you think he knows?" Anastasia whispered before breaking down and crying into Minerva's shoulder. "Do you know? About the lifeline?"

Minerva brought her arms around the girl.

"Yes, I know…I didn't want it to be true…"

Anastasia continued her crying as she felt the pain in every nook of her body. She didn't want to care after he had been such a jerk, but she couldn't help it.

"It feels like my soul was torn out," she moaned miserably. "Minnie, what if he's dead?"

Minerva hugged her closer.

They received a brief note by parchment airplane approximately fifteen minutes later. Snape stated Draco was physically fine and had returned to the castle. No reply needed.

Although, inside, Anastasia's heart panged to see Draco, she knew she shouldn't say more about him in front of Minerva. The professor's haunted eyes looked out over pursed, judgmental lips as she walked Anastasia back to the common room.

Anastasia rose early the next day and took a place in the empty great hall. She could barely sleep the night prior. It was as if her insides had scabbed over. She pushed the bases of her palms into her eyes to soothe them.

She didn't know if Draco would appear, but soon enough he did along with Blaise. They took their spots at the Slytherin table. She looked up, made brief and concerned eye contact with Draco. He turned away from her and began to have a frantic whispering conversation with Blaise.

She wanted to say hello, but she was certain Blaise hated her, or maybe Draco hated talking to her in front of Blaise.

Anastasia looked back up again to see Blaise storming off with his biscuit. Anastasia stared down at the table.

If only Draco wasn't such a jerk, then… Then, what? She wasn't sure she knew the end of her thought or wanted to think it. She was embarrassed by how she acted the night prior in front of the professors. When she looked again, she saw that Draco had stood and was walking the long way around the table, eyes averted, but towards her.

As she was about to open her mouth to ask him what happened, the owls swooped in with the mail, dropping things at students' usual seats.

She spotted the familiar black owl with white spots. Obsidian carried a small scroll in his talons.

Anastasia looked up. Draco followed her gaze. The bird landed on Gryffindor table, and Obsidian stretched out his leg.

Not to Draco, but to Anastasia.

She unraveled the scroll and was greeted with the following message.

Dear Anastasia,

It is our pleasure to invite you to Easter lunch at Malfoy Manor on Sunday, April 11th. This is an annual occurrence, and there will be several family friends in attendance. Please send your RSVP via owl by March 31st, so we can add your place card.

Sincerely,

Narcissa

There were boxes to mark yes or no.

"What?" Draco asked, gauging her shocked expression. She turned the letter around so he could read it. He squinted and then frowned.

Obsidian pecked aggressively for the reply. Draco pulled a treat out of his pocket and fed it to the bird while Anastasia reread.

Unsure of what to do, Anastasia stared at the letter.

"Are you going?" she asked Draco. He flinched before answering.

"Of course…it's at my house…uphold the Malfoy reputation and all that…" he said, folding his arms. "Although I'm not sure what that means at this point."

Anastasia almost plucked up the courage to ask what happened the night before. But the rest of the students filed in. Draco shifted nervously. He stepped slowly, and then ran back to the Slytherin table. Anastasia rolled her eyes and took out her quill, marking the "yes" box.

Coward or not, he wasn't going back there alone.